The Flame Breathers

CHAPTER XIV S O S — Stay Away!

In the Bleek Street headquarters of Justice, Inc., the giant Smitty suddenly began fumbling at his belt.

“What’s wrong with ye, mon?” said Mac dourly. “Is it wee wild life ye’re entertainin’ now on that overgrown carcass of yours?”

“Wild life, nothin’!” snapped Smitty. “There’s a radio call. From the chief, most likely.”

He tuned in the ingenious little belt set.

“Smitty talking.”

The voice that came was as calm and cold as glacier water.

“This is Benson, Smitty. Listen carefully and get everything right the first time, for I may not have a chance to talk long or to repeat. I’m in the disinfecting tank of a storage warehouse on Second Avenue near Thirty-fourth Street. A white stone-front building next to a wholesale paper office—”

“You’re in what?” yelled Smitty, quick brain taking in at once the dreadful possibilities of such a prison. Then he bellowed, “We’re practically on our way. We’ll be there in ten minutes, chief — all of us—”

“No!” The voice of The Avenger seemed to crackle like an electric arc. “That is precisely what I do not want you to do. I believe the gang here has planned just such a move. Instead, you are to go to the hotel where Lorens Singer is temporarily located. You are to find a man I have reason to believe lurks around there a lot. The man is small, has peculiarly pointed ears. When I saw him last, he wore a dark-brown suit, light-brown felt hat and dark-tan shoes. His tie is wine-colored, with a slightly larger knot than most. Get that man and bring him to the warehouse. Keeping him covered, but keeping out of sight yourself, make him command the men here to leave. Then — and not before — open the tank and let me out. Understand?”

“Sure, I understand,” said Smitty breathlessly. “But who is the little guy with the sharp ears?”

“I don’t know his name.”

“Is he in with this crew? Would a command of his make them obey?”

“I think so.”

“But you’re not sure?”

“Not entirely,” came the quiet, emotionless voice.

“Sweet Samuel, chief! If I show up there with my gun on a guy that gang never even saw before and try to make the stranger tell them what to do—”

“It will be unfortunate,” said Benson crisply. “But it is a chance we must take. My calculations indicate that this man can make the gang do as he says. If my calculations are wrong… Bring him here as swiftly as you can, Smitty. And Smitty — bring my kit.”

The clever little radio went dead.

“My kit,” Benson had said. There had been no need for further explanation, such was the swift coordination between The Avenger and his aides. Smitty went into Benson’s office and grabbed what seemed to be an ordinary overnight bag.

He raced out bareheaded and got into Benson’s special sedan, which was usually at the curb waiting for anyone needing particularly fast transportation.

The sedan looked like a sedate old thing that should belong to some elderly couple from a tank town where twenty miles an hour was real speeding. But the car actually was armored like an army truck, and had well over a hundred an hour in its purring motor.

Smitty got to the hotel in ambulance time, parked half a block from it and entered a drugstore. He walked in leisurely and sat at the soda fountain.

“A coke,” he said, staring not at the clerk but out the window. The window let him see the hotel entrance.

Benson in a steel tank, helpless, as subject to death at the whim of a murder gang as any chained prisoner lying helpless under a guillotine! And all Smitty could do about it was hang around here and watch for a man with sharp ears! The man might or might not show up within the next twelve hours. He might or might not be able to save Benson. It was a thousand to one that the pale-eyed Avenger had come to the end of the trail—

Smitty was off the stool and out the door. He could move like a flyweight boxing champion when he had to, for all his great size.

A man had left the hotel doorway. The man, had Smitty known it, was Roger Bainbridge, of The Henderlin Corp. He had been with Lorens Singer for over an hour.

The man had stepped into a limousine. The sleek car had rolled off, and a taxi had suddenly darted after it. Smitty had one glimpse of a man in the cab — a fellow who looked small, though it was hard to tell because of the sitting posture, and who had queerly sharp ears.

The man the chief wanted was trailing this other fellow, who had been one of dozens going in or out of the hotel entrance and who looked like a perfectly respectable citizen.

Smitty started to hail another cab, saw the lights at the near corner go red and changed his mind.

He walked toward where the cab had stopped, three cars behind the limousine, getting there as the lights went green again.

The giant timed it beautifully. The little man’s cab was just beginning to roll when Smitty jerked open the door and slid in. He grinned at the driver, who turned when he heard the door slam. The driver, sure the giant was a friend of his passenger, turned front again and kept on going.

“Hello,” said Smitty, to the man with the pointed ears.

Then the giant dropped the persiflage. A gun had suddenly appeared in the man’s hand. But even more swiftly Smitty’s vast paw went out and grabbed the wrist behind the gun.

In such cases, Smitty had a very simple way of disarming a person. He just squeezed!

