Gold of the Gods Part 15

De Moche glanced at his watch. "I have a lecture at this hour," he remarked, evidently glad of an excuse to terminate the interview.

As he left, Kennedy accompanied him to the door, careful himself to step over the mat.

"h.e.l.lo, what's new?" we heard a voice in the hall.

It was Lockwood, who had come up from downtown. Catching sight of de Moche, however, he stopped short. The two young men met face to face.

Between them pa.s.sed a glance of unconcealed hostility, then each nodded stiffly.

De Moche turned to Kennedy as he pa.s.sed down the hall. "Perhaps it may have been sent to divert suspicion--who can tell?" he whispered.

Kennedy nodded appreciatively, noting the change.

At the sound of Lockwood's voice both Norton and I had taken a step further after them out into the hall, Norton somewhat in advance. As de Moche disappeared for his lecture, Kennedy turned to me from Lockwood and caught my eye. I read in his glance that fell from me to the mat that he wished me quietly to abstract the piece of paper which he had placed under it. I bent down and did so without Lockwood seeing me.

"Why was he here?" demanded Lockwood, with just a trace of defiance in his voice, as though he fancied the meeting had been framed.

"I have been showing this to every one who might help me," returned Kennedy, going back into the laboratory after giving me an opportunity to dispose of the shoe-prints.

He handed the anonymous letter and the other warnings to the young soldier of fortune, with a brief explanation.

"Why don't they come out into the open, whoever they are?" commented Lockwood, laying the papers down carelessly again on the table. "I'll meet them--if they mean me."

"Who?" asked Kennedy.

Lockwood faced Norton and ourselves.

"I'm not a mind reader," he said significantly. "But it doesn't take much to see that some one wants to throw a brick at me. When I have anything to say I say it openly. Inez Mendoza without friends just now would be a mark, wouldn't she?"

His strong face and powerful jaw were set in a menacing scowl. He would be a bold man who would have come between Lockwood and the lady under the circ.u.mstances.

"You are confident of Mr. Whitney?" inquired Kennedy.

"Ask Norton," replied Lockwood briefly. "He knew him long before I did."

Norton smiled quietly. "Mr. Kennedy should know what my opinion of Mr.

Whitney is, I think," replied Norton confidently.

"I trust that you will succeed in running these blackmailers down,"

pursued Lockwood, still standing. "If I did not have more than I can attend to already since the murder of Mendoza I'd like to take a hand myself. It begins to look to me, after reading that letter, as though there was nothing too low for them to attempt. I shall keep this latest matter in mind. If either Mr. Whitney or myself get any hint, we'll turn it over to you."

Norton left shortly after Lockwood, and Kennedy again picked up the letter and scanned it. "I could learn something, I suppose, if I a.n.a.lyzed this printing," he considered, "but it is a tedious process.

Let me see that envelope again. H-m, postmarked by the uptown sub-station, mailed late last night. Whoever sent it must have done so not very far from us here. Lockwood seemed to take it as though it applied to himself very readily, didn't he? Much more so than de Moche.

Only for the fact that the fibres show it to be on paper similar to the first warnings, I might have been inclined to doubt whether this was bona fide. At least, the sender must realize now that it has produced no appreciable effect--if any was intended."

Kennedy's last remark set me thinking. Could some one have sent the letter not to produce the effect apparently intended, but with the ultimate object of diverting suspicion from himself? Lockwood, at least, had not seemed to take the letter very seriously.

X

THE X-RAY READER

"I think I'll pay another visit to Whitney, in spite of all that Norton and Lockwood say about him," remarked Kennedy, considering the next step he would take in his investigation.

Accordingly, half an hour later we entered his Wall Street office, where we were met by a clerk, who seemed to remember us.

"Mr. Whitney is out just at present," he said, "but if you will be seated I think I can reach him by telephone."

As we sat in the outer office while the clerk telephoned from Whitney's own room the door opened and the postman entered and laid some letters on a table near us. Kennedy could not help seeing the letter on top of the pile, and noticed that it bore a stamp from Peru. He picked it up and read the postmark, "Lima," and the date some weeks previous. In the lower corner, underscored, were the words "Personal--Urgent."

"I'd like to know what is in that," remarked Craig, turning it over and over.

He appeared to be considering something, for he rose suddenly, and with a nod of his head to himself, as though settling some qualm of conscience, shoved the letter into his pocket.

A moment later the clerk returned. "I've just had Mr. Whitney on the wire," he reported. "I don't think he'll be back at least for an hour."

"Is he at the Prince Edward Albert?" asked Craig.

"I don't know," returned the clerk, oblivious to the fact that we must have seen that in order to know the telephone number he must have known whether Mr. Whitney was there or elsewhere.

"I shall come in again," rejoined Kennedy, as we bowed ourselves out.

Then to me he added, "If he is with Senora de Moche and they are at the Edward Albert, I think I can beat him back with this letter if we hurry."

A few minutes later, in his laboratory, Kennedy set to work quickly over an X-ray apparatus. As I watched him, I saw that he had placed the letter in it.

"These are what are known as 'low tubes,'" he explained. "They give out 'soft rays.'"

He continued to work for several minutes, then took the letter out and handed it to me.

"Now, Walter," he said brusquely, "if you will just hurry back down there to Whitney's office and replace that letter, I think I will have something that will astonish you--though whether it will have any bearing on the case remains to be seen. At least I can postpone seeing Whitney himself for a while."

I made the trip down again as rapidly as I could. Whitney was not back when I arrived, but the clerk was there, and I could not very well just leave the letter on the table again.

"Mr. Kennedy would like to know when he can see Mr. Whitney," I said, on the spur of the moment. "Can't you call him up again?"

The clerk, as I had antic.i.p.ated, went into Whitney's office to telephone. Instead of laying the letter on the table, which might have excited suspicion, I stuck it in the letter slot of the door, thinking that perhaps they might imagine that it had caught there when the postman made his rounds.

A moment later the clerk returned. "Mr. Whitney is on his way down now," he reported.

I thanked him, and said that Kennedy would call him up when he arrived, congratulating myself on the good luck I had had in returning the letter.

"What is it?" I asked, a few minutes later, when I had rejoined Craig in the laboratory.

He was poring intently over what looked like a negative.

"The possibility of reading the contents of doc.u.ments inclosed in a sealed envelope," he replied, still studying the shadowgraph closely, "has already been established by the well-known English scientist, Dr.