Chapter XI: Part 11

“The same thing is true of the bat that sprinkled death in the face of Berjet. When you and I, in company with the police, entered the scientist’s house, the bat had been gone for several minutes, and the stray particles of pulverized death had settled. You realized this, of course, or you would not have entered the room. If Strange and I had entered the house five minutes earlier, you would have let us enter it alone.”

Peret took a lavender handkerchief from the breast pocket of his coat and wiped from his brow some beads of perspiration. A slight moisture was also noticeable on the forehead of the artist, but it was due to another cause. Although he must have known that each word of the detective’s was a strand in the rope that was being woven around his neck, he gave no signs of emotion. Inwardly, the strain had begun to tell on him, but outwardly he was calm, confident, almost indifferent.

Restoring the handkerchief to his pocket, Peret resumed: “I confess that at first the case baffled me. Through a mistake of my own, soon to be explained, I got started on the wrong track. Your story of the Whispering Thing did not impress me, although I did not at first suspect you of deliberately trying to deceive me. I laid the Thing to your imagination and wrought-up condition. My skepticism vanished, however, when I reached my rooms, as I have explained.

“At first I scarcely knew what to believe. The asphyxiation theory of Sprague and, later on, of Coroner Rane set my mind in motion, but led me nowhere, because it did not fit in with my interpretation of Berjet’s last words. As a matter of fact, nothing else seemed to fit in with anything. Clues ran counter to each other and the facts themselves clashed.

“I got my first inspiration when you declared that the breathing of the Thing was cold and clammy, for this made it seem likely that poison fumes had been fanned in your face by some mechanical device. Had it not been for the horrible experience in my room, this is the theory upon which I should have based my investigation.”

“Then you captured the bat?” said Deweese, in a tense voice.

“_Oui, Monsieur_,” nodded Peret. “I tried to shoot the tiny thing, without even knowing what it was; but I ask you in all seriousness, my friend, could one hope to hit with a thirty-two bullet a _chauve-souris_ that one could not see? Not I! So I telephoned for the police and they came and conquered it with a tear bomb!

“The bat, _Monsieur_, was then turned over to the city chemists, and they analyzed the traces of powder found adhering to the little pads on its wings. Their report gave me the name of the poison that opened the gates of eternity for Berjet and Sprague.”

Peret twisted the needle-points of his slender black mustache and beamed upon his host.

“But why accuse me?” asked Deweese, smiling. “I have no bats in my menagerie—nothing, in fact, but a flea-bitten bulldog.”

Peret’s face became sober.

“You stand accused not by me,” he said solemnly, “but by Berjet, the first of your victims.”

“What’s that?” asked Deweese sharply. For the first time, he seemed alarmed. He sat up suddenly in his chair, and as suddenly relaxed, but the hunted look that crept into his eyes continued to show how sharply the blow had struck home.

“You start, eh? Good! My reasoning is sound. Yes, my friend; Berjet is your accuser. Just before he died, he uttered two words. The first word was ‘assassins;’ and the other was a word that I at first believed to be ‘_dix_,’ the French word for ‘ten,’ which is pronounced _dees_. I thought Berjet meant he had been attacked by ten assassins, incredible as it seemed. That is what got me all balled up, as the saying goes.

“But after I heard your name, and let it roll around in my mind for awhile, I realized my mistake. The dying man did not say _Dix_. He pronounced your name, or rather, your present _alias_, ‘Deweese.’

“When realization of this burst upon me, I was so gratified that I decided to lay a little trap for you. I became very excited, you may recall, shouted that I knew what the Whispering Thing was, that the mystery was solved! I wanted you to show your hand, my friend. But I was not looking for you to act through a confederate, and as a result I very obligingly walked into the little trap which you, in turn, laid for me.

“Who was it that put the _chauve-souris_ in my room, eh? Was it Sing Tong Fat? It could not have been you, for you have been under surveillance every minute of the time since you left the murdered scientist’s house last night. I think you gave Sing Tong Fat instructions to destroy me over the telephone, for the police report you as having called your house from Greenleigh’s drug store after your departure from Berjet’s. Ah, that devil of a Chinaman! I was watching him through the kitchen window for a little while this morning polishing silver, and he was singing to himself! _Pardieu!_ he has an easy conscience for a would-be murderer, _monsieur_!”

“You have a very fertile imagination,” remarked Deweese, when Peret paused to blow the ashes from his cigarette. “But your fairy tale amuses me, so pray continue. In view of the fact that I was near the scene of the crime when Berjet was murdered, it is not difficult to perceive how you might confuse my name with the scientist’s last utterance. But how you ever came to identify me with Dalfonzo is past my comprehension.”

“That is very easily explained,” was Peret’s affable reply. “After leaving the scene of the crime last night, I had your house placed under surveillance of the operative I have already mentioned. While he was waiting for me to join him, so we could search the house, he saw Sing Tong Fat through one of the windows and recognized him as your familiar.

“There are very few foreign agents unknown to the Secret Service, and my operative has the record of you and Sing Tong Fat at his finger-tips. He knows that you and the Chinaman have been associated for years, and that at the present time you are working in the interests of Soviet Russia. Sing Tong Fat is not the idiot he appears to be; he is an international agent that several countries would give a good deal to lay their hands on.

