XX
THE PULMOTOR
I went directly to our apartment after Craig left me and for a littlewhile sat up, speculating on the probabilities of the case.
Senora de Moche had told us of her ancestor who had been intrusted withthe engraved dagger, of how it had been handed down, of the death ofher brother; she had told us of the murder of the ancestor of InezMendoza, of the curse of Mansiche. Was this, after all, but areincarnation of the bloody history of the Gold of the Gods?
There were the shoe-prints in the mummy case. They were Lockwood's. Howabout them? Was he telling the truth? Now had come the poisonedcigarettes. All had followed the threats:
BEWARE THE CURSE OF MANSICHE ON THE GOLD OF THE GODS.
Several times I had been forced already to revise my theories of thecase. At first I had felt that it pointed straight toward Lockwood. Butdid it seem to do so now?
Suppose Lockwood had stolen the dagger from the Museum, although hedenied even that. Did that mean, necessarily that he committed themurder with it, that he now had it? Might he not have lost it? Mightnot some one else--the Senora, or Alfonso, or both--have obtained it?Might not Mendoza have been murdered with it by some other hand toobtain or to hide the secret on its bloody blade?
I went to bed, still thinking, no nearer a conclusion than before,prepared to dream over it.
That is the last I remember.
When I regained consciousness, I was lying on the bed still, but Craigwas bending over me. He had just taken a rubber cap off my face, towhich was attached a rubber tube that ran to a box perhaps as large asa suitcase, containing a pump of some kind.
I was too weak to notice these things right away, too weak to care muchabout them, or about anything else.
"Are you all right now, old man?" he asked, bending over me.
"Y-Yes," I gasped, clutching at the choking sensation in my throat."What has happened?"
Perhaps I had best tell it as though I were not the chief actor; for itcame to me in such disjointed fragmentary form, that it was some timebefore I could piece it together.
Craig had seen Burke, and had found that everything was all right. Thenhe had made the few little investigations that he intended. But he hadnot been to the laboratory. There had been no light there that night.
At last when he arrived home, he had found a peculiar odour in thehall, but had thought nothing of it, until he opened our door. Thenthere rushed out such a burst of it that he had to retreat, almostfainting, choking and gasping for breath.
His first thought was for me; and protecting himself as best he couldhe struggled through to my room, to find me lying on the bed,motionless, almost cold.
He was by this time too weak to carry me. But he managed to reach thewindow and throw it wide open. As the draught cleared the air, hethought of the telephone and with barely strength enough left called upone of the gas companies and had a pulmotor sent over.
Now that the danger was past for me, and he felt all right, his activemind began at once on the reconstruction of what had happened.
What was it--man or devil? Could a human fly have scaled the walls, oran aeroplane have dropped an intruder at the window ledge? The lock onthe door did not seem to have been tampered with. Nor was there any wayby which entrance could have been gained from a fire escape. It was notilluminating gas. Every one agreed on that. No, it was not an accident.It was an attempt at murder. Some one was getting close to us. Everyother weapon failing, this was desperation.
I had been made comfortable, and he was engaged in one of hischaracteristic searches, with more than ordinary eagerness, becausethis was his own apartment, and it was I who had been the victim.
I followed him languidly as he went over everything, the furniture, thewalls, the windows, the carpets--there looking for finger-prints, therefor some trace of the poisonous gas that had filled the room. But hedid not have the air of one who was finding anything. I was too tiredto reason. This was but another of the baffling mysteries thatconfronted us.
A low exclamation caused me to open my eyes and try to discover whatwas the cause. He was bending over the lock of the door looking at itintently.
"Broken?" I managed to say.
"No--corroded," he replied. "You keep still. Save your energy. I've gotstrength enough for two, for a while."
He came over to the bed and bent over me. "I won't hurt you," heencouraged, "but just let me get a drop of your blood."
He took a needle and ran it gently into my thumb beside the nail. Adrop or two of blood oozed out and he soaked it up with a piece ofsterile gauze.
"Try to sleep," he said finally.
"And you?" I asked.
