Chapter I: The Woman in the Limousine

Standing in the dark doorway of a delicatessen shop, Kingdon Cole gazed, through the fog and drizzle of the October night, at a second-story window across the street. The brim of a slouch hat shaded his eyes and most of his face. His lean figure was draped in a mackintosh that reached almost to his feet. The upward slant of the cigar, clamped between his teeth, hinted at total absorption in what he saw.

The building that claimed his attention was an ordinary three-story structure of murky brick. Flanked by a warehouse on one side and a secondhand clothing store on the other, it presented a sullen and gloomy aspect to the watcher across the street. Yet there was something in the very drabness of the house and the chill atmosphere which hung over it that might have appealed to the imagination of a man like Kingdon Cole.

A man’s head and shoulders were dimly silhouetted against the lighted window shade at which he was looking so fixedly. For half an hour or longer the figure had not stirred. The rigid poise of the head and the stiff set of the shoulders suggested that the man at the window was engaged in a task that occupied his whole mind.

Cole struck a match and, holding it in his cupped hands, lighted his dead cigar. The flickering light shone for an instant on fingers that were long, slim, and finely tapering, the fingers of a man of great mental energy and a compelling personality.

“Wonder what the learned Professor Carmody finds so interesting,” he mumbled. “Some scientific treatise, very likely, or perhaps it is——”

He lowered his gaze, as he vaguely sensed that a pair of eyes was trying to pierce the gloom in which he stood. What with the wet night and the lateness of the hour that dreary section of Bleecker Street was all but deserted. Now and then a crosstown car jogged along at a lumbering pace; occasionally a taxicab passed on its way.

Cole looked up and down the block. The impression was more distinct now. Some one was watching him, just as he was watching the solitary figure in the window. His senses, sharpened by long training, told him he was under observation even before he could trace the impression to its source. Now he saw a limousine drawn up at the corner, less than twenty paces from where he stood. Its sides of burnt sienna gleamed in the blurred lights. It seemed to lend a touch of affluence to the squalor and dreariness of the scene. How long the car had been there he did not know, for the window across the street had claimed all his attention.

The car began to move, crawling, snaillike and silent toward the point where Cole stood. It stopped opposite the doorway that sheltered him. He fancied that he saw the flicker of a face behind the curtains. Then the door opened a few inches, and he caught a glimpse of a beckoning hand.

His eyes narrowed under their puckering brows. The monotony of his vigil was being broken in a strange way, and the slow twisting of his lips signified that the interruption was not altogether displeasing. Once more he glanced up at the window across the street, noticing that the shadowy figure had not stirred. Then he crossed the sidewalk, and instantly the door of the limousine was flung wide.

“Won’t you step in, Mr. Cole?” asked a voice.

Though his life had inured him to surprises, Cole started a little. It was odd that the occupant of the car should address him by name. The interior was dark, but in the shadows he saw the figure of a woman.

“You are very patient, Mr. Cole,” the voice continued. “You are wasting your time, however. It isn’t likely that Professor Carmody will go out to-night, so you might as well jump in.”

A sharp hunching of Cole’s shoulders registered surprise number two. It was all very mystifying. Not only did the occupant of the car know his name, but she seemed familiar with his business as well. He liked her voice, a deep soprano with a faintly playful undertone. For a moment he studied the long, slender lines of her figure, faintly discernible in the dusk and melting, here and there, into a background of saffron-hued cushions.

“You hesitate? I happen to know that Professor Carmody is in for the night and that your vigilance is useless.”

Cole looked at her intently. The mist, the drizzle, and the blurred sheen from the street lamps seemed to lend a touch of unreality to what he saw and heard.

“What do you know about Professor Carmody,” he demanded.

“A great deal more than you do. It’s quite possible that I am in a position to give you some valuable information. At any rate my car is more comfortable than a dark doorway.”

She leaned forward slightly, and there was a trace of mockery on her faintly parted lips. “Not afraid, are you, Mr. Cole?”

He gave a low laugh at the implied dare. With a shrug he stepped inside the car and sat down beside her. She picked up the speaking tube and, turning her head away from Cole, said something which he could not hear. In an instant the car was in motion.

“You seem to know a great deal,” he observed, trying to obtain a glimpse of her face under the billowing brim that shaded it.