“When my operative saw Sing Tong Fat in your house, he did not have to tax his mind much to deduce the name of the ‘master’ he is serving. Before I joined the operative, some one called Sing Tong Fat on the ’phone and he left the house almost immediately afterward. As the time of the call coincides with the hour you are reported as having ’phoned from Greenleigh’s drug store, I have no doubt that the message was from you. As the operative had instructions to wait for me, he did not shadow Sing Tong Fat when he left the house, which is a pity, for he probably would have caught the old scoundrel in the act of putting the bat in my room. After I arrived on the scene, we amused ourselves by searching your house—this house—thoroughly.”

“So it was you prowling around here last night, was it?” said Deweese savagely. “I wish I had known it; you should not have gotten away so easily.”

“Then I am glad you did not know,” laughed Peret. “Your bulldog and your bullet made it lively enough as it was.”

“I hope that you found your search worth while,” sneered Deweese.

“No,” replied Peret regretfully; “my search gave you a clean bill of health. We did not find the formula or anything else that would incriminate you. Nevertheless, _Monsieur_, your little game has been played—played and lost.

“And you played the game badly, too, my friend. For a man of your intelligence, your blunders are inexcusable. Why did you not leave that blood-thirsty old Chinaman in Russia, _Monsieur_? You can never hope to remain incognito as long as you have Sing Tong Fat in tow. His hatchet face is too well known. Your other blunders were all just as glaring as this one. Why did you linger near the scene of your crime, eh? And introduced yourself to the human bloodhounds that were searching out your scent! Ah, _Monsieur_, I admire your self confidence, but you have an over abundance of it.”

“Perhaps,” said Deweese, with an ironic smile. “At any rate, it doesn’t desert me now. For I know that you cannot convict me. You haven’t a shred of real evidence against me, and the chain of circumstantial evidence you have woven around me would be laughed to scorn in a jury room.”

“You are right,” assented Peret, almost apologetically. “So far I have only been able to reconstruct the crime in my mind by piecing together inconsequential nothings that do not constitute legal evidence. Surmises, deductions, and a stray fact or two—I possess nothing more, my friend. But for the present they must suffice. Before I am through, however, I promise to tie you up in a knot of incontestable evidence.”

“That you will never be able to do,” declared Deweese, “for I am innocent of the murders of Berjet and Sprague. I deny any knowledge of the crimes, in fact, except what I saw in your presence last night. However, ever since you have been here, I have noticed your hand toying with the revolver in your pocket, so I presume that I am under arrest, what?”

“What the devil do I want to arrest you for?” asked Peret, with feigned astonishment. “You yourself have said that I have no real evidence against you.”

The lids of Deweese’s eyes narrowed and the lines around his mouth grew hard. The pupils of his eyes, contracted to half their usual size, looked like points of cold fire.

“If you are not here to arrest me, what’s your game?” he demanded.

“Oh, I just wanted to see what effect my theories would have on you,” replied Peret calmly, as he rose to his feet. “I am a close student of psychology, and I find much in you that interests me. Thanks for your hospitality, _Monsieur_,” he continued, opening the door. “Perhaps I shall have an opportunity to return the courtesy some day, as I have no doubt we shall meet again.”

“Rest assured of that,” rejoined Deweese, with a sinister smile. “We shall certainly meet again.”

“It is written,” returned Peret.

He looked at Deweese for a moment, and then, with a bow, withdrew from the room.

_CHAPTER IX._

THE WORM TURNS

When the door had closed behind the detective, Deweese walked across the room and put his ear to the keyhole.

He heard the shrill chatter of Sing Tong Fat as he let Peret out of the house, and the slam of the front door when he closed it behind him. Heaving a sigh of relief, Deweese threw himself into a chair. The strain through which he had just come had been terrific. Ordinarily, he would have found a battle of wits with the detective much to his liking, for it was for just such games as this that he lived. But his experience with the Whispering Thing had left his nerves in such a state that he felt he had been no match for the Frenchman.

Nevertheless, now that he was at least temporarily unembarrassed by the detective’s presence, his brain began to function more normally and he set about evolving plans to extricate himself from his hazardous position. What a devil the Frenchman was! The man’s powers of deduction smacked of the supernatural. And yet—

He knitted his brow. Recalling to his mind his own blundering, it was not so difficult, after all, to perceive how the detective had arrived at his conclusions. He, Deweese, had laid his plans so carefully, that he had believed detection impossible. But now, viewing the working out of his plan in retrospection, he could see where he had erred, and cursed himself for his carelessness. His blunders, as Peret had implied, had been too obvious to escape notice. Should not the remarkable accuracy of Peret’s reasoning, therefore, be attributed to chance rather than to genius? The accursed dying speech of the scientist had given him the key to the mystery, and it was certainly only an ill chance that had led him to be on hand to hear it. With such a clue to work on, he reasoned, the solving of the case had simply been a matter of routine. Without this clue, the detective would have been lost. The fact that he himself had been attacked by the Whispering Thing would have shielded him from suspicion.

As he thought of his chance encounter with the bat, he shuddered. The accident in itself proved his carelessness. It had indeed almost proved his death. As Peret had said, he had been a fool to linger near the scene of his crime, but he had been so sure, so confident, that he had done his work too well to fear detection. As for Peret—well, his very frankness proved that he was something of a fool. Who but an idiot would have exposed his hand when he knew that his opponent held the strongest cards!

