The Black Box Part 69

Quest examined the strange-looking lump of metal steadily. The most curious thing about it seemed to be that it was absolutely sound and showed no signs of damage. He turned to the Professor.

"I think you are the only one who will be able to appreciate this, Professor," he remarked. "Look! It is a fragment of opotan--a distinct and wonderful specimen of opotan."

Every one looked puzzled.

"But what," Lenora enquired, "is opotan?"

"It is a new metal," Quest explained gravely, "towards which scientists have been directing a great deal of attention lately. It has the power of collecting all the electricity from the air around us. There are a dozen people, at the present moment, conducting experiments with it for the purpose of cheapening electric lights. If we had been in the room ten seconds sooner--"

He paused significantly. Then he swung round on his heel. Craig, a now pitiful object, his hands nervously twitching, his face ghastly, was cowering in the background.

"Your last little effort, Craig?" he demanded sternly.

Craig made no reply. The Professor, who had disappeared for a moment, came back to them.

"There is a smaller room across the hall," he said, "which will do for our purpose."

Craig suddenly turned and faced them.

"I have changed my mind," he said. "I have nothing to tell you. Do what you will with me. Take me to the Tombs, deal with me any way you choose, but I have nothing to say."

French smiled a little grimly.

"We may make you change your mind when we get you there," he remarked.

"No one will ever make me change my mind," the man replied. "This is my last word."

Quest pointed a threatening finger at him.

"Your last voluntary word, perhaps," he said, "but science is still your master, Craig. Science has brought many criminals to their doom. It shall take its turn with you. Bring him along, French, to my study. There is a way of dealing with him."

Quest felt his forehead and found it damp. There were dark rims under his eyes. Before him was Craig, with a little band around his forehead and the mirror where they could all see it. The Professor stood a little in the background. Laura and French were side by side, gazing with distended eyes at the blank mirror, and Lenora was doing her best to soothe the terrified niece. Twice Quest's teeth came together and once he almost reeled.

"It's the fight of his life," he muttered at last, "but I've got him."

Almost as he spoke, they could see Craig's resistance begin to weaken. The tenseness of his form relaxed; Quest's will was triumphing. Slowly in the mirror they saw a little picture creeping from outline into definite form, a picture of the Professor's library. Craig himself was there with mortar and trowel, and a black box in his hand.

"It's coming!" Lenora moaned.

Quest stood perfectly tense. The picture suddenly flashed into brilliant clearness. They saw Craig's features with almost lifelike detail. From the corner of that room where the Professor was standing, came a smothered groan. It was a terrifying, a paralysing moment. Even the silence seemed charged with awful things. Then suddenly, without any warning, the picture faded completely away. A cry which was almost a howl of anger broke from Quest's lips. Craig had fallen sideways from his chair. There was an ominous change in his face. Something seemed to have pa.s.sed from the atmosphere of the room, some tense and nameless quality. Quest moved forward and laid his hand on Craig's heart. The girl was on her knees, crying.

"Take her away," Quest whispered to Lenora.

"What about him?" French demanded, as Lenora led the girl from the room.

"He fought too hard," Quest said gravely. "He is dead. Professor,--"

They all looked around. The spot where he had been standing was empty. The Professor had gone.

CHAPTER XVI

JUSTICE CHEATED

The first shock was over. Craig's body had been removed, and the girls had taken Mary, half stunned with grief, to their room. French and Quest were left alone.

"This is some disappointment," the former remarked gloomily.

"It is a disappointment," Quest said slowly, "which may clear the way to bigger things."

"What's in your mind now?" French enquired.

Quest shook his head.

"A turmoil. First of all, where is the Professor?"

"Must have scooted right away home," French suggested. "He was looking pretty sick all the time. Guess it must have been a powerful shock for him, and he isn't so young as he used to be."

"Give me that paper of Craig's again," Quest asked, stretching out his hand.

The Inspector produced the doc.u.ment from his inner pocket, and Quest, stretching it out upon his knee, read it word for word.

"Never to communicate or to have anything to do with any one of the name of Ashleigh, eh?" he remarked, as he handed it back again. "Rather a queer provision, that, French."

"I've been thinking that myself," the Inspector admitted. "Seems to be rather reversing the positions, doesn't it?"

Quest glanced at the clock.

"Well," he said, "if you're ready, Inspector, we'll be getting along."

"Where to?" French demanded.

Quest looked for a moment surprised. Just then Lenora entered the room.

"Are you going out?" she asked Quest.

He nodded.

"The Inspector and I are going to have a look for that black box," he told her.

"Won't you want me?"

He shook his head.