THE lounge corridor that led to the terrace garden of the Hesperides Club was deserted. Inside, warm lights cast a subdued glow; the thumping rhythms of a swing band fought against the wolf whine of the November winds. At the end of the corridor, the French doors were tightly sealed. No patron of the club would wish to brave that terrace, open to the arctic breath from the nearby river. Yet now, someone was outside. The knob of the door turned slowly. And against the lighted panes of glass, there was a queerly distorted shadow, as if a man with curiously hunched shoulders crouched there, working on the lock!
Muted shouts and a muffled shot from outside slapped across the musical murmur that sifted into the corridor from the huge dining-room, but these sounds were swallowed in the universal thump of the orchestra. There was a brittle snap of breaking metal . . . and the door thrust open! A few, hard fine snowflakes whirled in through the opening and the curtains shivered in the cold. Then a figure whipped into the corridor, the door clapped shut and a man whirled to send his piercing blue-grey gaze stabbing through the dim reaches of the club.
The shouts outside were louder, but there were no more shots . . . yet!
The man's lipless mouth twisted in a thinly bitter smile, and long silent bounds carried him along the carpeted hallway. A broad-brimmed black hat was drawn low over his brows, and as he ran a long, black cape whipped and bellied from his shoulders. A handkerchief was bound about his right hand, and the white cloth was stained with sinister red!
A dozen feet ahead, the door of a private dining-room opened quietly, and a waiter stepped into the corridor. His head was bent, and there was a knowing smile on his lips, slyness in his eyes. He straightened, and saw the racing figure, and the smile grew lop-sided on his lips; his mouth strained with the beginning of a scream that could not drag itself free of his lips.
"My God! The Spider!"
The Spider's leap was as fierce as the charge of a tiger! His left fist cut a crisp arc to the waiter's chin! He eased the man to the floor and, with a swift glance behind him, sped on! He whipped around the corner toward the great arch that was the main entrance to the dining-room!
An instant later, the terrace doors burst open and four men spilled into the corridor. They were hatless, without overcoats, faces burnished by the wind. Guns were in their fists and their eyes were hot and eager. Their leader pointed a hand toward the prostrate waiter, and the hand trembled.
"He came this way!" the man said, and there was a tremor in his voice, too, like the whine of a dog when the scent is hot. "Rex, stay here! Watch those doors! Mac is bringing the other boys around the front, and I'll get Duncan. By God!" He lifted a clenched fist on which the knuckles shone, white as bone. "By God, we've got the Spider!"
Three of his men raced on. The man called Rex stood beside the closed terrace doors. His eyes searched the doorways, the corridor. They even flicked to the ceiling. It was all right for Butch to leave him here to watch for the Spider, but God in heaven, what chance did one man stand against the Spider? That guy just wasn't human. Let a guy step outside the law, and try to grab himself a little easy money—and down upon him came the Spider! You could bribe cops, and judges; a smart mouthpiece could wriggle you through most any scrape, but from the Spider, there was no chance of protection at all!
Rex clutched his gun until his forearm ached. Behind him, the wind rattled the door . . . and he jumped two yards away from it, whipped about with a shaking gun-hand.
"Geez!" he whispered. "I wish the gang would come back!"
Just short of the arched entrance to the main dining-room of the Hesperides Club, the gunmen had gathered in a tight knot. Their wary eyes skimmed over the laughing guests inside the doorway. They were in a side alcove off the main lobby. Telephone booths lined one wall and no one heeded them. The man called Butch stood tautly, with his lips folded in against each other. His breath made rasping sounds in his nostrils.
A compact broad-shouldered man, smoothly plastered head thrust forward aggressively, swung around the corner and confronted.
"What the hell is this, Butch?"
Butch faced him. His words pushed but like bits of metal between clamping teeth. "The Spider! He came in here! Duncan, we've got him!"
Duncan's cold gambler's eyes narrowed. "By God, if we can get him, I'd almost be willing to wreck the club! You boys spread out. Doors plugged? Good! Mac, stay here. The rest of you . . . . Come on!"
