Guy Garrick Page 22

  CHAPTER XXII

  THE MAN HUNT

  Here we were, locked in a little room on the top floor of themysterious house. I looked out of both windows. There was no way toclimb down and it was too far to jump, especially in the uncertaindarkness. I threw myself at the door. It had been effectually braced byour captors.

  Garrick, in the meantime, had lighted the light again, and placed it bythe window.

  Forbes, now partly recovered, was rambling along, and Garrick, with oneeye on him and the other on something which he was working over in thelight, was too busy to pay much attention to my futile efforts to finda means of escape.

  At first we could not make out what it was that Forbes was trying totell us, but soon, as the fresh air in the room revived him, his voicebecame stronger. Apparently he recognised us and was trying to offer anexplanation of his presence here.

  "He kidnapped me--brought me here," Forbes was muttering. "Threedays--I've been shut up in this room."

  "Who brought you here?" I demanded sharply.

  "I don't know his name--man at the gambling place--after the raid--saidhe'd take me in his car somewhere--from the other place back ofit--last I remember--must have drugged me--woke up here--all I know."

  "You've been a prisoner, then?" I queried.

  "Yes," he murmured.

  "A likely story," I remarked, looking questioningly at Garrick who hadbeen listening but had not ceased his own work, whatever it was. "Whatare you going to do, Guy? We can't stay here and waste time over suchtalk as this while they are escaping. They must be almost to the roadnow, and turning down in the opposite direction from Dillon and hisman."

  Garrick said nothing. Either he was too busy solving our presenttroubles or he was, like myself, not impressed by Forbes' incoherentstory. He continued to adjust the little instrument which I had seenhim draw from his pocket and now recognised as the thing which lookedlike a telephone transmitter. Only, the back of it seemed to gleam witha curious brightness under the rays of the light, as he handled it.

  "They have somehow contrived to escape the effect of the bombs," he wassaying, "and have surprised us in the room on the top floor where thelight is. We are up here with a young fellow named Forbes, whom we havecaptured. He's the young man that I saw several times at the gamblingjoint and was at dinner with Warrington the night when the car wasstolen. He was pretty badly overcome by the fumes, but I've brought himaround. He either doesn't know much or won't tell what he knows. Thatdoesn't make any difference now, though. They have escaped in a car.They are leaving by the road. Wait. I'll see whether they have reachedit yet. No, it's too dark to see and they have no light on the car. Butthey must have turned. They said they were going in the directionopposite from you."

  "Well?" I asked, mystified. "What of it? I know all that, already."

  "But Dillon doesn't," replied Garrick, in great excitement now. "I knewthat we should have to have some way of communicating with himinstantly if this fellow proved to be as resourceful as I believed himto be. So I thought of the radiophone or photophone of Dr. AlexanderGraham Bell. I have really been telephoning on a beam of light."

  "Telephoning on a beam of light?" I repeated incredulously.

  "Yes," he explained, feeling now at liberty to talk since he haddelivered his call for help. "You see, I talk into this transmitter.The simplest transmitter for this purpose is a plane mirror of flexiblematerial, silvered mica or microscope glass. Against the back of thismirror my voice is directed. In the carbon transmitter of the telephonea variable electrical resistance is produced by the pressure on thediaphragm, based on the fact that carbon is not as good a conductor ofelectricity under pressure as when not. Here, the mouthpiece is just ashell supporting a thin metal diaphragm to which the mirror on the backis attached, an apparatus for transforming the air vibrations producedby the voice into light vibrations of the projected beam, which isreflected from this light here in the room. The light reflected is thusthrown into vibrations corresponding to those in the diaphragm."

  "And then?" I asked impatiently.

  "That varying beam of light shoots out of this room, and is caught bythe huge reflector which you saw me set up at the foot of that talltree which you can just see against the dark sky over there. Thatparabolic mirror gathers in the scattered rays, focusses them on theselenium cell which you saw in the middle of the reflector, and thatcauses the cell to vary the amount of electric current passing throughit from a battery of storage cells. It is connected with a very goodtelephone receiver. Every change in the beam of light due to thevibrations of my voice is caught by that receiving mirror, and theresult is that the diaphragm in the receiver over there which Dillon isholding to his ear responds. The thing is good over several hundredyards, perhaps miles, sometimes. Only, I wish it would work both ways.I would like to feel sure that Dillon gets me."

  I looked at the simple little instrument with a sort of reverence, foron it depended the momentous question of whether we should be releasedin time to pursue the two who were escaping in the automobile.

  "You'll have to hurry," continued Garrick, speaking into histransmitter. "Give the signal. Get the car ready. Anything, so long asit is action. Use your own judgment."

