Page:Weird Tales v01n03 (1923-05).djvu/120

The Whispering Thing

(Continued from page 64)

a phantom when at large, and, when in the toils, as slippery as an eel. Execution of the plan I have formed, therefore, I am going to entrust to you. It is very doubtful if I could slip through the cordon of police around the house but I think that you may be able to do so, and it is very necessary that one of us should. Here, then, is what I want you to do:

"The soviet agent, No. 29, is waiting in New York for the Q-gas formula. He is stopping at the Alpin Hotel. The formula is locked in a safe-deposit box in the Exporter's Bank in this city. The box was rented by me under the name of John G. McGlynn. I want you to take the first train to New York and get No. 29 to return to Washington with you. It is too risky for you to try to telegraph him.

"I will give you a paper authorizing him to open the box and remove the formula. The formula is to be replaced with fifty thousand dollars in gold, the second and final installment of the price No. 29 agreed to pay for the secret.

"After the exchange, which must take place in your presence, you are to rejoin me here and we will settle our score with Peret, and then take steps to extricate ourselves from the net he has woven around us. The most important thing now is the formula. Once we have gotten rid of that, we can doubtless make our get-away. We have done so many times in the past under circumstances almost as trying as the present ones, and we can doubtless do so again.

"What do you think of the plan, Sing? It is filled with danger, but—if you can think of a better one, I should be glad to hear it."

"I agree with you as to the danger," rejoined the Chinaman in a strange voice, and then, very suddenly, he pressed the muzzle of an automatic against Deweese's temple.

With is free hand he then swept the wax wrinkles from his face and grinned. Deweese, in spite of the proximity of the automatic, recoiled. The man was not Sing Tong Fat. He was Jules Peret!

"Move at your peril, Monsieur," warned the detective. Then, raising his voice, "Hello, major!" he shouted.

The door swung open, and Major Dobson, accompanied by Detective Sergeant Strange and Harvey Bendlow, entered the room. Behind them came O'Shane and Frank, dragging between them Sing Tong Fat, the latter bound and gagged and minus his skull cap and outer clothing which, needless to say, now adorned the head and body of the mirthful French detective.

"Did you hear the conversation, Major?" cried Peret gleefully.

"Every word of it," declared Dobson, much gratified at the success of Peret's stratagem. "Sergeant Strange and I were watching through a crack in the door and heard and saw all. The stenographer in the hall has it all down. The jig is up, Mr. Alias Deweese," he added, turning to the international agent. "Your goose is cooked and the mystery of the 'invisible monster' is a thing of the past."

"You devil!" shouted Deweese hoarsely, glaring at the Frenchman; "you have trapped me!"

"So I have," agreed Peret, wiping the yellow stain from his face with a handkerchief. "But did I not promise you that I would do so? Ah, Monsieur, if you but knew what it cost me to keep my promise! Did I not have to sacrifice my hair and beautiful mustache this morning? Still, the wig and false mustache I wore before I donned Sing Tong Fat's regalia looked very natural, did they not? They must have, since they deceived you, my friend. But you should see my head without a covering! it looks like the egg of the ostrich."

He pressed Sing Tong Fat's skull-cap down more firmly on his head and laughed heartily.

"Ma foi," he continued, as he removed from his face the little pads of wax that had given his eyes an almond slant, "I almost feel tempted to make my impersonation permanent. Sing is such a handsome and charming man—which doubtless explains why he fought so hard to retain his identity. When he was seized by my good friends in the vestibule, as he opened the door to let me out awhile ago, he was an astonished and infuriated man. He fought, hissed and scratched like the cat of the alley. And how he glared at them when they divested him of his clothing and helped me to make up my face to look like his own. Look at him glaring at me now!

"My colleagues say I am a mimic and make-up artist of the first order, and when I think how beautifully I deceived you, M. le Comte di Dalfonzo, I am almost persuaded that they are right."

THE END.