The man called Mac had a sly, pointed face. His eyes were wide, round and palely shallow, the eyes of the killer. "The dining-room, Duncan," he said softly, the words almost lisped.
Duncan glanced toward him, took short choppy strides toward the main arch. His brittle glance swept the floor before settling on the headwaiter.
"Any new guests in the last five minutes?" he snapped.
"Nearly ten," the headwaiter murmured. "The Saxon-Thompsons. Miss van Sloan . . . ."
"To hell with them!" Duncan whirled to the others, gestured with a tautness that made his arm move jerkily. The men wedged behind him. They moved on their toes, eyes darting everywhere, hands thrust into gun pockets. Mac stood against the wall. Just let the Spider pop out now from somewhere. This super-man talk was a lot of rot. There wasn't any man you couldn't kill with a bullet in the right place. He'd put his mark on the Spider!
He grinned . . . then straightened.
A waiter with a worried frown swung around the corner from the main entrance. "You Mac?" he grunted. "There's a call for you in Duncan's office. Says come quick!"
Mac said, "Yeah? For me?"
He started toward the waiter, and the man turned away. They were around the corner for perhaps ten seconds, then Mac came bounding back.
"You get the number!" he called after the waiter. "I can't leave!"
His eyes stabbed quickly, hotly about the corridor, centered on the phone booths . . . on the booth at the very end. His round pale eyes stretched a little wider and the smile on his mouth became a twisted, sly grimace. He touched his tongue to his lips.
"Hey, you!" he snapped at the headwaiter. "Get Duncan, and get him fast!"
The headwaiter stiffened, stepped into the corridor. "Were you talking to me?" he asked indignantly.
Mac's head swung toward him deliberately, and his pale eyes fell on those of the headwaiter. The man quivered. "Yes, sir! Mr. Duncan, I'll get him!"
Mac kept his eyes on the booth, and Duncan came swiftly, slapping his heels down hard into the softness of the cushioned carpet. Mac pointed with his chin, his lips scarcely moving.
"The end booth," he murmured. "See that piece of black stuff sticking out through the door! That's the Spider's cape!"
Duncan drew in a quick, hard breath. His right hand snapped across his chest, came back into sight with a gun from an under-arm holster.
"You mugs close up this corridor," he whispered to the men at his back. "We don't want nobody from the dining-room butting in."
Duncan moved forward on his toes. Mac slipped from his side and came at the booth door from the other side. Their eyes shone, and their breath was noisy between colorless lips.
"Burn him down?" Mac formed soundless words.
Duncan nodded curtly. His teeth began to show between his lips. They were flat against the wall, against the other booths on each side of that partly opened door. Duncan reached out his hand, set it on the handle. He drew in a slow breath, his shoulders swelled. Then he whipped open the door!
With a muffled shout, Mac leaped forward, his gun lifted, ready. Duncan's gun was cradled against his hip.
White fumes roiled out of the opened door. Tendrils of smoke curled up toward the ceiling, swarmed about the shaded lights. There was that smoke, and the little tag-end of a black cape . . . and that was absolutely all. The booth was empty!
Duncan ripped out a harsh oath, spun toward Mac.
A booth five doors up the line was pushed open, and a man stepped out—a tall smiling man with a lithe self-confidence in his every movement, with his head, capped in crisp black hair, held commandingly. His evening dress was tailored perfection.
"What's the trouble, Duncan?" he drawled pleasantly. "Someone attempt to hold you up?"
Duncan whipped toward the man. For an instant, his face was out of control. His mouth was twisted by ugly rage, his eyes glittering. It was only an instant, then his calm gambler's mask dropped into place again, and he was smiling.
"A chiseler did a sneak on us, Mr. Wentworth," said Duncan suavely. "I hope we haven't disturbed you."
Wentworth smiled. The gesture of his right hand, a lean, delicately shaped hand, but powerful, was easy. "Not at all, Duncan," he said easily. "I hope you catch your . . . chiseler. I dislike such rabble."
"A chiseler did sneak out on us, Mr. Wentworth," said Duncan. "It's been a long time since we've seen you here. Welcome to the Hesperides." He stepped toward Wentworth . . . and thrust out his right hand!