Of course, there was a possibility that the Frenchman was holding something back, but what if he was? Was he, Count Vincent di Dalfonzo, “mystery man” of a hundred _aliases_ and acknowledged by the police to be the cleverest international crook outside of prison bars, to be deprived of his liberty and a fortune by an imbecile of a private detective?

He laughed, and his laugh did not sound pleasant. After all, he had the formula, and the game was not yet lost. His blunders had not been as bad as they might have been. He would have been arrested at once, he argued, had Peret believed that there was even the slightest chance of convicting him. It only remained for him to make one imperative move, and then sit tight. The Frenchman was bluffing, or perhaps he was laying another of his diabolical traps. Well, he should see!

After fortifying himself with a stiff drink of whisky from the flask in the table drawer, he tapped the hand-bell on the table, and Sing Tong Fat, as if he had been awaiting the summons, entered the room with noiseless tread.

“Did you let that blankety-blank Frenchman out?” demanded Deweese.

“_Tchèe, tchée_,” chattered Sing Tong Fat. “He gone. Me watchee him glo dlown stleet. He allee samee tam fool clazy man. He say he blowee topee head off. _Hoi, hoi._” He drew one of the silken sleeves of his blouse across his face and looked at his master anxiously. “He say polis alle lound house in stleet, _Fan-Fu_. He talkee allee samee Victrolee—”

“The house is still under surveillance, is it?” observed Deweese, wrinkling his brow. “Well, so much the better. We work best when we work cautiously, and we are not likely to be incautious when we know we are watched.”

He lighted a fresh cigarette and gazed reflectively at the thread of smoke that curled upward from the lighted end. The drink of whisky had cleared his brain, and, alert, feverishly bright-eyed, every nerve in tune, he was now the man who for years had matched wits with the continental police and eluded them at every turn. Sing Tong Fat, well aware of the seriousness of the situation, shuffled his feet uneasily and waited, with an anxious look on his face, for his “master” to speak.

“Sing Tong Fat,” said Deweese, finally, “you and I have been friends and coworkers for many years. We have associated in many dangerous enterprises and I have always been liberal when it came to a division of the spoils. As we have shared the pleasures of our adventures, so too have we shared their dangers. I feel it only fair to tell you, therefore, that our peril has never been so great as it is now. Unless we act quickly we are doomed. You follow me, do you not?”

Sing Tong Fat touched his forehead and gravely nodded.

“It seems as if Fate has been against us from the very beginning in the Q-gas business,” resumed Deweese in an unemotional tone. “The murder of Berjet, while necessary, was unfortunate, and since then we have had one stroke of bad luck after the other. We erred in trying to kill the French detective in the manner we did. He should have been knifed, swiftly, surely, silently. The bat that I instructed you to put in his room failed to accomplish his death and gave him a clue which, if we are not careful, may prove to be our undoing. Most important of all, both of us have been recognized. So you can realize how serious the situation is.”

“I await thy command, O Illustrious Master,” said the Chinaman gravely, in his native tongue.

Deweese, as if he took this for granted, nodded and proceeded:

“Of the two of us you have the most cunning, and you therefore stand the better chance of eluding the police. This is not flattery; it is wisdom I have acquired through the years of my association with you. You are as elusive as a phantom when at large, and, when in the toils, as slippery as an eel. Execution of the plan I have formed, therefore, I am going to entrust to you. It is very doubtful if I could slip through the cordon of police around the house but I think that you may be able to do so, and it is very necessary that one of us should. Here, then, is what I want you to do:

“The soviet agent, No. 29, is waiting in New York for the Q-gas formula. He is stopping at the Alpin Hotel. The formula is locked in a safe-deposit box in the Exporter’s Bank in this city. The box was rented by me under the name of John G. McGlynn. I want you to take the first train to New York and get No. 29 to return to Washington with you. It is too risky for you to try to telegraph him.

“I will give you a paper authorizing him to open the box and remove the formula. The formula is to be replaced with fifty thousand dollars in gold, the second and final installment of the price No. 29 agreed to pay for the secret.

“After the exchange, which must take place in your presence, you are to rejoin me here and we will settle our score with Peret, and then take steps to extricate ourselves from the net he has woven around us. The most important thing now is the formula. Once we have gotten rid of that, we can doubtless make our get-away. We have done so many times in the past under circumstances almost as trying as the present ones, and we can doubtless do so again.

“What do you think of the plan, Sing? It is filled with danger, but—if you can think of a better one, I should be glad to hear it.”

“I agree with you as to the danger,” rejoined the Chinaman in a strange voice, and then, very suddenly, he pressed the muzzle of an automatic against Deweese’s temple.

With his free hand he then swept the wax wrinkles from his face and grinned. Deweese, in spite of the proximity of the automatic, recoiled. The man was not Sing Tong Fat. He was _Jules Peret_!

“Move at your peril, _Monsieur_,” warned the detective. Then, raising his voice, “Hello, major!” he shouted.

