The trained fingers closed on the handle--and on the instant, as though in startled amazement, shifted to the dial.They came back to the handle--a wrench--then a low, amused chuckle--and the door swung open.The great, unwieldy thing was only a monumental bluff!
It not only had not been locked, but it COULD NOT be locked--the mechanism was out of order, the bolts could not be moved by so much as a hair's breadth!
Still chuckling, Jimmie Dale shot the flashlight's ray into the interior of the safe--and the chuckle died on his lips, and into his face came a look of strained bewilderment.Inside, everything was in chaos, books, papers, a miscellany of articles, as though they had first been ruthlessly pulled out on the floor, then gathered up in an armful and crammed back inside again.For an instant he did not move, and then a queer, hard, mirthless smile drew down the corners of his mouth.With a sort of bitter, expectant nod of his head, he turned the light upon the door of the safe.Yes, there were the scratches that the tools had left; and, as though in sardonic jest, the holes, where the steel bit had bored, were plugged with putty and rubbed over with some black substance that was still wet and came off, smearing his finger, as he touched it.
It could not have been done long ago, then! How long? A half hour--an hour? Not more than that!
Mechanically he closed the door of the safe, rose to his feet and, almost heedless of noise now, the flashlight ray dancing before him, he jumped across to the old-fashioned cabinet and pulled the door open.Here, as within the safe, all inside, plain evidence of thorough, if hasty, search, was scattered and tossed about in hopeless confusion.
He shut the cabinet door; the flashlight went out; and he stood like a man stunned, the sense of some abysmal disaster upon him.He was too late! The game was up! If it had ever been here, the package was gone now--GONE! The Crime Club had been here before him!
"The game was up! The game was up!"--his mind seemed to keep on repeating that.The Crime Club had beaten him by an hour, at most, and had been here, and had searched.It was strange, though, that they should have been at such curious pains to cover their tracks by leaving the room in order, by such paltry efforts to make the safe appear untouched when the first glance that was at all critical would disclose immediately what had been done! Why should they need to cover their tracks at all; or, if it was necessary, why, above all, in such a pitifully inadequate way! His mind barked back to the same ghastly refrain--"the game was up!"NO! Not yet! There was still a chance! There was still Spider Jack! Suppose, in spite of their search, they had failed to find the package! Jimmie Dale's lips set in a thin line, as he started abruptly toward the door.There was still that chance, and one thing was grimly certain--Spider Jack would, at least, show him where the package HAD BEEN!
And then, halfway to the door, he halted suddenly, and stood still--listening.An electric bell was ringing loudly, imperiously, somewhere upstairs.Followed almost immediately the sound of some one, Spider Jack presumably, moving hurriedly about overhead; and then, a moment later, steps coming down the staircase in the adjoining room.
Jimmie Dale drew back, flattening himself against the wall.Spider Jack entered the room, stumbled across it, in the darkness, fumbled for the door that led into his little shop, opened it, passed through, fumbled around in there again, for matches evidently, then lighted a gas jet in the store, and, going to the street door, opened it.
Jimmie Dale had edged along the wall a little to a position where he had an unobstructed view through the open doorway connecting the shop and the room in which he stood.Spider Jack, in trousers and shirt, hastily donned, no doubt, as he had got out of bed, was standing in the street doorway, and beyond him loomed the forms of several men.Spider Jack stepped aside to allow his visitors to enter--and suddenly, a cry barely suppressed upon his lips, Jimmie Dale involuntarily strained forward.Three men had entered, but his eyes were fixed, fascinated, upon only one--the first of the three.
Was it an hallucination? Was he mad---dreaming? It was Hilton Travers, THE CHAUFFEUR--the man whom he could have sworn he had last seen dead, lashed in that chair, in that ghastly death chamber of the Crime Club!
"Rather rough on you, Spider, to pull you out of bed at this hour,"the chauffeur was saying apologetically.
"Oh, that's all right, seein' it's you, Travers," Spider Jack answered, gruffly amiable."Only I was kind of lookin' for you last night.""I know," the chauffeur replied; "but I couldn't connect with my friends here.Shake hands with them, Spider--Bob Marvin--Harry Stead.""Glad to know you, gents," said Spider Jack, with a handgrip apiece.
The chauffeur lowered his voice a little.
"I suppose we're alone here, eh, Spider? Yes? Well, then, you know what I've come for--that package--Marvin and Stead, here, are the ones that are in on it with me.Get it for me, will you, Spider?""Sure--Mr.Johansson!" Spider grinned."Sure! Come on into the back room and make yourselves comfortable.I'll be mabbe five minutes, or so."Jimmie Dale's brain was whirling.What did it mean? He could not seem to understand.His mind seemed to refuse its functions.
Travers, the chauffeur--ALIVE! He drew in his breath sharply.That curtain in the corner! He must see this out now! They were coming!
Quick, noiseless, he stole along the side of the wall, reached the corner, and slipped in behind the curtain, as Spider Jack, striking a match, entered the room.
Spider Jack lighted the gas, and, as the others followed behind him, waved them toward the chairs around the table.