Swaying on the light platform which the scores of boys carried easily on their shoulders, the Spider watched with quietly speculative eyes the slow gathering of the army at his heels. The man tied to the post turned his head and a grin spread over his features.
"How'd I do, Spider?" he whispered.
Wentworth's lips moved slightly, "It's the best performance you've ever given—on or off stage," he said quietly. "Do as well when you dismiss them, and I'll double that thousand dollar fee."
The actor nodded. "I'll wow 'em," he promised.
Wentworth let his eyes roam again over the assembled crowd. The police were closing in behind them. He glanced down a side street and saw galloping troops of horsemen keeping pace. There were motorcycle police ahead, clearing the way. The smile on his lips grew thin. Littlejohn was allowing him to solve the problem—but the police would be on hand afterward! He had planned to lead the march into the park. He saw now that was impossible . . . and unnecessary.
Ahead of him was a small truck, driven by Bill Sanders. As the boys approached it, they lifted the platform from their shoulders. When it rested on the truck, they looked up at Wentworth. The small capes about their shoulders mimicked the Spider's. They were very proud of them, these members of the Spider clubs whom Bill had rounded up from every section of the city.
Wentworth smiled slowly down into their perspiring faces, met the eager glint of their eyes. "Pass the word along," he told one softly. "When I give the signal, all of you run and scatter! You have done a great thing this day! You have done what grown men, and organized police could not do! You will never regret it! It was a great service. The word will be . . . Spider!"
Wentworth saw the eager whisper run along the line. The platform was supported now by the truck. That had not been possible in the square where a human barrier blocked all movements of cars. But the way was clear now.
Wentworth cried, "Spider!"
Like chaff before the wind, the boys broke and ran. They scattered in every direction, filtered through the trailing crowd of tiring old people, into building entrances, down side streets, into subway entrances. In less than a minute, there was not one of them in sight! But the platform trundled on. It was only three blocks from the park entrance now. Already, he could see the wide jaws of the police trap spread there. He turned to the actor.
"Make your speech here," he said, "but make it fast! Bill, stop the truck. When I give the word, clear out of here fast!"
Bill nodded, and the actor lifted his voice: "My friends!" he said. "My people! The plan has failed, and the fault is mine. Go to your homes now, and the Spider swears I will be allowed to go free! I know he tells the truth, and each moment you delay keeps me a prisoner that much longer. Go to your homes now . . . so that I may be free. Break it up. Go, each of you, to his home!"
The old people stopped, puzzled. Many already had fallen away from the fringes of the crowd. They stared at the bound prisoner on the platform, at the grim, twisted figure of the Spider. Hope died in their faces. It was a piteous thing to see how weary they were now that their dream was broken, now that they no longer sang. In bewilderment, they turned and looked at each other while the actor exhorted them again. Slowly, they began to file away. A man alone here, a couple there . . . small groups of three and four together. They were bitterly disappointed, they were baffled, and they were tired. Slowly, painfully, they limped away.
Wentworth turned to the actor and handed him money. "There is a statement there that I kidnapped you and forced you to perform this role," he said quietly. "It should prove that you can give no evidence against me. If you have trouble, my lawyers will help you."
The actor nodded. "That's okay, Spider," he said. "I can see you're going to have a job getting away yourself!"
Wentworth called, "Bill! Scram!"
In an instant, the boy had jumped down from the truck's seat, and was racing away. The crowd swallowed him. Wentworth cut the actor free, but stood for a moment staring out over the dissipating crowd. The police were closing in more rapidly now.
Wentworth laughed. He leaped to the ground and dived into a subway entrance where many weary oldsters were moving heavily down the steps. He ran along the platform and leaped to the tracks . . . . The police were only minutes behind. They stared wildly around them. The weary old people were silent on the platforms. There were a half dozen wandering dully, like lost children, about the tracks.
"Hey, you!" a cop yelled at one old man, whose grey hair hung about his shoulder. "Hey, you see the Spider go this way? You ought to hate that guy! He busted up your strike. Say, did you see him?"
The old man merely stared, his mouth hanging open. His teeth had gaps in them; his face was seamed. The cop swore, "Here, grandpa, leave me give you a hand up before you get hurt!"