Wentworth's easy smile did not fade, though he knew well the significance of Duncan's offered handclasp. These killers knew that the Spider had been wounded in the right hand . . . and here was Wentworth on the spot where the Spider had vanished in a cloud of smoke! The wound, no more than a bullet-burn, but damnably painful none-the-less, was covered now with a swift hemostatic collodion. And Wentworth, calmly, deliberately, accepted Duncan's handclasp. Duncan's fingers clamped down with a vise-like pressure, and his powerful thumb dug into the back of Wentworth's wounded hand!
Pain shot up Wentworth's arm and jarred against his nervous system like a thousand jabbing knives, but it was not for nothing that Wentworth lived his double life; on one hand the wealthy gentleman of leisure, clubman, sportsman; and on the other, that secret avenger of the night, that champion of preyed-upon humanity—known as the Spider! His clasp of Duncan's hand was natural, easy, and the careless smile of his lips never wavered!
Through long seconds, Duncan held that grip . . . then he relaxed it and stepped back, and there was puzzlement in his black eyes.
"You give your guests a warm welcome, Duncan," Wentworth said easily. "I'm sorry I haven't dropped by before, but I've been . . . rather on the run lately!"
Duncan faltered, "I hope we didn't disturb you."
Wentworth waved his right hand carelessly, a lean, powerful hand, but delicately sensitive in shape. "Not at all. I couldn't reach my party, and I didn't like to leave my number. Always unsatisfactory, don't you think?" He turned toward the close-pressed rank that closed the corridor. "I hope you catch your chiseler!"
Unostentatiously, he tucked his right hand into his trouser pocket. The blood was squeezing out through the collodion . . . and these wolves would need no more than a glimpse of blood upon his right hand to close in with blazing guns! Such was their fear and hatred of the Spider, they would risk anything at all to bring him down!
He moved casually toward the corridor guards. His grey-blue eyes looked beyond them. The headwaiter was already bowing obsequiously . . . . And that row of killers, of men panting for the life of the Spider, lawless criminals who lived by the gun . . . . These men stepped aside and made a passage for Wentworth without waiting for an order from Duncan! Such was the force of the man, Wentworth.
The headwaiter bowed again, "This way, Mr. Wentworth," he said loudly. "Miss van Sloan is waiting!"
Mac was at Duncan's elbow. "You heard what he said, didn't you? He tried to get somebody, and wouldn't leave his number. Well, look here. Somebody phoned me in your office, sent word by the waiter. I turned my back for maybe ten seconds . . . ."
"Ten seconds," murmured Duncan. "Time enough. Yes, time enough for him to leave one booth and duck into another . . . . But he didn't flinch when I clamped down on his hand."
"He's got that hand in his pocket now," said Mac . . . .
Richard Wentworth strolled easily across the dining-room of the Hesperides. A dozen people nodded to him eagerly, or tried to detain him at their tables, but he murmured his excuses and pushed on. He knew that Duncan's eyes were still on him, and that the men would not so soon, or so easily, drop their search for the Spider. He was still in the deathtrap! After all, the Spider had killed one of their number tonight, one of their experts who would be hard to replace—an expert in the cowardly vicious crime of arson!
Wentworth's eyes met those of Nita van Sloan across the last fifty feet of the dining-room and saw the smile move her full soft lips. His stride lengthened, and there was, perhaps, a pang in his breast; not that he regretted his task, or the duties to which he had pledged himself. But it was hard on Nita always to live thus in peril. A pity, a great pity that they were not what they seemed—two people very much in love and out for an evening's entertainment . . . .
"I hope, my dear," he murmured, "that I haven't kept you waiting long?"
"A year or so," Nita laughed up into his face. "At least five minutes."
Wentworth clasped her hands . . . with his left, dropped an order for Martinis to the attentive waiter as he slid into a chair opposite Nita, She leaned toward him with her handkerchief.
"Dear," she said, "You should be more careful when you keep me waiting! Who was she?" She touched his mouth corner with the handkerchief, dabbing away a bit of the Spider make-up which he had missed. Under her breath, she whispered. "Duncan is coming this way. Four men backing him, separately. Do you need my gun?"