The door swung open, and Major Dobson, accompanied by Detective Sergeant Strange and Harvey Bendlow, entered the room. Behind them came O’Shane and Frank, dragging between them Sing Tong Fat, the latter bound and gagged and minus his skull cap and outer clothing which, needless to say, now adorned the head and body of the mirthful French detective.

“Did you hear the conversation, Major?” cried Peret gleefully.

“Every word of it,” declared Dobson, much gratified at the success of Peret’s stratagem. “Sergeant Strange and I were watching through a crack in the door and heard and saw all. The stenographer in the hall has it all down. The jig is up, Mr. _Alias_ Deweese,” he added, turning to the international agent. “Your goose is cooked, and the mystery of the ‘invisible monster’ is a thing of the past.”

“You devil!” shouted Deweese hoarsely, glaring at the Frenchman; “you have trapped me!”

“So I have,” agreed Peret, wiping the yellow stain from his face with a handkerchief. “But did I not promise you that I would do so? Ah, _Monsieur_, if you but knew what it cost me to keep my promise! Did I not have to sacrifice my hair and beautiful mustache this morning? Still, the wig and false mustache I wore before I donned Sing Tong Fat’s regalia looked very natural, did they not? They must have, since they deceived you, my friend. But you should see my head without a covering! it looks like the egg of the ostrich.”

He pressed Sing Tong Fat’s skull-cap down more firmly on his head and laughed heartily.

“_Ma foi_,” he continued, as he removed from his face the little pads of wax that had given his eyes an almond slant, “I almost feel tempted to make my present impersonation permanent. Sing is such a handsome and charming man—which doubtless explains why he fought so hard to retain his identity. When he was seized by my good friends in the vestibule, as he opened the door to let me out awhile ago, he was an astonished and infuriated man. He fought, hissed and scratched like the cat of the alley. And how he glared at them when they divested him of his clothing and helped me to make up my face to look like his own. Look at him glaring at me now!

“My colleagues say I am a mimic and make-up artist of the first order, and when I think how beautifully I deceived you, _M. le Comte di Dalfonzo_, I am almost persuaded that they are right.”

THE END.

_Strange, Indeed, Are the Possibilities of the Human Mind. A Weird Example Is Found in_

THE DEATH CELL

_By_ F. K. MOSS

“Man is by nature an experimenter,” argued my friend, Dr. Armand, a psychologist of some repute, “and he is steadily delving into the Unknown and bringing to light knowledge that is often appalling in its intricacy of concept.

“He gathers about him a few relatively simple pieces of apparatus and discovers the existence of particles infinitely smaller than the most minute object visible under the ultra-microscope. He measures its size, mass, electrical charge, and in truth finds out more about it than he knows of visible objects. All of this he learns about matter that he can never even hope to see with his naked eye. The simple but marvelous instrument, the spectroscope, tells him of the composition of the stars. It told him that upon the sun there is an element unknown upon this earth; he called it helium, and later discovered and isolated the gas after first finding it on a body millions of miles away. Beautiful indeed, is modern science!”

Armand paused for a moment as if more fully to comprehend the scope of the subject, and then continued:

“But the most refined and sensitive piece of apparatus, if I may call it that, and about which so little is understood, is the human brain. A vast amount of research has been done along the lines of psychology by many able men and the data has been formulated into several well established hypotheses, and yet”—he stretched out his arms in a vague sort of gesture—“how little we really know about the brain!”

We had met, as had been our custom, at Armand’s apartment to enjoy an afternoon together and to discuss old times and friends. I must confess, with all due respect to the Doctor, that the subject was often soon changed into a scientific lecture by him on his favorite theme, psychology. I really enjoyed these informal talks immensely, for there is no more entertaining speaker than the scholarly Armand.

I nodded. “Yes, I suppose so, but it seems a natural consequence—the brain. How can the brain be studied and mathematically analyzed like—well, mechanics, for example?”

“Perhaps that is not such an impossibility as it would seem,” said Armand. “In the past the whole proposition has been studied conceiving of the brain as a matter quite as abstract as the ‘soul.’ The more recent school of investigation has attacked the problem, bearing in mind that, after all, the functioning of the brain might be governed by the same laws of physics that can be universally applied elsewhere.

“The application of the electron theory is not absurd in the least. However, all research must be based upon the axiom, ‘If an occurrence can be made to take place under certain conditions, then the repetition of those conditions should invariably produce the same occurrence.’ As yet this fact has not been established firmly in the case of the brain.

“I have,” he continued, “just finished obtaining the data on the most absorbing case I have ever had the opportunity to study. The data was available only in fragments obtained from various sources, and in many places I have been forced to bridge the gaps by drawing purely from my conception, or imagination, of what took place.”

I was deeply interested in Dr. Armand’s work, particularly in a case which he deemed so extraordinary, and I urged him to relate the thing in some detail.

“The first part of the amazing affair is of common knowledge and varies little from many other cases on record. However, the weirdest and most intensely absorbing episode began after the rest of the world conceded the whole unfortunate affair closed forever. Perhaps it would have been closed had the principal actor been but slightly different in mentality, or even in a different mood at the crucial hour. Potentially, there might be many possibilities of such an occurrence, but the probability of the combination of the required circumstances at the critical hour, is infinitesimal. Even the exact repetition of the conditions might not necessarily produce the same results.”

