Master of Death

CHAPTER XII. A TRAP CLOSES

THERE was a pause in the rapping at the door. Then came heavy thuds, repeated with a stern, impatient stroke. Joseph Barratini turned to Rupert Sayre. The older man’s face was aghast.

“Answer it!” whispered Sayre. “Answer it — after I have hidden.”

Springing to his feet, the young physician moved hurriedly toward a door at the side of the living room.

Doctor Barratini, trembling, gripped his arms and followed.

“What shall I do?” he questioned hopelessly.

“Go with him,” ordered Sayre. “My car is out front. I shall follow. After you have returned we can discuss what to do.”

A look of elation appeared upon Barratini’s face. He clasped Sayre’s hand; then turned toward the door where the heavy rapping was continuing its ceaseless beat.

“Just a moment!” called Barratini. “Just a moment, outside there!”

Reaching the door, Barratini paused long enough to see that Rupert Sayre was out of sight. The black-haired surgeon opened the door and stepped back.

A thin, cadaverous man stalked into the room. With swinging hand, he closed the door behind him and approached Barratini with an ugly, steady gaze.

Rupert Sayre, eyeing the situation through the crevice of the side door, was horrified by the ghastly scene. To the young physician, this exceeded the description which Barratini had given him.

The arrival was unquestionably the final criminal upon whom the famous surgeon had operated. There was recognition in Barratini’s eye, and Sayre could see him shrinking away from the corpselike visitor.

This creature was a monster — and Barratini might well be the one who had created him. Fear and remorse were registered upon the eminent surgeon’s face, and Sayre could see his body tremble. For a moment, the young doctor was ready to spring forth and grapple with the hideous visitor; then, like an automatic figure, the man stopped, and his threatening gestures ended. Drawing a hand from his pocket, he thrust an envelope toward Doctor Barratini.

The surgeon received the envelope. He faltered as he opened it. Crisp bank notes came forth in Barratini’s hands. The physician sidled across the room and inserted the money in a table drawer. The cadaverous man stalked slowly after him. Barratini turned to face this vigilant automaton who was dogging his footsteps.

“Come!”

The ugly creature uttered the summons in a harsh voice. His hand again moved toward his pocket. Sayre could see that whatever the brain-riddled criminal had lost in initiative, he had gained in purpose, under the direction of Eric Veldon, the fiend who had sent him here.

Joseph Barratini smiled weakly. He bowed as he picked up his hat from a chair. Accompanied by the summoner, he walked deliberately from the apartment. At the door, however, he paused, to throw a desperate glance toward the door where Rupert Sayre was hidden.

As soon as the outer door had closed behind Joseph Barratini and the corpselike man, Rupert Sayre sprang from his hiding place. The young physician realized the need for caution. He knew that this transformed man who accompanied Doctor Barratini was evidently under definite instructions. It would be wise not to excite suspicion. The monster might be dangerous, if he saw any one coming to interfere with Barratini’s departure.

The corridor was empty when Sayre reached it. The moving dial above an elevator door showed that Barratini and his conductor were descending. Sayre rang the bell. Another elevator stopped a few moments later. Sayre reached the lobby just in time to see Barratini and the mechanical man passing through the revolving door. The young physician hurried on their trail, carefully keeping them within sight.

On the sidewalk, Sayre saw the automaton usher Barratini into a large limousine. The door closed. The man climbed to the driver’s seat. Sayre hurried across the street, and gained his coupe. The limousine was moving as he started the motor. Sayre took up the chase.

The limousine threaded a devious route. Obviously the driver had instructions to totally bewilder the passenger’s sense of direction. The strange pursuit reached an avenue. Traveling in the rear Sayre followed a course toward upper Manhattan. Time and again, the limousine stopped before a traffic light.

Policemen were available; yet Sayre dared not call them. He remembered his promise to Barratini.

The young physician realised, as he drove along, that Eric Veldon must indeed be a dangerous man with whom to deal. It was probably that he wanted Barratini to perform another operation. If so, it would be best to let this adventure reach its natural conclusion. The more that Sayre could learn, the better could he aid Barratini to bring Veldon to justice.

The young physician did not approve of Barratini’s forced operations; nevertheless, he respected the eminent international surgeon, and did not feel himself qualified to offer criticism. He had promised to aid Barratini as a friend. He intended to do so.

Furthermore, Sayre could appreciate the mental condition of Doctor Joseph Barratini. He fancied that a ride in that darkened limousine, piloted by a cadaverous chauffeur who had been resurrected from a life of crime, could be anything but cheerful. Thoughts of the gruesome monster who had summoned the old physician made Rupert Sayre shudder.

THE whole chase seemed mechanical, an incredible occurrence in the midst of teeming Manhattan. Sayre found himself staring straight ahead as he kept his gaze steadily upon the moving limousine. It was with an effort that he managed to turn his head to note the part of Manhattan that he was traveling. The strange chase had just reached the upper end of Central Park.

On through a maze of streets. The limousine was again following an eccentric course. At last, it swerved into a side street and ran past a row of old, dilapidated houses. Sayre slowed the speed of his coupe. He eased the car along until the limousine had turned a corner.

