Too, he did not like to paste her one on the jaw. That handicapped him. She clawed at him, tore the pocket of his coat. His pipe and tobacco and other articles spilled across the floor.
“Cut it out, sister!” he roared. “I’m Nace! If you’re Rosa Andricksen, I’m the guy you sent for!”
The effect of this was surprising. She stopped struggling, held her head up to bring her ear close to his lips.
“What did you say?” she asked in a very pleasant voice. “I’m a little hard of hearing!” It was the voice that had phoned Nace!
“A little!” Nace snorted, then, very loudly, “I am Lee Nace! Sometimes people are kind enough to call me a private detective.”
“Oh!” The girl disentangled herself. “I thought you were one of Reel’s men!” She pointed at the man on the bed. “That’s Reel!”
She seemed contrite, although there was a queerly set, vacant look about her face. Moving over, she picked up his pipe, tobacco and matches. She thrust the articles in his trouser pocket, as if he were a little boy.
“What’s behind this mess?” Nace yelled.
“I don’t know,” the girl replied in the queerly soft voice the hard-of-hearing sometimes use.
Nace gave her a hard eye. “Now don’t start slipping me fast balls, sister!”
There was something he did not trust about her manner.
“What?” she asked in her gentle voice.
“Tell me the truth!” he shrieked. “Was it you who called me?”
“Yes!” she breathed gently. “It was I.”
“Why did you do it?”
“What?”
The adder glowed purple on his forehead as he bellowed, “Why did you call me?”
“Oh! This man,” she pointed at the fellow handcuffed to the bed, “came to my apartment tonight and seized me. He took me to that bungalow. I got to the phone and tried to call you. I didn’t think I had gotten you.”
“What did he take you to the bungalow for?” Nace roared.
“I don’t know,” she whispered.
“Did you know Jimmy Offitt?” The bellowing was making Nace hoarse.
Her answer surprised him.
“No,” she said gently.
Nace scowled. There was something wrong here. It did not hook up. He eyed her wrists, her ankles. Purple marks showed where she had been tied recently.
That gave him an idea. He swept into the hallway, got the clothesline wire with which she had tried to snare him, and came back.
Although she squealed and struggled, he tied her wrists and ankles. He did not bind so tightly as to cause pain, but when he was done, he was sure she would not get away.
He left her sitting on the floor, glaring at him, and went out to investigate the rest of the house.
The place was big, like a castle. Nace put a fresh stem in his pipe, thumbed in tobacco, and lit up. He left tobacco smoke in each room, mingling with the Oriental incense odor.
There seemed to be no servants. In two of the rooms, he found cobras picketed. He found the snakes because he was looking for them. Had he been prowling, burglar-like, he probably would have been bitten.
One upstairs bedroom was fitted with Chinese ornaments — a dragon tapestry, idols, and such.
In one corner was a trunk, plentifully plastered with steamer labels. The trunk seemed to have gone over most of Europe. Some of the customs stamps bore dates. They ranged over a period of the past three years.
Nace opened the trunk. It seemed to hold curios — timetables, hotel advertisements, bottles of perfume, bits of lace. The things most travelers pick up. But the Oriental nature of the things indicated this was the room of the Chinaman, Hoo Li.
On a dressing table was a picture of a plump Chinese. In the drawer of the table was a passport with the same picture. It was Hoo Li.
With the passport was the printed sailing list of an Atlantic liner that had docked in New York some three weeks ago. Nace ran through the list. As he came to names that interested him, he underlined them. When he was done, he had seven names.
M. J. REEL
HOO LI LUNG
BARON VON AUSTER
MOE MEVINSKY
JOHN HEAVY
JIMMY OFFITT
ROSA ANDRICKSEN
Nace swore, fingered his notched left ear.
“The whole outfit came into the States on a liner three weeks ago,” he grunted. “And the black-haired queen told me she didn’t know a thing about this! The hell she doesn’t!”
He barged for the stairs. Somewhere outdoors, an automobile engine started. Nace took the stairs, six at a jump.
The girl sat in the hallway. She was still wired hand and foot. But the door behind her was closed.
Nace tried the door. It was locked. There was no key in it.
The automobile engine was receding rapidly down the driveway. Nace plunged through the front door. Tires screamed as the car skidded into the street. Nace caught a glimpse of the machine as it scudded under a street lamp. No one but Reel was in the vehicle.
Nace knew his chances of catching the car were nil. He did not try. He swung around the side of the house, fanning the ground with his flashlight, lest there be more anchored cobras.
A window in the coffin of a house was open. It gave into the orange-lighted room. Reel had departed by this route.
Entering, Nace inspected the handcuffs. They had been unlocked off Reel’s wrist.
Dark-faced, Nace glowered at the source of the orange light. The base of this was a weird green skull. He went over, seized the light and smashed it on the floor.
The green skull was only plaster. It flew all over the room, a myriad of pieces.
He went to the door, hard-heeled, made sure no key was in this side of the lock. He kicked the lock out. That eased his anger somewhat. But the scarlet serpent was still hot on his forehead when he towered over pretty, dark-eyed Rosa Andricksen.
His voice a low, tearing whisper, he said, “Are you going to give me the handcuff key and the key to that door, or do I have to hunt for them?”
His voice had been pitched very low. Had she been the least bit deaf, she could not have heard him.
“I’ll give them up!” she said, proving there was nothing wrong with her hearing. She had, it was plain, faked the deafness so as to enable Reel to overhear Nace’s words.
Nace threw the keys away. His hair was down over his eyes, and his jaw was knobby. His stubby pipe was sunk deep in his jaws.
“You jumped me that last time to get the key to the handcuffs from my pockets,” he said grimly. “I’ll hand it to you, sister! You’re the slickest dip I ever ran into.”
She smiled impishly up at him. “You don’t seem to like me!”
He scowled. “That means you won’t talk?”
“I did talk,” she replied. “I told you that Reel came to my apartment tonight, got me, and took me to that bungalow, and I called you. Then Reel brought me here. I got away — I was tied in the basement. I set that wire loop on the floor of this hall. I was after Reel. But you came along.”
Nace grinned wryly. “You’ve got one thing I like.”
She blinked. “What’s that?”
“Nerve!”
He went into the room where the orange light had burned. He had not yet taken the time to search it thoroughly. Under the window where Reel had escaped stood a large window-seat chest.
Nace opened the chest lid.
Cr-a-c-k! went his pipe stem.
He swore a deep thumping oath in his chest. Then he called, “Have you seen Hoo Li tonight?”
“I know no one by the name of Hoo Li!” she replied.
He went back and untied her. “In that case, I’ll show him to you!”
He led her in and showed her what was in the window box. He knew by the way that she gulped and began to tremble that she had not known what was there. No actress was that good!