He did so now with his left hand darting out and over the man’s mouth to shut off the resultant yell of agony.

The gun dropped cozily into Smitty’s lap. He pocketed it and stared into the little fellow’s raging eyes.

“I usually take somebody as near my size as I can find,” he said. “But this time has to be an exception. Tell your man to go to Second Avenue near Thirty-fourth Street.”

“Who are you?” panted the man with the odd ears. “By what right—”

“Give him that address,” snapped Smitty, turning on the pressure again a very little.

The man hastened to obey. The cab was redirected after a shrug of the driver’s shoulders.

“What’s on Second Avenue near Thirty-fourth?” said the little man, looking so perplexed that Smitty’s heart sank.

Had The Avenger’s apparent stab into thin air about this man having something to do with the warehouse gang been a wrong one? Was the fellow merely some innocent bystander who could do Benson no more good than any other casual taxi fare in the big city?

True, the man had a gun and had drawn it. But lots of people having nothing to do with gangs carry guns; and any one of them would draw if a stranger forced a way into his cab. Even the fact that the man had been trailing somebody, might mean nothing; he could be a private detective on some job having nothing to do with Benson’s deadly dilemma.

“What’s on Second Avenue?” the man repeated.

“A storage warehouse,” said Smitty. “In it there’s a bunch of guys I don’t like. You’re to tell them to go home or to Coney Island or any other place a long way off.”

“You must be crazy,” said the little man. “I don’t know any men in a warehouse at that address. What kind of men?”

“Very competent killers or I miss my guess,” said the giant.

The little man’s mouth twisted.

“Oh! But look here! If I go in and try to tell such men what to do, they may… they may shoot me!”

“They may,” said Smitty. “Step on it, driver.”

“But my dear sir! You’re exposing me to death! You’re the same as murdering me.”

The cab raced down Second Avenue into the Thirties. Smitty’s eyes roamed over the cluster of buildings, looking for the storage warehouse with the white stone front. He spotted the wholesale paper office — and the warehouse next to it.

“Stop here, driver,” said the giant.

The cab stopped before the storage building. Smitty took a gun from his pocket. He seldom used a gun; his fists were preferable. But he had to act unsuspicious in the sight of the many people around. He held the gun well concealed.

“Walk ahead of me to the door,” he said. “When you get to it, just walk in. Order the first man you see to collect the others and leave. If you don’t—” He jabbed the gun hard.

“If I die it’ll be your fault,” wailed the man with the pointed ears.

But he went to the door and tried it. It wasn’t locked. Evidently the men inside were only too anxious for it to open hospitably to an intruder. The little man went in. His heel snapped against the door in a fast effort to slam it in Smitty’s face.

The effort did not succeed. Smitty’s foot was a lot larger. The giant shut it himself, softly.

There was a door leading into a darkened little office with grimy windows on the street. Smitty ducked in there.

“Stand right there,” he whispered, “in this doorway. Call to one of the men. If you don’t and if you try to leap out of range, I’ll make a sieve out of you.”

The little man was sweating. But there was raw murder in his eyes now — no longer any trace of perplexity.

However, the big fellow had him, and he knew it.

“Jake!” he called.

There were steps. Smitty crouched back farther in the shadows of the office. He saw a man who looked uncannily like a snake come up to the little fellow. Furthermore, he came up to him as if he knew him. Smitty drew a deep breath of relief. Once more The Avenger had been right in a assumption whose foundations were a complete mystery to everyone else.

“Jake,” said the little man, voice almost natural, “get the others and take them out of here for about half an hour. I want to be alone.”

“Take them out? You want to be—” exclaimed the snake-like individual. “Hey, that ain’t what I thought was to happen—”

“Take them all out! Don’t come back for half an hour. That’s an order!” said the little man crisply. He started to turn his head a bit, longingly, as if contemplating an attempt to glance at the giant concealed behind him and thus tip the gangster to his presence. But he didn’t complete the move.

“O.K., if you want it like that,” said the snaky one dubiously. “Though it looks damn funny to me.”

He went back toward the big receiving room, calling as he went. In a few minutes men began to file past the little man. And past, if they had guessed it, a giant with a gun in his hand who was the real commander behind this maneuver.

Smitty gave the gang three minutes. Then he picked the little man up by the scruff of the neck, as he’d have picked up a kitten, and carried him at arm’s length into the receiving room.

He opened the tank. Benson walked calmly, emotionlessly out. The big fellow drew a great breath and dropped his squirming burden.

“Chief—”

The little man deemed it a good time to run. He made a mistake.

He had taken three long, running steps, when a gray streak seemed to blur beside him. The Avenger’s fist went out with delicate exactness and power. It got the little man under the ear, and he went down. And out!