Dr. Armand then related the story as he conceived it, prefacing his remarks with the statement:

“If the reactions of what we term the abnormal mind could only be chronicled, we would stand aghast at what would be written.”

DR. ARMAND’S STRANGE NARRATIVE

The friendship of James McKay and William Larson was a source of wonder and pleasure to their mutual friends and acquaintances. Such was the close companionship of the two men that they were often laughingly referred to as “David and Jonathan.”

Each regarded the other with pride, respect, and understanding. Possibly there could not have been found a more glorious example of the love of one man for another than this one. Certainly few, if any, would have been so mentally constituted as to produce reactions which would lead to such terrible results.

McKay had met Larson some six years previous through his newspaper work, both being on the staff of a Denver newspaper. Strangely, in view of their later friendship, neither was particularly attracted to the other until some time later.

On this occasion McKay had been asked to “sit in” a card game at Larson’s apartment, which he willingly did, for games of chance were attractive to McKay. The party lasted nearly the entire night, and upon breaking up, Larson offered to share his room with McKay, as the latter lived at some distance.

What drew the two men together is impossible to say, but their friendship must have ripened quickly, for the next evening found McKay established permanently as a roommate of Larson.

In appearance, if their expressions were analyzed, the two men were strikingly alike; enough so to be readily taken for brothers. Both were of a slender athletic build, dark complexioned, and with sharp, clean-cut features—sportsmen, in every sense of the word.

In character, however, there was much difference. McKay, the younger, was an impulsive, quick-acting and confident sort of fellow, easily offended, but correspondingly quick to accept an apology. While clever in many respects, he was not given to concentrated and painstaking study.

This trait was evident from his writing—original, snappy, entertaining, but often lacking in fine details of accuracy. Larson, on the other hand, was of a more conservative type, slower but more positive in his actions, and of a nature that inquired into things in a thorough and precise fashion.

Such was the well-known friendship of the two that great was the surprise of all who knew McKay when, his face black with anger, he entered the barroom of the Palace Hotel and demanded:

“Where’s that damned Larson?”

Friends at once tried to ascertain the trouble, and also to urge him to return to his home, as he had evidently been drinking heavily. But McKay was in no mood to be pacified by his friends.

“Don’t interfere in my affairs!” he snarled.

Then he ordered a drink, swallowed it at a gulp, and then seated himself in a far corner of the room.

McFadden, a close friend of both Larson and McKay, went over to him and, linking his arm in McKay’s in a hearty and jovial manner, attempted to take him away. McKay turned on him so savagely that he gave it up, resolving to find Larson and learn the reason for McKay’s anger.

As McKay only sat and watched and waited, his eyes blazed with a deadly gleam.

* * * * *

McKay had become, as Larson expressed it, hypnotized by and infatuated with a really beautiful but altogether shallow and irresponsible sort of woman. The affair had caused Larson a great deal of annoyance, as McKay would, at times, become extraordinarily cheerful and then sink into spells of despondency so sullen and irritable that even the quiet-natured Larson found it impossible to live with him.

These moods, as Larson well knew, were occasioned by Miss Conway’s treatment of Jim. Her influence over McKay seemed as unlimited as it was magical. Larson had tried to reason with Jim, and had tried to convince him that Miss Conway did not care seriously for him or any one else except herself. But all his efforts produced no other effect than to kindle new passion in McKay.

On the evening mentioned, McKay had asked permission to call at her home, but was refused, she pleading a previous engagement. For some unknown reason (the guiding hand of fate, for those who believe in fate), he walked out to her home, and as he drew near he saw Larson—his old pal, Bill Larson—enter the home of Miss Conway!

For a moment he stood as if stunned. Of all persons, Bill was the last he would have suspected.

Then it all became plain to him—Bill had tried to alienate the girl’s love!

Slowly, listlessly, McKay turned and retraced his steps to his room. He sat there a long while in the dark and let his mind become polluted with the poison of an insane jealousy, while he saturated his system and dulled his conscience with whisky.

About eleven he rose, placed a gun in his pocket, and started for the hotel where he and Larson often met in the evening. As he walked, his mind became closed to reason, closed to his regard for his friend, closed to everything except that Larson had double-crossed him. As he sat and waited in the barroom his brain focused itself on this one point until it had taken possession of him.

He had been there about a half hour when Larson appeared, laughing and chatting with some friends. Bill was in great spirits, for he had accomplished, that night, the thing he had long sought. Miss Conway had been very reasonable and had promised that she would cause McKay no more anxiety.

McFadden and a few others hastened at once toward him to tell him about McKay. But they were too late, for Larson, espying McKay, sang out:

“Hello, Jim, old scout! Come over and ‘hist’ one with us!”

McKay jumped up and strode over to the bar, his eyes glittering and his mouth twitching with hatred.

“You damn——!” and he leveled an accusing finger at Larson.

“Jim!” cried Larson, “what’s wrong?” Larson was greatly shocked and distressed over the condition of his friend, and he overlooked, if he heard, the insult hurled at him.

“So that was what you wanted?” McKay snarled.

“My God, Jim, what is it?”

“You may have beaten me, but you will never, never get her!” And a stream of fire leapt from McKay’s gun and Larson dropped to the floor, uttering but one word—“Jim!”