Wentworth sighed, lips smiling though his grey-blue eyes were keen and cold. "I hoped to conceal that blonde from you," he said, and softly, "Knock over your glass and break it!"
Nita leaned back easily, but her hand, returning to her side, jarred her water glass toward the floor. Wentworth grabbed for it as it shattered . . . and gashed the back of his right hand! With an exclamation of annoyance, he clapped a handkerchief to the wound—and looked up into Duncan's coldly watchful eyes.
"I seem to be hard on your glassware this evening, Duncan," he said easily, and uncovered his hand.
Duncan's solicitous tones held an undercurrent of mockery. "I hope it's not a severe wound, Mr. Wentworth."
Wentworth smiled, "It might have been so much worse. Did you want something?"
Duncan uttered an exclamation. "Stupid of me. That wound quite cut it out of my mind. There's a phone call for you . . . in a booth in the hall."
"Somehow," Wentworth murmured, "I have an aversion to phone booths tonight. Have a phone plugged in here, Duncan."
He turned back to Nita, who was engaged in binding his cut hand with the napkin. "It's really nothing at all, dear," he said.
Duncan stood an instant longer by the table, then whipped about and went striding choppily across the dining-room.
"He's not satisfied," Nita said quietly. "He'll be back. What do you want me to do?"
"Nothing just now," Wentworth told her. "In a little while, we'll leave. I dropped my cigarette lighter while paying a call this evening . . . ."
Nita could scarcely control her start. In those few words, she knew the whole story. She knew that Wentworth's cigarette lighter held a device in its base for imprinting the seal of the Spider, and she knew where that seal was placed—upon the foreheads of those he killed in his coldly just execution of those who were outside the law!
A young couple strolled past, talking excitedly. "Best fire I've seen in years!" the man was exclaiming. "That old tenement burned like paper."
"And good riddance, I say!" the girl cried, and laughed.
Wentworth's lips lost their smile. Thoughtless fools! "Five children died in that fire," he told Nita quietly. "It was a touch-off! Arson!"
Nita's shoulders shuddered a little, and she drew the fur scarf about them. "So that was where you went," she whispered. "That man deserved death!"
Wentworth glanced up as the waiter set the Martinis before them with a flourish. Duncan was returning with another waiter who bore a table phone. The smile on his lips was quiet, and Nita did not need to read his thoughts. She knew that the Spider had ferreted out the guilty man and that he had got his deserts! But the cigarette lighter, and the bullet burn across the back of his hand . . . and these cold-jawed men with their terrible, hidden guns . . . .
Wentworth lifted the Martini in his left hand, and Nita gaily clinked her glass against his. "Death and destruction . . ." Wentworth murmured.
"The phone, Mr. Wentworth," Duncan interrupted suavely.
Wentworth laughed, and finished the toast . . . "to all care and sorrow, my dear!"
Duncan gestured to the waiter, who plugged in the phone . . . and Wentworth took it in his left hand. He was leaving no prints of his right hand here. It had been gripping the cigarette lighter when a bullet had burned across its back, paralyzing the grip of his fingers. And he needed the gun in his left hand, and needed it badly! There had been no time for anything except flight. He lifted the phone.
"Richard Wentworth here," he said, with a quiet smile at Nita. He had only half-believed in the reality of this phone call, but he knew the voice that cracked secretly in his ear.
"Danger, Major!"
Wentworth's nerves tautened. Only Jackson, who had served under him in the war and was still his top-sergeant, called him 'Major.' And Jackson was at police headquarters on the Spider's special business. But while Wentworth's nerves keyed to the excitement in Jackson's voice, even Nita could see no change in his smile.
"Yes," he said.
Jackson already was rushing on. "Police headquarters is turned inside out. Anonymous tip where a body can be found with Spider seal on forehead—and beside the body, a cigarette lighter with the Spider's fingerprints on it!"
Wentworth frowned slightly. "He must have been in a hurry to have been so careless," he said, already preparing for an abrupt departure. "The matter is getting expert attention, I take it?"
