He glanced upward quickly. The shaft of wood came down flush with the opening here; there was no handhold except the elevator tracks, and these were slippery with grease. “X” tried to brace himself against the opposite wall as he had done in the elevator, but the walls were wet where the water from below had slapped against them, and his feet slipped. The grating was halfway open now. It was sliding into a slot in the wall into which it fitted snugly. He stood on the slowly moving bars, back to the wall, and watched the space in front of him grow wider and wider — the space into which he would be hurled when his foothold slid entirely away from under him.
The moving bars made a rasping sound against his wet rubber heels. He looked down into the water below, watched it foam past, rumbling and roaring as if impatient at being deprived for so long of its prey. He wondered how long a strong swimmer could live down there. A sudden sound above him drew his gaze upward, and he saw that the trapdoor of the cage had opened once more. The cage was descending upon him at express train speed.
IF it didn’t stop it would crush him there, or else hurl him into the water. He crouched, ready to dive, and noted something for the first time. The grating had opened wide now, leaving him only about four inches to stand on. He could see clearly now, and noticed that there was a cord of some sort stretched across the opening, fluttering around in the foaming waters.
Barely had his brain grasped the significance of this cord stretched across the opening, before the cage was upon him. Only a half-inch of foothold remained, and he was ready to dive, when that sixth sense of his held him there. And he was not crushed. For the cage had stopped with a sudden lurch, not a foot from his crouched head; it stopped with a jerk that would have dislodged anybody clinging to its sides.
And with that half-inch of foothold remaining to him, “X” did the thing that his sudden understanding of the situation dictated. He stooped far over, gripped that cord, and yanked it upward. At the same tune he reached up and gripped the hanging edge of the open trapdoor in the cage.
His pull on the cord brought instant response in the form of a clamorous bell ringing somewhere above. The last half-inch of grating disappeared from under his feet, and he let go the cord, clung with both hands to the trapdoor.
His quick intuition had grasped the situation instantly. That cord was there to tell the Skull whether or not his man had fallen through the opening. If the bell rang, the Skull knew the job was done; if it didn’t he knew that his victim was still clinging to the elevator. So he had dropped the cage with a jerk to dislodge him. And now that “X” had pulled the cord, the Skull would think that he had gone through this time.
And “X” had judged correctly. For the grating started to slide back once more, until it covered the opening again. If the Agent had fallen through, he would be trapped there in the rushing water, unable to climb out. And the water was now a good half-inch above the bars of the grating, rising faster and faster.
“X” did not look down again. He devoted his attention to getting back in the elevator. His hold on the edge of the trapdoor had been precarious, but now he could stand on the grating. He reached up, gripped the lever just inside the cage, lifted himself by that, then managed to scramble up by getting a purchase on the upper edge of the trapdoor for here it was hinged to the wall of the cage.
He raised one foot, then the other, and levered himself up. He was now resting his fingertips on the hinged edge of the trapdoor. He strained his muscles, and inch by inch he moved himself upward.
Now he had his back against one wall, and the soles of his shoes against the other, resting on the lever. He was well within the cage when the trapdoor suddenly swung shut beneath him. With a sigh of relaxing muscles he rested on the floor; if the trapdoor had remained open another half minute he would have been compelled to give up his hold and drop back to the grating.
Slowly, the cage began to rise. The Skull must by now be convinced that he was beneath the grating, carried along by the rushing force of the river water. He had dropped his gas gun and screwdriver in the first mad fall of the elevator. If he should come to grips with the master of murder he must use some other means to fight him.
He waited, breathing deeply, while the cage rose for what he estimated were about three flights. It was dark in the cage; but the Agent did not take out his flashlight. Darkness was his friend now.
When the elevator came to a stop, Secret Agent “X” rose to his feet and tried the lever that controlled the door. It worked. The Skull had apparently hooked up the connection again from the outside, intending no doubt to use the cage when he was through with the valves controlling the river flow.
The panel slid open, and “X” stepped into the corridor. He did not close the panel behind him. It might be necessary to have it conveniently open on the way back.
Chapter XX
NOW, the Agent proceeded swiftly from passage to passage, his uncanny instinct for direction guiding him right. Yet he was cautious, proceeding soundlessly through the empty passages. For he was unarmed, and the Skull would be fully equipped and dangerous; even though he might be taken by surprise at finding “X” still alive.
The Agent met no one as he retraced his steps and reached the huge barred door of the execution chamber. He did not stop here, but made his way into the next corridor, opened a door and stepped carefully into the anteroom of the Skull’s private sanctum. This was where he had originally been searched by Rufe Linson when he came as Fannon. Before him was the door without a handle. The door which led to the inner lair of the Skull.
Quickly, silently, “X” stooped before that door, and laid out at his side the flat black case containing his chromium steel instruments. From this case he extracted a long, thin, tempered steel tool, which he inserted in the crack between the door and the jamb. He knew that the door was opened electrically from within, and being familiar with such mechanisms, he knew exactly what tool to use.
The steel jimmy, a perfect conductor of electricity, closed the circuit which controlled the door, and it swung open on well-oiled hinges.
The room within was utterly dark. Would it be occupied?
The Agent tensed as he saw that the face of the Skull was gleaming at him from the darkness — that luminous face, weird and revolting.
“X” waited tautly. He was in the light, at the mercy of the demoniac master of evil who sat there. Not a word was spoken. The Skull’s face did not move.
Suddenly, “X’s” eyes began to gleam. He sensed something; no man could sit there so quietly, absolutely immovable. With a quick motion he produced his flashlight, clicked it on, directed its beam at the desk. Its rays bathed the hideous face. And the Agent, with a sigh of relief, scooped up his tools, darted into the room. He stopped short just within; he had been about to dart across to the desk — and in doing so he would have stepped on that four-foot strip of electrically charged floor.
The Agent jumped, cleared the strip, and came close to the desk. The thing that glowed there luminous and ugly was not the head of a man, but a mask — the mask which the Skull used. It was painted with phosphorus to resemble the bony structure of the head, and in the dark the phosphorus gleamed in the semblance of a skull. Over the back of the chair lay the vermilion-hooded cloak of the master of crime.
That mask and cloak could mean only one thing. That the Skull was still out in the guise of Binks. “X” glanced at his watch; ten-thirty. Yes. The Skull had said where he was going. He would be in the main room now, preparing to take some men out to collect the ransom for the first of the millionaires.