  There he was, flashing a message out of our prison by an invisible raythat shot across the Cimmerian darkness to the point where we knew thatour friends were waiting anxiously. I could scarcely believe it. ButGarrick had the utmost faith in the ability of the radiophone to makegood.

  "They MUST have started by this time," he cried, craning his neck outof the window and looking in every direction.

  Forbes was still rambling along, but Garrick was not paying anyattention to him. Instead, he began rummaging the room for possibleevidence, more for something to do than because he hoped to findanything, while we were waiting anxiously for something to happen.

  An exclamation from Garrick, however, brought me to his side. Tuckedaway in a bureau drawer under some soiled linen that plainly belongedto Forbes, he drew out what looked like a single blue-steel tube aboutthree inches long. At its base was a hard-rubber cap, which fittedsnugly into the palm of the hand as he held it. His first and middlefingers encircled the barrel, over a steel ring. A pull downward andthe thing gave a click.

  "Good that it wasn't loaded," Garrick remarked. "I knew what the thingwas, all right, but I didn't think the spring was as delicate as allthat. It is a new and terrible weapon of destruction of human life, onethat can be carried by the thug or the burglar and no one be the wiser,unless he has occasion to use it. It is a gun that can be concealed inthe palm of the hand. A pull downward on that spring discharges athirty-two calibre, centre fire cartridge. The most dangerous featureof it is that the gun can be carried in an upper vest pocket as afountain pen, or in a trousers pocket as a penknife."

  I looked with added suspicion now, if not a sort of respect, on theyoung man who was tossing, half conscious, on the bed. Was he, afterall, not the simple, gullible Forbes, but a real secret master of crime?

  Garrick, keen though he had been over the discovery, was in realitymuch more interested just now in the result of his radiophone message.What would be the outcome?

  I had been startled to see that almost instantly after his second callover the radiophone there seemed to rise on all sides of us lights andthe low baying of dogs.

  "What's all that?" I asked Garrick.

  "Dillon had a dozen or so police dogs shipped up here quietly,"answered Garrick, now straining his eyes and ears eagerly. "He startedthem out each in charge of an officer as soon as they arrived. I hopethey had time to get around in that other direction and close in. Thatwas what he sent the chauffeur back to see about, to make sure thatthey were placed by the man who is the trainer of the pack."

  "What kind of dogs are they?"

  "Some Airedales, but mostly Belgian sheep dogs. There is one in thepack, Cherry, who has a wonderful reputation. A great deal depends,now, on our dog-detectives."

  "But," I objected, "what good will the
y be? Our men are in anautomobile."

  "We thought of that," replied Garrick confidently. "Here they are, atlast," he cried, as a car swung up the lane from the road and stoppedwith a rush under our window. He leaned out and shouted, "Dillon--uphere--quick!"

  It was Dillon and his chauffeur, Jim. A moment later there was atremendous shifting and pulling of heavy pieces of furniture in thehall, and, as the door swung open, the honest face of the commissionerappeared, inquiring anxiously if we were all right.

  "Yes, all right," assured Garrick. "Come on, now. There isn't a minuteto lose. Send Jim up here to take charge of Forbes. I'll drive the carmyself."

  Garrick accomplished in seconds what it takes minutes to tell. Thechauffeur had already turned the car around and it was ready to start.We jumped in, leaving him to go upstairs and keep the manacled Forbessafely.

  We gained the road and sped along, our lights now lighted and showingus plainly what was ahead. The dust-laden air told us that we wereright as we turned into the narrow crossroad. I wondered how we wereever going to overtake them after they had such a start, at night, too,over roads which were presumably familiar to them.

  "Drive carefully," shouted Dillon soon, "it must be along here,somewhere, Garrick."

  A moment before we had been almost literally eating the dust the carahead had raised. Garrick slowed down as we approached a bend in theroad.

  There, almost directly in our path, stood a car, turned half across theroad and jammed up into a fence. I could scarcely believe it. It wasthe bandit's car--deserted!

  "Good!" exclaimed Dillon as Garrick brought our own car to a stop witha jerk only a few feet away.

  I looked about in amazement, first at the empty car and then into thedarkness on either side of the road. For the moment I could not explainit. Why had they abandoned the car, especially when they had everyprospect of eluding us in it?

  They had not been forced to turn out for anybody, for no other vehiclehad passed us. Was it tire trouble or engine trouble? I turned to theothers for an explanation.

  "I thought it must be about here," cried Dillon. "We had one of my menplace an obstruction in the road. They didn't run into it, which showsclever driving, but they had to turn so sharply that they ran into thefence. I guess they realised that there was no use in turning andtrying to go back."

  "They have taken to the open country," shouted Garrick, leaping up onthe seat of our car and looking about in a vain endeavour to catch somesign of them.

  All was still, save here and there the sharp, distant bark of a dog.

  "I wonder which way they went?" he asked, looking down at us.