“And you are anxious to learn how much more I know. Isn’t it so, Mr. Cole? It was neither vulgar curiosity nor adventurousness that prompted you to accept my invitation to ride with me. You accepted only because you hoped to learn something. Having heard me speak your name and mention Professor Carmody you naturally thought it might be profitable to cultivate my acquaintance.”

“Perhaps so,” said Cole dryly. “What do you know about me aside from my name and my interest in the estimable professor?”

“A great deal,” was the surprisingly prompt reply. “You are a student of criminology, a follower in the footsteps of Lombroso, Pinel, and Prichard, though you by no means accept their theories. You have written two books on crime and criminals. They are too scientific for the general reader, I have been told, but experts on the subject regard them as authoritative. Perhaps some day I shall try to read them.”

“I fear you won’t find them very interesting,” replied Cole. “What else?”

“You live in a small apartment in Gramercy Park, which also serves as your office. Two years ago you did a very brilliant piece of work on the Wilmerding murder case, though you magnanimously, or for reasons of your own, let the police claim the credit for the results. You follow criminal investigations largely as a scientific pursuit. If you cared to devote all your time to it you could make a great success, but you accept only such cases as happen to interest you personally. As a result you lead a quiet and somewhat precarious existence, deriving your sole pleasure from your work and such inexpensive amusements as books, music, and, on rare occasions, the theater.”

“You seem to have taken considerable pains looking me up,” he remarked.

“Oh, I haven’t told you all I know yet. I have learned a number of things about your private life and personal habits, but we needn’t go into those things now.”

“Are you equally well informed in regard to Professor Carmody?”

“Not quite. The professor is a riddle. To all outward appearances he is interested in nothing but his experiments and his musty old books. He seems to be living in that kind of neighborhood by preference, because he isn’t so apt to be bothered by meddling neighbors. His house is said to contain one of the best-equipped laboratories of its kind in the world. That’s only a rumor, of course. The professor doesn’t encourage visitors. To the few people who have talked with him he is what the novelists call a man of mystery. He comes and goes without speaking to any one, and his life is a closed book. As far as I know, only one person has been inside his house in a year, and that person never came out.”

“Oh, you know that!”

“Yes, I am one of the very few who are aware of the fact. Let me see, it’s about three weeks since Malcolm Reeves disappeared. His relatives, your clients, in other words, have reason to believe that he visited Professor Carmody on the night of his disappearance. No wonder the case fascinates you, Mr. Cole. Disappearances are always interesting, but especially so when a mysterious person like Professor Carmody is involved.”

Cole regarded her in frank amazement, but her head was now slightly bowed, and all he could see of her face was the curve of the chin.

“The relatives did well to put the case in your hands,” she went on. “You are both capable and discreet and, as I presume you know, there were excellent reasons for not reporting Reeves’ disappearance to the police. Are you making satisfactory progress?”

“My clients seem satisfied.”

“You have not yet paid the professor a visit?”

“What would be the use?”

“You are right, of course. It would only put him on his guard. You prefer not to let him know that he is under suspicion.” She laughed gently, as if amused at something. “Besides, it is doubtful whether a search of Carmody’s house would reveal any clews to Reeves’ fate. The professor is a chemist, and I understand there are certain chemical processes by which bodies can be made to disappear completely, leaving no trace.”

“Then you think Reeves has been murdered?”

“Don’t you?” she asked quickly.

Cole smiled. Instead of answering the question he asked another. “How can you be so sure that Carmody will not leave his house to-night?”

“Because he has the best of reasons for staying in.”

“What are they?”

“One is that his engagement for to-night was canceled by telephone at four o’clock this afternoon.”

Cole gave her a puzzled stare. “How do you know that?”

She laughed a little. “There are ways of finding out,” she said mysteriously. “Tapped wires, for instance. But the professor’s principal reason for staying in to-night is that he is well aware that you are watching him. You see, Mr. Cole, he has more shrewdness than you have been giving him credit for. And the fact that he is staying in on your account shows that he has great respect for your ability.”

She had raised her head a trifle, and Cole gave her a long, bewildered glance. He half expected to see a smile on her lips, but her face was grave.

“Are you one of Reeves’ relatives?” he asked abruptly.

“Oh, no!”

“Then how——”

“I have certain sources of information. Sources so vast that you would be staggered if I were to tell you of them. Please don’t look at me like that. I am not insane, neither am I subject to hallucinations. The fact that I happen to know more about the Carmody case than you do is no reflection on your ability as an investigator. It merely shows that your equipment is inadequate. Care to hear more?”