He reached down a hand and helped the old man to the platform. Then he stared at him questioningly. "Say, for an old one, you got a powerful grip! Say—"
From the old mouth came a whisper, cold as steel, "Shut up, copper, or die! That's a gun!" His right hand pressed hard into the cop's side, and his voice became cracked and ancient. "It's awful kind of you, officer, to help an old man. Now, if you can just get me through this crowd and up on the street!"
The gun urged the cop on, and so they went through the police lines. At a far corner, Wentworth unloaded the man's gun and gave it back to him. "If you make no outcry," he said quietly, "no one will know what happened. Remember that!"
He turned and leaped into a coupe parked at the curb. The motor roared and the car spurted away. For a long moment, the cop stood motionless, watching the escape of the Spider. It was only afterward that he thought about reloading his gun to try a shot; it was too late by then. He looked swiftly about. No one in sight. He hurried back toward the subway station.
Wentworth raced grimly through the crowded streets. Soon, he must walk into Moulin's trap . . . in Nita's room. There was no other way in which he could conquer . . . the Council of Evil!
The room where the Council of Evil met this time had no lavish walls of padded leather. The walls were brick and the room had the musty dampness of an underground cell. But there was the same long table, the same sheet of glass . . . and five men in black hoods.
Abruptly, the glass turned milky and the face of Moulin gazed out at them from beneath heavy-lidded eyes.
"Report!" his voice sounded.
Towan laughed comfortably. "We pulled off the rehearsal all right, me and Cassin. Took something like a million bucks out of them boxes at Roycroft. The cops wouldn't even of known it was missing, if it hadn't been for the Spider. He damned near messed us up. But we got that guy Jackson locked up. We can have some fun with him a little later on."
Moulin said, thickly, "We should accept Towan and Cassin!"
There were nods of assent and Moulin's head turned toward the man on his right. "Your identity is no longer a secret, it seems, Bennington," he said.
Bennington's voice burst out hoarsely, "It was perfect, my rehearsal! We tied up everything tighter than a drum . . . until the Spider stepped in. I can do it again, but not unless that damned Spider . . ."
Moulin said slowly, "Bennington should be accepted. He did deliver . . . . As for the Spider, you need not worry about him any longer. Zero hour is at eight o'clock. I will give you all your instructions . . . . And at eight o'clock, the Spider will pay a visit to Nita van Sloan. My men will be there. My slave will be in the room with the woman. He will not escape—and we will all be multimillionaires!"
Towan leaned forward. "How?" he demanded roughly. "Where is there that much money?"
Moulin laughed, "Did you ever see the vaults of the big downtown banks?" he asked, "or the Federal Reserve branch, with all its gold?"
Towan breathed in noisily between his teeth, "Geez," he whispered. "Oh, geez!"
Moulin nodded slowly. "Zero hour at eight . . . by which time, the Spider will be in our trap! This time, he will not interfere!"
Nita Van Sloan lay back in her chair with her eyes closed. There was a corsage of velvety red roses on the stand beside her. She seemed utterly relaxed, resting. But there was no happiness, or content, in her face.
On the other side of the room a nurse sat with her head bowed submissively. Her hair was golden and thick. Her hands, idle in her lap, held a hypodermic needle filled and ready for instant use. It contained a green fluid.
Nita lifted her head and peered intently at a clock on the stand. Its hands pointed toward two minutes of eight.
"I'm not sure," she said heavily, "that I want to do this. It is like treachery."
The blonde nurse spoke in a monotone. "You cannot help a criminal. You must be sure. You cannot marry him unless you are sure. There is only one way to be sure."
Nita rolled her head fretfully. "You sound like . . . The Voice," she said dully. "I wish I could remember. I must be sure, but I do not like it."
The door of the room was closed, but the sound of footfalls came through readily. It was the visiting hour and many patients were receiving. A loudspeaker called a doctor's name tinnily. Nita, with her eyes closed, did not hear the door open. She knew only that the loudspeaker sounded suddenly much louder, and then was pinched down again. She opened her eyes, and gasped.
Just inside the door stood a hunched figure. Its twisted back was toward her, and the whole body was covered in a long black cape. The figure turned slowly about, and she had a glimpse of a lipless mouth, of commanding eyes beneath the brim of the black hat. The nurse still had her head bowed.
"Who are you?" Nita gasped.