The weapon dropped from McKay’s limp hand, and his face was ashen as he gazed, speechlessly, at the bleeding and lifeless body of his best friend on earth.

He slowly turned away, and later surrendered himself to the authorities.

The tragic affair caused a great deal of comment. Some three weeks after the murder the case was brought to trial and attracted widespread interest. The dingy West Side courtroom was crowded to capacity. Friends, acquaintances, business men, curiosity seekers, fought for seats.

Considerable difficulty was encountered in the selection of a jury. The popularity of the murdered man, as well as the defendant, made it hard to find an unbiased yet capable juryman.

After that, however, the trial was brief, the end coming with almost startling suddenness. The state’s case was plain and simple: The evidence was overwhelmingly against McKay, and the situation was not improved by his refusal to offer any defense.

His attorney put up the plea of temporary insanity. His arguments held weight. The plea was eloquent and logical, and probably would have been a deciding factor had not McKay himself, at the conclusion of the address, risen—and, to the dumbfounded court and attorney, refused to accept insanity as a defense.

The jury was out fifty minutes and returned a verdict of “guilty in the first degree,” and recommended the death penalty. All eyes were turned toward McKay, who remained perfectly emotionless.

The judge then pronounced the death sentence on James McKay.

* * * * *

The friends of McKay were surprised at the severity of the penalty. Especially dejected over the outcome were McFadden, a brother newspaper man; Kirk, an oil operator, and Barnard, a young Medic, for these three, with McKay and Larson, had formed what they termed the “gang.” Now one of the five was dead and another was sentenced to be hung.

They at once demanded a new trial, but it was refused. Scarcely could the men refrain from emotion when McKay asked them and his attorney to settle up his worldly affairs. As he was without a family, he willed all his property to his three friends, and even mentioned in some detail a few personal effects he wanted each to have.

Of all present, McKay was the least affected by the scene. His voice and movements were those of an automaton rather than that of a human being. Indeed, he was practically such and had been so since the death of Larson.

After attending to the last detail of his worldly affairs he rose and silently shook the hands of his friends. Accompanied by two plain clothesmen, handcuffed wrist to wrist, he left them and started on his last trip to Canon City. He had often visited that little Colorado city, and had spent many a pleasant time there. He requested the officers to drive down Seventeenth Street.

At one end was the golden dome of the State Capitol, brilliantly aglow from the crimson rays of the setting sun; at the other was the station, dark against the purple, snow-capped Rockies.

As he neared the station he looked long and sadly at the huge arch erected at the entrance. The word _Mizpath_ was blazoned across the arch.

* * * * *

The utmost consideration was shown McKay by the prison authorities, who were well acquainted with the young reporter. The Warden met him at the office and personally took him to the death cell.

The door clamped shut and the bolts shot in place with metallic harshness, and the law began to exact its penalty as it had done in the Dark Ages—caging him in with stone and steel.

Five days passed, long grinding days and longer nights, for sleep no longer supplied periods of relaxation. His friends were agreeably surprised when they visited him a few days later to find him in an apparently cheerful frame of mind. He talked of Larson in the freest sort of manner. He delighted in dwelling upon the characteristics of his late friend. More and more, as the days passed by, did he like to discuss Larson. He would relate incident after incident in the life of the latter which, due to the closeness of their friendship, he knew quite as well as his own.

As to his impending execution, he seemed surprisingly unconcerned. Calmly and without bitterness, McKay waited for justice to take its course.

* * * * *

Barnard and McFadden were silently playing pinochle, while Kirk stared moodily out the window at the cold and drizzling rain.

The spirits of the men were at low ebb and they had met that Wednesday evening only through force of habit. Efforts to liven up the evening had been made, but with no enthusiasm, and it promised to be as dull as the weather outside.

“Why not!” suddenly muttered Kirk, half to himself and half aloud.

Barnard and McFadden turned around and eyed their companion curiously. Kirk went over to his desk and started searching for something.

Reseating himself, he read and re-read the newspaper clipping he had taken from the desk. The expression on his face was so strange that the pinochle game was abandoned and his friends attempted to learn the cause of his unusual behavior.

“What is the matter with you?” demanded McFadden, somewhat impatiently.

“Read that!” and Kirk forced the clipping into McFadden’s hand.

The latter glanced at it briefly, then gave it his undivided attention and then passed it over to Barnard, who was exceedingly impatient to read it after noting its effect upon McFadden.

Barnard’s expression instantly changed from one of curiosity to one of great seriousness. Kirk looked at McFadden in an effort to appraise the effect of the article, and read an excitement equal to his own. Together they turned to Barnard, who read aloud:

“CHICAGO, MARCH 8: The startling disclosure was made today by
Chicago detectives that associates of ‘Red’ Murphy, gunman, who
was hanged this morning, had all but succeeded in restoring
Murphy to life! The request was made and granted for the body
immediately after being taken from the scaffold. The body was
placed in an ambulance and whirled away. Inside the ambulance,
hot blankets, pulmotor and restoratives were applied until
Murphy began to breathe again. The desperate attempt was
futile, however, as Murphy died a few minutes after being
revived.”

For at least fifteen minutes after Barnard finished not a word was spoken. Finally Kirk turned to Barnard.