“What else do you know?”

“I know that the case you are working on is only one minor angle of a vast mystery. The disappearance of Malcolm Reeves is nothing but an incident. Reeves himself was only an insignificant puppet in one of the greatest games ever played. All you have seen so far is one of the minor threads in the woof. I am always mixing my metaphors, but I know you won’t mind. Mr. Cole, this affair has ramifications that may some day rock the whole continent.”

“I feel considerably shaken up already,” admitted Cole. “You realize, of course, that you are using strong words?”

“No stronger than the situation demands.”

“If it is as bad as all that why doesn’t somebody put a stop to it?”

“Because——” She checked herself and regarded him intently. “Well, because the man who is big enough for the task has not yet been found.”

Again Cole cast a glance at the window. The car had made several turns in the last few minutes. He caught only a blurred view of his surroundings, but he thought they were traversing one of the cavernlike streets near the southern tip of Manhattan Island.

“Have you heard enough?” she asked.

“Just enough to give me an appetite for more.”

“In that case you must trust me implicitly and obey me without questions. I am taking desperate chances in confiding in you, Mr. Cole, and certain precautions are absolutely necessary. Will you promise me on your honor that you will not try to ascertain the location of the place I shall take you to?”

Cole considered. There was a flavor of mystery about the adventure that appealed to him, but the prospect of learning something more about the Carmody case was an even greater temptation. From what little the woman had so far told him he surmised that she must have unusual sources of information. Much that she had said coincided with what he already knew, so he had no cause to doubt her truthfulness.

“You have my promise,” he told her.

The car made another turn, swung down a dark block, then veered again to the south. Cole caught a hazy glimpse of dark, towering skyscrapers.

The woman looked at him fixedly, as if in doubt. “I believe you are a man of your word, Mr. Cole, but promises are sometimes broken in spite of the best intentions. Please don’t be offended.”

She produced a scarf and with a deft touch covered his eyes, securing the bandage with a firm knot at the back. Cole chuckled amusedly. He might be walking into a trap, but it would not be the first time, and he had great confidence in his ability to take care of himself in any situation that might come up.

After continuing its zigzagging course a few minutes longer the car stopped. His mysterious conductress touched his arm as they stepped out. She guided him across the sidewalk and up a few stone steps, and then they traversed what appeared to be a long corridor. Finally Cole found himself in a narrow inclosure which he guessed to be an elevator.

“We are in one of the tallest office buildings in New York,” the woman whispered in his ear, “but you’re not likely to guess its name.”

The door clanked shut, and the cage shot swiftly upward. Cole felt a rush of wind in his ears. He maintained a languid composure, but inwardly he marveled. A modern skyscraper was the last place he would have expected the woman to take him to. He tried to estimate the number of floors they were passing. Five, ten, fifteen, twenty——

Still the cage darted upward, and then it stopped so suddenly that he caught his breath sharply. They stepped out, and the girl removed the scarf from his eyes. He gazed around him bewilderedly. All about him, with the exception of a single elevator shaft was a vast expanse of blank wall. There was no sign of doors or windows, and the only illumination was a small electric bulb in the ceiling.

“We came up in a private elevator,” the woman explained. “This is the top floor. To the public at large and to most of the tenants of the building it practically does not exist. This way, Mr. Cole.”

She stepped to one of the corners of the triangular space, of which the elevator shaft formed the center, and Cole followed. In the dim light he could not see exactly what happened, but the woman’s hand went out and then a narrow portion of the wall slid back. They stepped through an aperture, and instantly the opening closed behind them. They were in a long corridor with doors on each side.

“Surprised?” she asked, starting to lead him down the hall.

“Rather. Never expected to find such mysterious contrivances in a modern office building.”

Her only reply was a low laugh. The floor of the corridor was luxuriously carpeted; the doors on either side had a solid appearance. Cole’s amazement grew. He wondered what was beyond the massive doors and what was the nature of this establishment that was hidden behind blank walls. He had little time for speculation, for his companion opened a door and bade him enter.

“Excuse me, Mr. Cole,” she murmured when she had switched on the light. “I shall be back directly.”

The door closed, and she was gone. Alone, Cole looked about him, and his eyes opened wide in astonishment.