"It's no use. I'm going over to the laboratory. I can't sleep. There'sa cop down in front of the house. You're safe enough. By George, ifthis case goes much further we'll have half the force standing guard.Here--drink that."
I had made up my mind not to go to sleep, if he wouldn't, but I slippedup when I obeyed him that time. I thought it was a stimulant but itturned out to be a sedative.
I did not wake up until well along in the morning, but when I did I wassurprised to find myself so well. Before any one could stop me, I wasdressed and had reached the door.
A friend of ours who had volunteered to stay with me was dozing on acouch as I came out.
"Too late, Johnson," I called, trying hard to be gay, though I feltanything but like it. "Thank you, old man, for staying with me. But I'mafraid to stop. You're stronger than I am this morning--and besides youcan run faster. I'm afraid you'll drag me back."
He did try to do it, but with a great effort of will-power I persuadedhim to let me go. Out in the open air, too, it seemed to do me good.The policeman who had been stationed before the house gazed at me asthough he saw a ghost, then grinned encouragingly.
Still, I was glad that the laboratory was only a few blocks away, for Iwas all in by the time I got there, and hadn't even energy enough toreply to Kennedy's scolding.
He was working over a microscope, while by his side stood in racks,innumerable test-tubes of various liquids. On the table before him laythe lock of our door which he had cut out after he gave me the sleepingdraught.
"What was it?" I asked. "I feel as if I had been on a bust, without therecollection of a thing."
He shook his head as if to discourage conversation, without taking hiseyes off the microscope through which he was squinting. His lips weremoving as if he were counting. I waited in impatient silence until heseemed to have finished.
Then, still without a word, he took up a test-tube and dropped into ita little liquid from a bottle on a shelf above the table. His facelighted up, and he regarded the reaction attentively for some time.Then he turned to me, still holding the tube.
"You have been on a bust," he said with a smile as if the remark of afew minutes before were still fresh. "Only it was a laughing gasjag--nitrous oxide."
"Nitrous oxide?" I repeated. "How--what do you mean?"
"I mean simply that a test of your blood shows that you were poisonedby nitrous oxide gas. You remember the sample of blood which I squeezedfrom your thumb? I took it because I knew that a gas--and it has provedto be nitrous oxide--is absorbed through the lungs into the circulationand its presence can be told for a considerable period afteradministration."
He paused a moment, then went on: "To be specific in this case I foundby microscopic examination that the number of corpuscles in your bloodwas vastly above the normal, something like between seven and eightmillion to a drop that should have had somewhat more than only halfthat number. You were poisoned by gas that--"
"Yes," I interrupted, "but how, with all the doors locked?"
"I was coming to that," he said quietly, picking up the lock andlooking at it thoughtfully.
He had already placed it in a porcelain basin, and in this basin he hadpoured some liquids. Then he passed the liquids through a fine screenand at last took up a tube containing some of the resulting liquid.
"I have al
ready satisfied myself," he explained, "but for your benefit,seeing that you're the chief sufferer, I'll run over a part of thetest. You saw the reaction which showed the gas a moment ago. I haveproved chemically as well as microscopically that it is present in yourblood. Now if I take this test-tube of liquid derived from my treatmentof the lock and then test it as you saw me do with the other, isn'tthat enough for you? See--it gives the same reaction."
It did, indeed, but my mind did not react with it.
"Nitrous oxide," he continued, "in contact with iron, leaves distincttraces of corrosion, discernible by chemical and microscopic testsquite as well as the marks it leaves in the human blood. Manifestly, ifno one could have come in by the windows or doors, the gas must havebeen administered in some way without any one coming into the room. Ifound no traces of an intruder."
It was a tough one. Never much good at answering his conundrums when Iwas well, I could not even make a guess now.
"The key-hole, of course!" he explained. "I cut away the entire lock,and have submitted it to these tests which you see."
"I don't see it all yet," I said.
"Some one came to our door in the night, after gaining entrance to thehall--not a difficult thing to do, we know. That person found our doorlocked, knew it would be locked, knew that I always locked it. Knowingthat such was the case, this person came prepared, bringing perhaps, atank of compressed nitrous oxide, certainly the materials for makingthe gas expeditiously."
