“Yes, Betty,” the Agent said. “I got your letter, but I didn’t know you were on the island till I saw you just now. Why are you here?”
BETTY DALE tapped her brief case with slim fingers. “These squatters,” she said, “have been treated miserably. I’m collecting facts for a feature article in next Sunday’s Herald. I can’t understand why the city, yelling about relief to the poor, should hound these people who are hurting no one. The editor of the Herald feels just the same. My article will burn the mayor and his friends up. It ought to arouse public opinion. I had to come at night so the police wouldn’t see me. Steve, over there, a chap who built one of those shacks, brought me out in his boat. I’m just leaving.”
Agent “X” listened to the simple explanation of why she had come voluntarily into the shadow of destruction. It was one of those strange, ironic twists of Fate which no one could anticipate. He spoke quickly, laying his hand on her arm.
“I see, Betty, but you won’t need those notes. The city will understand soon why those poor devils were ordered away. The island is going to be blown up!”
Betty Dale started, paled, and stood very still. Her voice, sounded faint. “Blown up — why? I thought—”
“It’s part of a criminal plot, Betty. Part of the thing you spoke of in your letter. I won’t explain it all now, but the mayor himself is a victim of it. His hand was forced.”
“When — when will this happen?” Betty asked.
“At midnight!”
“Midnight — that’s only a half hour off!”
“Exactly. And that’s why we must hurry.”
Betty came closer, spoke quickly. “There’s a young fellow in that shack back there — a friend of Steve’s. He refuses to leave. I got most of my notes from him. He’s told me how hard things have been. We must warn him, too!”
The Agent nodded. “Wait here a minute, Betty. Steve has a boat, you say. I’ll get him to take his friend off at once. Then you can come with me. We’ll stand off the island, and watch for the explosion together.”
Agent “X” swiftly approached Steve. The tattered young squatter peered at him sharply.
“Say, are you a friend of Miss Dale’s? I didn’t know she knew any mugs over in this dump! She’s a swell kid all right. She’s gonna write up in the paper how they treated us!”
“X” repeated briefly what he had told Betty, explained why Steve must leave and take his friend with him at once. The boy’s face went white. He pocketed the money “X” gave him dazedly, turned and ran to the shack of his friend, and Agent “X” returned to Betty’s side.
“Come,” he said. “I’d planned to look around, but there isn’t time now. We’d better leave right away.”
Betty Dale took his arm. Together they hurried across the ash heaps and piles of dirt toward the spot where he had drawn up his boat. But before they reached it, Betty suddenly stopped and pointed.
“Who are those men?” she asked.
“X” saw them at the same instant — two furtive, swift-moving figures, just appearing from behind an ash pile. He paused, drew Betty back, and abruptly tensed in his tracks. For a harsh voice sounded directly behind him, a voice that gave menacing command.
“Don’t move — either of you!” it said. “I got you covered — and I’d just as leave shoot as not.”
“X” OBEYED instantly. He heard shuffling footsteps close behind him, felt a gun against his back. Then the speaker raised his voice and spoke again. “Here’s the bird, boys, and a jane with him. Come on over.”
The two that Betty Dale had seen came up quickly. They had twisted, brutal faces. Guns were in their hands. The Agent’s pulses hammered. His skin felt cold. Left to himself he would have made some swift attack. But the guns were aimed at Betty Dale, also. He couldn’t risk a bullet that might snuff out her life.
“Listen,” he said harshly, “this is no time for a stick-up. There’s a bomb out here somewhere. This island’s going up at midnight.”
One of the men broke into a cackle of derisive mirth. “Wise guy, eh! You’re telling us! Bomb is right — and you and the dame will find out more about it in a minute.”
The cords in the Agent’s neck stood out. He crouched, made ready to leap. But the quick, brutal voice of the gangster stopped him.
“I don’t know who this jane is, but it looks like you like her. Any rough stuff and she gets rubbed out, see? Come on, boys! Put ’em where I told you.”
With a single frightened scream, Betty Date tried to break away, crying for “X” to follow. But one of the men caught her instantly. A second man pressed a gun against her back. “X” saw his trigger finger tense. He spoke quickly, hoarsely:
“Betty — don’t! They’ll kill you!”
Feeling a crushing weight of horror upon him, Agent “X” allowed himself to be led along. These men were spies of the Terror. He realized that, now. Their faces were grim. They, too, were hurrying, anxious to get away from this place. Their actions supported his belief that the Terror’s threat was no mere boast. A gun was against “X’s” back, also. He didn’t fear that, but he was handicapped, made utterly helpless by the knowledge that Betty would be shot down callously if he made a move to save her or himself.
The gangsters veered to the left suddenly, took a narrow, ash-strewn path, and led their prisoners with them. One of them flashed a light. A squat brick building showed ahead. It was part of an old incinerating plant, discarded by the city since the new one had been built. It was windowless, merely a brick storage shed, but it had a strong, metal-bound door. This was open.
The gangsters thrust Betty inside, then “X.” They gave the girl a shove which made “X” clench his teeth in fury. The next moment he, too, was forcibly hurled into the shed’s interior. The gangster with the guns menaced them an instant. One of them spoke.
“We don’t know who you are, guy, but we can make a guess! You seem to know too much. One of the hobos out here told us you’d warned him and the bunch to beat it — on account of a bomb. I guess you’d like to know where the bomb is — and I’m gonna tell you. It’s right here in this shed, see? And you and the jane are gonna have a chance to watch how it works. So long, sweethearts! We’ll be seein’ you in hell!”
Harsh laughter followed this sally. The door slammed shut. A padlock clicked in a staple outside. Then came the sound of footsteps receding.
Betty Dale and the Agent were prisoners, close to the bomb of death — scheduled to explode at the end of a mere twenty minutes.
Chapter VII
RIGID horror gripped the Agent for a second. He leaped to the spot where Betty Dale had been hurled to the floor and flashed on his light.
She was just getting up. Her voice sounded clear and steady beside him. “I’m afraid I got you in a jam,” she said.
The Agent gave a harsh laugh. “It’s the other way round, Betty! If I had gone on and left you alone — this wouldn’t have happened.”
He moved away, flashing his light quickly in all directions. Horror still held him, made his neck and hands feel cold. He wasn’t thinking of his own life, or of Betty Dale’s alone. He was thinking of those other thousands, millions perhaps, whose existences were threatened as long as this man, the Terror, was active — as long as the dozen bombs remained unfound.
His light paused abruptly, making a round spot at one end of the window-less chamber. A cluster of bricks had tumbled out here. A few broken pieces lay on the floor. Others had evidently been carted away. But what held “X’s” interest was a spot above the bricks, on the wall itself, which had apparently been cemented over. The work had been done cleverly, with dirt and soot rubbed in, blackened like the rest of the building’s interior. But the sharp eyes of Agent “X,” trained to observe minute details, saw instantly that it was only camouflage.