The doctor set to work to examine Marchand’s effects. He labored slowly and found the job tedious.
There was very little of interest.
OSCAR served dinner at six o’clock, before Doctor Lukens had completed his examination. The serving man requested an evening off, and Lukens granted it.
Immediately after dinner the doctor and the secretary went back to work. The final examination was completed. Willis prepared to replace everything where he had found it. He was interrupted by the doorbell.
Paget, attired in evening clothes, came upstairs with him.
“Good evening, doctor,” Paget said lazily. “Anything of interest to me?”
“Nothing.”
Paget dropped into a chair and gazed carelessly at Willis. The physician sat beside Paget and also watched the secretary as he worked.
Once again Doctor Lukens obeyed the impulse to turn toward Paget. He discovered the visitor looking at the scarab ring on his left hand.
Paget smiled sheepishly.
“Curious ring, doctor,” he said, indicating the object with his hand. “I do not recall seeing you wear it before.”
“It belonged to Henry Marchand,” replied the physician. “He presented it to me some time ago. I came across it to-day in my home.”
The physician had scarcely completed his statement before a suspicion seized him.
Why had Paget noticed the ring? The clubman was not usually observant. At that instant Doctor Lukens suddenly realized that Paget, when he had visited the house in the morning, had been staring at the scarab ring — not at the papers which Lukens had held.
The physician’s suspicion must have been reflected by Paget. The man arose and stretched his arms.
“Must be going,” he drawled. “Society affair tonight. Have to attend them, you know — good business.”
He extended his hand.
“Good-by, doctor,” he added. “May not see you for some time. Guess my business with Mister Marchand is now ended. If anything turns up, notify me.”
Doctor Lukens kept staring at the door through which Rodney Paget had gone. He heard the front door close downstairs. The physician turned to Willis.
“Take a night off,” ordered the physician. “You look pale and weak. It’s not yet nine o’clock. Go and see a movie.”
The secretary seemed to brighten at the suggestion as Lukens waved his hand toward the door.
“I’ll be in at eleven thirty,” promised Willis.
“All right,” laughed Lukens. “I guess Oscar will be back before that. You both like to go to bed early. Run along. I won’t lock the front door.”
Lukens was meditative after the secretary’s departure. He drummed upon the desk with his open hand, and the clatter of the scarab ring caught his attention. He snapped his fingers with a sudden idea.
He referred to the card in his pocket. Using the telephone at the side of the room, he called the number which the mysterious stranger had given him the night before.
“No answer,” he murmured after two minutes had passed. “I hope Barlow is on the job.”
BARLOW was on the job. At that exact time he was watching the phone booth. He heard the ringing of the bell. It ended. Barlow waited a short while; then entered another booth.
Had Barlow been watching the busy refreshment counter across from the phone booth he might have seen one of the white-coated attendants leave his place. Barlow would have suspected nothing in the man’s action, for the attendant passed out of sight behind the partition in back of the counter.
There the attendant dialed a number. Upon receiving a reply, he merely grunted a few unintelligible sounds and hung up the receiver with the air of a man who had obtained a wrong number.
Immediately afterward the attendant was back at the counter, serving a new customer.
The telephone rang in the upstairs room where Doctor Lukens was seated. The physician answered it.
“Barlow?” he said. “Nothing doing there? No one showed up? Thanks. You can drop the job now. It was just an experiment.”
He hung up the receiver.
“A hoax!” was Lukens’s comment. “A hoax — unless Barlow was not discreet and frightened the man away. Yet I can’t understand—”
The telephone rang again.
A whispered voice responded to the physician’s answering word. Doctor Lukens recognized the tones of the mysterious stranger.
“Do you wish to see me?” came the voice.
“Yes,” replied Lukens almost involuntarily. “I have found—” he glanced at the ring on his finger, then hesitated. “I can tell you when I see you. Can you come here now?”
“Immediately.”
“No hurry,” said Lukens suddenly. “Say within an hour.”
He hung up the receiver.
“That was a mistake,” he murmured. “An hour may be too soon. I should have told him to call back. But then, he might have suspected. Well, it’s a case of trusting to luck.”
He picked up the telephone and called police headquarters. He asked to talk to Joe Cardona. The physician uttered an exclamation of satisfaction when he heard the detective’s voice over the wire.
“Ah! Cardona!” he said in a low voice. “This is Doctor Lukens. I am in Henry Marchand’s house. Can you come right away?”
“What’s it about?” asked the detective curiously.
“I don’t know,” replied the physician frankly. “I expect a visitor. Who he is — what he is — I do not know. His purpose may be important. Come at once. The door is unlocked. Move upstairs cautiously, and keep out of sight in the hall.
“I am in the room where Marchand died. If my visitor is here, you will overhear the conversation. If he has not yet arrived, you will see him come in later. I expect him within an hour.”
“Right!”
Lukens hung up the receiver and began to pace the room. Then he seated himself in the chair at the desk and feigned deep thought. He kept his back to the door; he was anxious to learn if he could detect the stranger’s approach.
He picked up the dice and held them on the palm of his right hand. He shook them thoughtfully, then closed his fist over them and gripped the cubes tightly.
The impression that some one was entering the room suddenly dominated the physician’s mind. He fought against it momentarily; then turned quickly in his chair.
With a mad effort he scrambled to his feet. Before him, halfway across the room, stood a man who held a curious revolver. The muzzle was muffled by a silencer. The gun was directed toward the desk.
A cry escaped the physician’s lips. It was a cry of recognition — of sudden understanding. It was the man as much as the gun that alarmed him.
In the fraction of a second the physician realized the situation. Before he could act, he saw a finger press the trigger. With a sighing gasp, Doctor George Lukens collapsed upon the floor!
CHAPTER VII. A MURDERER ESCAPES
IT was nearly an hour after the physician’s phone call when Detective Cardona reached the old house on Eighty-first Street. He did not enter the brownstone mansion immediately upon arrival. Instead, he stood across the street and uttered a low, almost indistinguishable whistle. Two men came from the darkness.
“Here’s the lay, boys,” whispered the detective. “I’m going in that house to see a man upstairs. There may be nothing to it, but I want you to hop in quick if you hear anything. How long have you been here?”
“Only about two minutes,” replied one of the men. “We put a couple of uniformed men out back, like you told us.”
“Good. Has any one gone in?”
“Not since we’ve been here.”
“All right. There’s no rush about it. If I come out first, be ready to grab the next fellow that comes out if I give the signal.