Reaching the corner, Sayre noted that the limousine had stopped a short way up the block. With a quick twist of the wheel, the young physician kept straight ahead. He brought his car to a quick stop, and prepared to reverse it. Then another thought struck him.

Was this the end of the trail? Barratini had said something about a deserted house. The surgeon had mentioned a spot probably on Long Island. Perhaps he had been mistaken.

Sayre decided to investigate. He turned off the ignition switch, and extinguished the lights on his coupe.

Pocketing the key, he left the car and approached the corner. He could still see the tail light of the limousine.

The street was very dark. Rupert Sayre felt sure that he could reach the limousine undetected. He moved along the silent building walls until he had reached the large car. He could see through the side window of the front seat. The car was empty. The cadaverous driver had evidently left to report.

Cautiously, Sayre reached the side of the limousine. He listened intently to make sure that no one was near by. He placed his hand upon the handle of the rear door. He noted, as he stared at the glass, that it reflected only blackness. It looked like an ordinary car window, except upon close inspection; then Sayre realized that it was opaque.

Sayre hesitated. He knew from what Barratini had said, that the door would not open from the inside. If the knob should function from the outside, however, it would be possible to effect Barratini’s release, should the surgeon now desire to escape. Sayre resolved to try. At least he could assure his friend that he was on the trail, and also give him the location of the neighborhood which they had reached.

The knob turned. The door opened. A sharp gasp came from Rupert Sayre’s lips. A flood of illumination came from the interior of the limousine.

Had that been all that Sayre saw, the young physician would quickly have closed the door. But there was something else which made Rupert Sayre stand motionless.

Doctor Joseph Barratini still occupied the interior of the limousine. But the light which came from the ceiling showed a complete change in the surgeon’s appearance.

Sprawled upon the cushions of the rear seat, Barratini was staring straight upward. His hat had fallen from his head. His black hair, disheveled, was strewn downward upon his ashen face.

A TRAINED physician, Rupert Sayre forgot all other than the stricken man who lay before his eyes. He leaped into the car and bent over Doctor Barratini’s body. He realized rapidly that the celebrated surgeon was dead.

Then came a sound from the sidewalk. Sayre turned quickly, but too late. In the glare of the dome light, he caught a glimpse of the leering, cadaverous face of the man who had summoned Joseph Barratini to his death. Sayre made a leap for the door. It slammed before he could reach it.

Rupert Sayre, like Joseph Barratini, was in a black-walled prison. Vainly, the young physician shouted and beat at the surrounding glass. The limousine began to move. Sayre realized that his cries could not be heard; that this shatter-proof glass would resist every effort that he applied to break it.

The limousine swung around a corner. Barratini’s body came toppling along the seat. Sayre was jolted down beside it. He gave his attention to the form of the dead physician and found that his first surmise was correct. Barratini was stone dead.

What had killed him? Stark terror came over Rupert Sayre. The mysterious force — whatever it might be — that had slain Barratini could still be present in the car! Would he, Rupert Sayre, become a victim also?

As the thought flashed through his mind, Sayre began to experience an unaccountable dizziness. Joseph Barratini’s body went slumping to the floor. Rupert Sayre made no effort to stop it. The light was dimming before his eyes. A whirling sensation possessed him. The limousine seemed to be climbing tremendous mountains; then sinking into limitless depths.

Rupert Sayre sank gasping upon the seat. His listless body began to respond to the rolls of the big car.

His staring eyes were livid until the lids closed over them. Rupert Sayre’s breathing became a painful, mechanical process.

Two victims lay within the rear of the limousine. One was Joseph Barratini, dead; the other was Rupert Sayre, unconscious. These two physicians, who had so recently discussed the insidious schemes of Eric Veldon, had paid the penalty for their attempt to pry into the evil devices of that master plotter.

MILES passed. The limousine came to a stop. The door opened. The light from the inner dome showed a gravelly driveway. Then, into that zone of illumination, came a face.

It was not the cadaverous visage of the human automaton who had summoned Doctor Joseph Barratini; it was the evil countenance of a personage more terrible than that man who looked like a living corpse.

Eric Veldon, the man who plotted murder, was surveying the bodies that lay within the limousine. Joseph Barratini, dead, came under his leering inspection. Rupert Sayre, alive, but in complete stupor, also commanded Eric Veldon’s attention.

The fiend’s lips formed a snarling smile. Stepping back from the open door, Veldon uttered a short command. Two men, moving with the mechanical stride of automatic figures, stepped forth from the darkness. They lifted the dead form of Joseph Barratini and carried it away.

A few minutes later, they returned. They raised Rupert Sayre’s limp body and bore it into darkness. Eric Veldon’s evil face surveyed the emptiness. The smile still showed upon the plotter’s lips, as Eric Veldon extinguished the light within the limousine.

Another man had died — another whom Eric Veldon had used as a dupe — another who could have revealed the identity of this living fiend.

Doctor Joseph Barratini, like Merle Clussig and Wycroft Dustin, was no longer of use to Eric Veldon.

Death was the final award that the superfiend had given him.

Rupert Sayre still lived. What fate awaited the young physician? That rested, at present, in the hands of Eric Veldon, to whom human lives were trifles!