I began to understand how it had been done.
"Through the keyhole," he resumed, "a stream of the gas was injected.It soon rendered you unconscious, and that would have been all, if theperson had been satisfied. A little bit would have been harmlessenough. But the person was not satisfied. The intention was not toovercome, but to kill. The stream of gas was kept up until the room wasfull of it.
"Only my return saved you, for the gas was escaping very slowly. Eventhen, you had been under it so long that we had to resort to thewonderful little pulmotor after trying both the Sylvester and Schaefermethods and all other manual means to induce respiration. At any ratewe managed to undo the work of this fiend."
I looked at him in surprise, I, who didn't think I had an enemy in theworld.
"But who could it have been?" I asked.
"We are pretty close to that criminal," was the only reply he wouldgive, "providing we do not spread the net in sight of the quarry."
"Why should he have wanted to get me?" I repeated.
"Don't flatter yourself," replied Craig. "He wanted me, too. Therewasn't any light in the laboratory last night. There was a light in ourapartment. What more natural than to think that we were both there? Youwere caught in the trap intended for both of us."
I looked at him, startled. Surely this was a most desperate criminal.To cover up one murder--perhaps two--he did not hesitate to attempt athird, a double murder. The attack had been really aimed at Kennedy. Ithad struck me alone. But it had miscarried and Craig had saved my life.
As I reflected bitterly, I had but one satisfaction. Wretched as Ifelt, I knew that it had spared Craig from slowing up on the case atjust the time when he was needed.
The news of the attempt spread quickly, for it was a police case andgot into the papers.
It was not half an hour after I reached the laboratory that the doorwas pushed open by Inez Mendoza, followed by a boy spilling with fruitand flowers like a cornucopia.
"I drove to the apartment," she cried, greatly excited and sympathetic,"but they told me you had gone out. Oh, I was glad to hear it. Then Iknew it wasn't so serious. For, somehow, I feel guilty about it. Itnever would have happened if you hadn't met me."
"I'm sure it's worth more than it cost," I replied gallantly.
She turned toward Kennedy. "I'm positively frightened," she exclaimed."First they direct their attacks against my father--then againstme--now against you. What will it be next? Oh--it is that curse--it isthat curse!"
"Never fear," encouraged Kennedy, "we'll get you out--we'll get all ofus out, now, I should say. It's just because they are so desperate thatwe have these things. As long as there is nothing to fear a criminalwill lie low. When he gets scared he does things. And it's when he doesthings that he begins to betray himself."
She shuddered. "I feel as though I was surrounded by enemies," shemurmured. "It is as if an unseen evil power was watching over me allthe time--and mocking me--striking down those I love and trust. Wherewill it end?"
Kennedy tried his best to soothe her, but it was evident that theattack on us could not have had more effect, if it had been levelleddirect at her.
"Please, Senorita," he pleaded, "stand firm. We are going to win. Don'tgive in. The Mendozas are not the kind to stop defeated."
She looked at him, her eyes filled with tears.
"It was my father's way," she choked back her emotion. "How could you,a stranger, know?"
"I didn't know," returned Kennedy. "I gathered it from his face. It isalso his daughter's way."
"Yes," she said, straightening up and the fire flashing from her eyes,"we are a proud, old, unbending race. Good-bye. I must not interruptyour work any longer. We are also a race that never forgets a friend."
A moment later she was gone.
"A wonderful woman," repeated Kennedy absently.
Then he turned again to his table of chemicals.
The telephone had begun to tinkle almost continuously by this time, asone after another of our friends called us up to know how we weregetting on and be assured of our safety. In fact I didn't know that itwas possible to resuscitate so many of them with a pulmotor.
"By George, I'm glad it wasn't any more serious," came Norton's voicefrom the doorway a moment later. "I didn't see a paper this morning.The curator of the Museum just told me. How did it happen?"
Kennedy tried to pass it off lightly, and I did the same, for as I wasup longer I really did feel better.
Norton shook his head gravely, however.
"No," he said, "there were four of us got warnings. They are adesperate, revengeful people."
I looked at him quickly. Did he mean the de Moches?