“You are a doctor. What about it?”

Barnard deliberated. “Yes, it might be done if the neck was not broken by the drop. If such was the case, death would be produced by strangulation.”

Gone was the boredom of the evening, and in its place was created a plan that was to write additional chapters beyond the “Finis” placed on the case of James McKay by the state. Throughout the entire night they discussed the plan—accepting and rejecting it time and time again.

There were many phases to be considered. The probability that McKay would be hanged without having his neck broken finally became the crux of the argument. Kirk suggested a plan. McFadden, as a newspaper man, would have access to the death chamber; the rope could be shortened and the knot fixing it to the scaffold could be arranged so that it would slip a bit, thereby easing the shock of the drop.

McFadden immediately protested, and refused to consider such a move. It would be torture for McKay. Barnard said:

“I could give McKay a ‘shot’ that would dull any pain produced.”

“Jim would not stand for a hypo.”

“He would not notice it, in the excitement and confusion of being bound.”

Throughout the discussion of the proposed plan, the possibility of legal consequences for themselves was not considered. They were playing for the life of a friend and the ethics of the methods were of secondary importance.

By morning they had formulated and agreed upon a definite plan of procedure, and before separating they spent a few moments in anticipating the joy of the reunion, if they were successful. Although McKay had taken the life of an equally close friend, so well did they understand the conditions that they extended their sympathy rather than censure.

Day by day the details of the plan were carried out. Each was assigned a definite part of the work to be done. McFadden spent all the time he dared spend at the penitentiary. He familiarized himself with the equipment of capital punishment. He studied the tying of knots; he experimented and found the best possible way to adjust a rope so that the shock of the drop would be taken up as smoothly as possible.

Nor could a more zealous medical student be found than Barnard. He sought out every possible reference on the subject, prepared emergency equipment to the last detail.

The day before the execution, McFadden and Barnard left for Canon City, Kirk remaining in Denver. That night Kirk got out McKay’s suitcase and started packing it.

* * * * *

McKay was the center of the solemn little group that, with precise movement, passed down the steel corridors. They entered the death chamber, and it was McKay who sought to cheer his friends.

He stepped upon the trap, and the officials bound his wrists to his thighs with wide leather straps. He laughed and joked with his friends, who could not force a laugh from their dry set lips. Then, while the hangman stood waiting with the black hood, the chaplain offered up a few words in prayer.

McFadden stepped up and bade his friend farewell. Barnard then came up and in a strained manner clapped McKay on the shoulder and said, “So long, old scout,” and then stepped down, quickly concealing a small hypodermic syringe in his pocket.

Barnard and McFadden left the room and waited just outside, where they exchanged significant glances. Each knew the other had not failed in his task. A few seconds later they heard the trap drop, and for eleven excruciating minutes—an eternity—they waited.

The prison physician pronounced McKay dead and they returned. The body was cut down quickly, then turned over to Barnard and placed in a waiting ambulance, and whirled away.

Once again the experiment was being tried.

The long chance won. After a desperate effort Barnard’s work was rewarded by a slight and uncertain breathing by McKay.

McFadden noticed this, and scarcely could refrain from shouting with joy. Barnard, however, quickly assured him that the results as yet were far from certain.

The body reached the mortuary and, by well-laid plans and judicious selection of undertakers, was placed on a bed rather than the marble slab of the embalmer. Barnard watched his “patient” with close attention, while McFadden hastened to telegraph Kirk, who was waiting in Denver.

The three friends were gathered about McKay when the latter regained consciousness after hours of quiet and restful sleep. McKay opened his eyes—shut them—then, with eyes wide open, hand on his forehead, he gazed in a glassy manner about the room. His whole body quivered for a few seconds, then relaxed, and then he spoke in a hoarse and mechanical tone.

“What—” His eyes wandered about and his words became inarticulate. Finally:

“What—what has happened?”

“Steady, old man,” said Barnard. “Everything is O. K. You came out fine.”

Again McKay stared. “Came out? Came out of what?”

“Don’t you realize—”

Barnard interrupted Kirk, and with a look warned McFadden to remain quiet.

“Never mind, old boy. Rest up a bit, and then we’ll explain.”

McKay was not satisfied. He asked: “Where is Jim—Jim McKay?”

“_What!_”

The three friends riveted their eyes on McKay, and slowly, first with Barnard, an expression of horror spread over their faces as they understood what had happened. The shock of being launched into eternity, only to be snatched back by his friends, had, as the law demanded, blotted out the life of McKay—_and they had brought back William Larson!_

* * * * *

Armand finished, and I turned over in my mind many questions that wanted answering.

“Is there any explanation of the transition of the personality, or soul of McKay, to that of Larson?”

“Yes,” said Armand. “The brain is composed of two hemispheres, one of which receives impressions and is the seat of thinking. The other hemisphere remains thoughtless. Undoubtedly, after the normal section became somewhat paralyzed by the melancholia of those terrible nights alone in the death cell the thoughtless section must have received impressions. You will remember that, following his melancholia, McKay desired above all to talk of Larson, and in dwelling on this the usually inactive hemisphere probably received its impressions.”

“Do you believe that he will always remain as Larson?” I asked.

