The Secret House Part 39

Then something touched the outstretched palm, something that in ordinary circ.u.mstances might have felt like the rough points of a ba.s.s broom. T.

B. was flung violently backwards and fell heavily to the ground.

"Get him into the chair quick," he heard Farrington's voice say. "That was a good idea of yours, doctor."

"Just a sprayed wire," said Dr. Fall complacently; "it is a pretty useful check upon a man. You took a wonderful a.s.sistant when you pressed electricity to your aid, Farrington."

The lights were all on now, and T. B. was being strapped to the chair.

He had recovered from the shock, but he had recovered too late. In the interval of his unconsciousness the body of Poltavo had been removed out of his sight. They were doing to him all that they had done to Poltavo.

He felt the electrodes at his calf and on his wrists and clenched his teeth, for he knew in what desperate strait he was.

"Well, Mr. Smith," said Farrington pleasantly, "I am afraid you have got yourself into rather a mess. Where is the other man?" he asked quickly.

He looked at Fall, and the doctor returned his gaze.

"I forgot the other man," said Fall slowly; "in the corridor outside."

He went to the invisible door and it opened at his touch. He was out of the room a few minutes, and returned looking old and drawn.

"He has got away," he said; "the woman has gone too."

Farrington nodded.

"What does he matter?" he asked roughly; "they know as much as they are likely to know. Put the control on the door."

Fall turned over a switch and the other renewed his attention to T. B.

"You know exactly how you are situated, Mr. Smith," said Farrington, "and now I am going to tell you exactly how you may escape from your position."

"I shall be interested to learn," said T. B. coolly, "but I warn you before you tell me that if my escape is contingent upon your own, then I am afraid I am doomed to dissolution."

The other nodded.

"As you surmise," he said, "your escape is indeed contingent upon mine and that of my friends. My terms to you are that you shall pa.s.s me out of England. I know you are going to tell me that you have not the power, but I am as well acquainted with the extraordinary privileges of your department as you are. I know that you can take me out of the Secret House and land me in Calais to-morrow morning, and there is not one man throughout the length and breadth of England who will say you nay. I offer you your life on condition that you do this, otherwise----"

"Otherwise?" asked T. B.

"Otherwise I shall kill you," said Farrington briefly, "just as I killed Poltavo. You are the worst enemy I have and the most dangerous. I have always marked you down as one whose attention was to be avoided, and I shall probably kill you with less compunction because I know that but for you I should not have been forced to live this mad dog's life that has been mine for the past few months. You will be interested, Mr.

Smith, to learn that you nearly had me once. You see the whole wing of the house in which Mr. Moole lies," he smiled, "works on the principle of a huge elevator. The secret of the Secret House is really the secret of perfectly arranged lifts; that is to say," he went on, "I can take my room to the first floor and I can transport it to the fourth floor with greater ease than you can carry a chair from a bas.e.m.e.nt to an attic."

"I guessed that much," said T. B. "Do you realize that you might have made a fortune as a practical electrician?"

Farrington smiled.

"I very much doubt it," he said coolly; "but my career and my wasted opportunities are of less interest to me at the moment than my future and yours. What are you going to do?"

T. B. smiled.

"I am going to do nothing," he said cheerfully, "unless it be that I am going to die, for I can imagine no circ.u.mstance or danger that threatens me or those I love best which would induce me to loose upon the world such dangerous criminals as yourself and your fellow-murderers. Your time has come, Farrington. Whether my time comes a little sooner or later does not alter the fact that you are within a month of your own death, whether you kill me or whether you let me go."

"You are a bold man to tell me that," said Farrington between his teeth.

T. B. saw from a glance at the blanched faces of the men that his words had struck home.

"If you imagine you can escape," T. B. went on unconcernedly, "why, I think you are wasting valuable time which might be better utilized, for every moment of delay is a moment nearer to the gallows for both of you."

"My friend, you are urging your own death," said Fall.

"As to that," said T. B., shrugging his shoulders, "I have no means of foretelling, because I cannot look into the future any more than you, and if it is the will of Providence that I should die in the execution of my duty, I am as content to do so as any soldier upon the battle-field, for it seems to me," he continued half to himself, "that the arrayed enemies of society are more terrible, more formidable, and more dangerous than the ma.s.sed enemies that a soldier is called upon to confront. They are only enemies for a period; for a time of madness which is called 'war'; but you in your lives are enemies to society for all time."

Fall exchanged glances with his superior, and Farrington nodded.

The doctor leant down and picked up the leather helmet, and placed it with the same tender care that he had displayed before over the head of his previous victim.

"I give you three minutes to decide," said Farrington.

"You are wasting three minutes," said the m.u.f.fled voice of T. B. from under the helmet.

Nevertheless Farrington took out his watch and held it in his unshaking palm; for the s.p.a.ce of a hundred and eighty seconds there was no sound in the room save the loud ticking of the watch.

At the end of that time he replaced it in his pocket.

"Will you agree to do as I ask?" he said.

"No," was the reply with undiminished vigour.

"Let him have it," said Farrington savagely.

Dr. Fall put up his hand to the switch, and as he did so the lights flickered for a moment and slowly their brilliancy diminished.

"Quick," said Farrington, and the doctor brought the switch over just as the lights went out.

T. B. felt a sharp burning sensation that thrilled his whole being and then lost consciousness.

CHAPTER XXI

There was a group of police officers about the gates of the Secret House as the car bearing Ela and the woman came flying up.

The detective leapt out.

"They have taken T. B.," he said. He addressed a divisional inspector, who was in charge of the corps.

"Close up the cordon," he went on, "and all men who are armed follow me."

He raced up the garden path, but it was not toward the Secret House that he directed his steps; he made a detour through a little plantation to the power house.

A man stood at the door, a grimy-faced foreign workman who scowled at the intruders. He tried to pull the sliding doors to their place, but Ela caught the blue-coated man under the jaw and sent him sprawling into the interior.