The Spider took two slow steps toward her. His voice came out flatly. "Wentworth will not be here," he said. "I came in his stead, so that you could be sure!"
Nita's hands grasped the arms of her chair rigidly. Her head was pressed back painfully, and there was fear in her face. Wentworth's own face, behind the mask of the Spider, was twisted in torment. He hated to shock her this way, but he had made his decision. Nita must hate him too much ever to become involved in his perils again. His heart was leaden inside him; his cold will was like steel.
Hidden, his eyes flicked about the room. The nurse sat as she had been at his entrance, and his eyes narrowed at recognition of her. She was the same who had taken notes on the meeting of the Council of Evil!
Suddenly, Nita was relaxed again in her chair. Her hand went out to the roses beside her on the table. Her eyes were still strained wide. She knew now. She had been right. The nurse was right to insist she must make sure and then allow her to notify the police. The sight of this twisted figure of a man was terrifying, but somehow she was sure that underneath that disguise was the man, Richard Wentworth. She could not have told how she knew it, but she did. There could no longer be any doubt.
Richard Wentworth had killed a man!
Nita shuddered a little at memory of that moment when she had seen the red seal ground into dying flesh. She said, slowly, "I am glad you came. All this time I had suspected Mr. Wentworth. It was wrong of me. He has been very kind; he sent all these flowers . . . ." She lifted the bouquet in her hand.
Wentworth said in his normal voice, "So now, you are sure."
He took a step nearer her. His hands were clenched at his sides. Out of his eye corners he still watched the motionless nurse. Where were the men of Moulin? They must be somewhere around . . . . But Nita would have been told a lie, of course. She wouldn't help gangsters to destroy him. She would think it was the police she served.
"Has The Voice spoken to you recently?" Wentworth asked.
Nita winced. "No, no!" she said. "I do not want to hear The Voice. It is always speaking to me. Even when my nurse is here, it speaks to me, but she cannot hear it . . . ! But what do you know about The Voice?"
Wentworth shook his head, bending toward her. "Only that it lies!" he said softly. "Come, Nita, there is danger here! You must go away with me!"
Nita gasped, "No!" She held the roses tightly as if they were a weapon. "No, I dare not!"
"I will protect you," Wentworth said quietly. The continual quiet, the motionless figure of the nurse worried him. There was terror and danger breeding here. For himself, he was ready to face it. But if the killers failed this time—and Wentworth intended that they should fail!—they might carry Nita away to bait him into a trap. And the result for Nita would be horrible . . . .
"You must," he said, and laid his hand on her arm. "Come with me, now!"
Nita gasped, "No! No, I tell you! You must go—"
Wentworth said hoarsely, "Nita!"
She lifted the corsage of roses and crushed them against his face!
For an amazed instant, Wentworth did not move. Then the heady odor of the roses revealed itself as deeper, more cloying than was normal. It clogged his nostrils, burned in his throat. Good God . . . gas! Wentworth hurled himself backward. He clawed for his gun, and his hand had no feeling in it at all. He could not tell whether he found his gun or not. Desperately, he wheeled toward the window. This was the one thing on which he had not counted. In his love and trust of Nita, he had not seen how she could be swayed. He had not thought that she would attack him!
Wentworth found that his feet were wooden, too. He glanced down at them in surprise, and found that he was on his hands and knees on the floor. He glanced up at Nita, and her eyes were wide, frightened. She was crouched back in her chair, her feet drawn under her.
It was while Wentworth was staring thus that he felt, more than heard, the step of the nurse beside him. He felt the burning sting of a needle. He thought he cried out. Then darkness seemed to spread out from that needle puncture. It contaminated every sense; it spread rapidly through his brain and his brain soaked it up hungrily, gratefully as if it were nepenthe.
It brought forgetfulness and a curious lack of any concern. He knew that he was stretched out, flat on his back, on the floor. He knew that the passive nurse had injected drugs into his veins and that he was incapable of movement. The gangsters would come presently to destroy him . . . and the zero hour of X-day already had struck. He knew all these things, and it did not seem to matter.
He was floating in the midst of a greenish cloud. He was without thought, without feeling. The rosiness turned dark, turned black. It enveloped the brain of the Spider, and he lay helpless awaiting the killers' guns!