“It is my belief that he will. He says that he is Larson, and he acts the life of Larson. Impossible as it may sound, I believe that exactly six years from the day of his execution, McKay, as Larson, will die—a victim of auto-suggestion and the vividness of his imagination.”

_Ghastly Retribution Befell the Victim of_

THE DEVIL PLANT

_By_ LYLE WILSON HOLDEN

It was the last straw! Injury upon injury I had borne without a murmur, but now I determined to revenge myself upon Silvela Castelar, let the cost be what it would. His malevolent influence had pursued me since early boyhood, and it was he who caused every fond hope of my life to turn to ashes before its realization.

Long ago, when we were boys in school together, his evil work began. We were both of Spanish blood, and both, having lost our parents in childhood, were being educated by our respective guardians at one of the famous boys’ schools of England.

Nothing was more natural in the circumstances, than that we should become chums and room-mates. However, it was not long before I began to be sorry that I had entered into such close relationship with him. He was absolutely unscrupulous, and soon his escapades won him an unenviable reputation among the other students, although he always managed, by skillfully covering his trail, to stand well with the authorities of the school.

Before many weeks had passed, a particularly heinous outrage, which he had committed, set the whole school in an uproar. It could not be overlooked, and a strict investigation was started.

What was my horror to discover that his devilish ingenuity had woven a web of evidence which thoroughly enmeshed me within its coils! There was no escape; I was dismissed in disgrace from the school, and in disgrace I left England. The notoriety I received in many of the leading papers of the Kingdom made it impossible for me to enter another school or to obtain any honest employment.

I came to America, working my passage over upon a cattle ship. The years that followed were hard ones, but by sober industry I forged slowly ahead until, at last, I had bright prospects of becoming the junior partner in a large business house in Baltimore.

Then my evil genius appeared. Silvela obtained employment in our company, and by his devilish cunning soon made himself well liked and trusted.

Then one morning, a few months after he came, it was reported that a large amount of money had been stolen from the firm. Again a network of circumstantial evidence pointed indisputably in my direction.

I was arrested and brought to trial. The evidence not being entirely conclusive, the jury disagreed, and I was set free; but my career in America was forever blasted.

As soon as I could close up my affairs, I buried myself in the wilds of Australia, where I began life anew. Fortune was kind to me and I prospered. Under another name, I became a respected and honored citizen of a thriving new settlement.

Then the crowning blessing of all came when I won the love of the beautiful Mercedes, a black-eyed, olive-hued immigrant from my old province of Andalusia. Then, indeed, I was at the threshold of Heaven! But how short was my day of bliss!

Four weeks before our wedding day Silvela Castelar suddenly entered our settlement. It is useless to dwell upon that wretched period. Sufficient to say that this hellborn fiend again worked his diabolic sorcery, and Mercedes was lost to me forever.

The report came to me that Silvela, for the first time in his life, loved with a fierce, consuming passion, and that Mercedes soon would be betrothed to him. Then it was that I vowed by all that was holy that Silvela Castelar should pay in full his guilty debt, even though, as a result, my soul should sink into stygian blackness.

* * * * *

Why do I write this? Because I take a grim pleasure in telling of my revenge, and because I want the world to know that I had just provocation. I am not afraid. Life or death—it matters little which is my portion now. When this is read I shall be far from the haunts of men.

Silvela Castelar thought I was a fool. It suited my purpose that he should continue to think so. I treated him as a bosom friend, and he, poor idiot, thought I never guessed that he was the instigator of the ruin which drove me from England, wrecked my business career in America, and in the end left me desolate, without hope of ever enjoying the blessings of love.

So, while we smoked, read, or hunted together, I brooded upon my wrongs, and racked by brain for some method by which I could accomplish that which was now the sole absorbing motive of my life. Then chance threw across my path the instrument of my vengeance.

One day, while I was wandering, desolate and alone, through a wild and unexplored part of the country, I came upon one of the rarest and at the same time one of the most terrible species of the vegetable kingdom ever discovered. It is known as the octopus plant, called by the natives “the devil tree.” When I saw it my heart gave a throb of exultation, for I knew that my search was ended; the means by which I could accomplish my purpose was now at hand.

Silvela and I had but one passion in common—an intense love for botanical investigation. I knew that he would be interested when he heard of my strange discovery, and I believed that his knowledge of the plant was not sufficient to make him cautious. On the evening of the next day but one, as we sat smoking, I broached the subject.

“Silvela, in the old days you used to be considerably wrapped up in the study of plant life. Are you still interested?”

“Somewhat,” he replied, and then his eyes narrowed craftily. “I exhausted the interesting possibilities of most of the known plants of the world a number of years ago. Lately I have found ‘the light that lies in women’s eyes’ a subject of greater interest.”

I could have strangled him where he sat; but a lifetime of trouble has taught me to conceal my feelings. I betrayed no emotion.

“I’ll venture that there is one plant which you have never studied at first hand.”

“What is that?” he asked, with mild curiosity.

“A plant,” I continued, “found only in the most inaccessible places of the earth. Probably it could be seen only in the wildest parts of Sumatra or Australia, and then scarcely once in a lifetime.”

He was now thoroughly aroused.

“What is the family of this wonderful shrub?” he asked. “I have a dim recollection of having heard of it. Let me see—isn’t it called—”