"Headquarters blew up!" Jackson chuckled. "Kirkpatrick left with motorcycle escort ninety seconds ago!"
"In that case," Wentworth said quietly, "we'll hurry right along, of course. Certainly, you may use the other car. And I suggest you hurry. Lucky you knew where to reach me."
Those last few words had told the quick-witted Jackson what to do—get another car and speed to the Hesperides Club. Frowning deeply, Wentworth handed the phone to the waiter. Under the watchful eyes of Duncan, he sat thoughtfully for a moment, then lifted his eyes gravely to Nita.
"There's hardly no way to break bad news, my dear," he said quietly. "Your cousin, Gregory, just had the misfortune to be hit by an automobile."
"Gregory!" Nita burst out, rising at once to her feet. "Is he hurt badly?"
Wentworth shook his head. "Can't tell yet. Fortunately, he was struck near my apartment, and the doorman recognized him, had him carried right in."
Duncan slid Nita's chair aside. His eyes were puzzled. "I hope, Miss van Sloan, you will find this less serious than you anticipate."
Wentworth said, quietly, "It's decent of you to be concerned, Duncan."
He and Nita hurried across the dining-room and, with inattentive seeming eyes, Wentworth saw Duncan send the gunmen racing along a corridor . . . a corridor that had an exit on the street! He doubted that it meant an attack. Duncan could not be sure enough of himself as yet. He got into the overcoat he had previously left at the checkroom, hurried Nita out through the doors of the Hesperides. As they stepped out beneath the marquee, a sleek limousine flashed from the curb up the street and swerved to a halt before them. A giant bearded Sikh, his head bound in a turban, leaped from the driver's seat to whip open the door.
Wentworth sprang into the tonneau behind Nita, caught up the speaking-tube as the Sikh, recognizing the need for haste, slid in behind the wheel again.
"Slow just after you turn the corner, Ram Singh," Wentworth snapped. "I'll jump out. Take the missie sahib to the apartment, and stay just four minutes. Then drive fast for the address she'll give you!"
The Daimler slid powerfully forward and Wentworth whipped toward Nita. In the special rear-vision mirror of the tonneau, he saw the four gangsters of Duncan piling into a sedan behind them.
"They'll follow you," Wentworth said swiftly. "Let them keep you in sight. I'll leave my overcoat and hat here. Rig them up on my cane as if I sat beside you. They won't attack. They suspect where I'm going, and want to keep me in sight. I'll see you in a few minutes. This is the address . . . . Watch Ram Singh on timing. It may be . . . important!"
Nita's hands clung to his, "Good luck, Dick!" she whispered. "And next time, dear, don't be so careless!" Her tone was light, but Wentworth knew the pain that lurked beneath her words. It was always her way to encourage him.
Wentworth laughed, but his eyes were bitter and cold. "I thought I had to deal with a single case of arson," he said soberly. "There is more behind it than that! I was sure the criminals would hold on to that cigarette lighter for their own purposes, and was going back for it later. There is a brain behind this, Nita."
Nita's face was set in a smile, but he saw the tightness of apprehension about her mouth corners. "Another battle, Dick?" she asked.
Wentworth's voice was grim. "Before he died, this arsonist—his name was Eggendorfer—talked a little. He said his master's name is . . . Munro!"
Nita's smile was wiped from her lips. She whipped toward Wentworth and her face was frightened. "Munro!" she whispered.
Before she could say more, the Daimler swerved around the corner and slowed. Wentworth sprang from the running-board and three long bounds hurled him into the shadows of a doorway. The Daimler spurted on and, an instant later, the pursuing gangster car whipped around the corner in pursuit. Wentworth watched them go with grim eyes, his nerves slowly tautening . . . . If he were wrong about their intention . . . . If they should attack Nita. But the Daimler was bullet-proof and Ram Singh was one of the greatest of a great warrior race!
Now . . . .
Cold wind whined desolately along the street and Wentworth, coat collar turned up to hide the white gleam of his formal shirt, felt the bite of the chill, though his blood was racing. This would have to be fast, damned fast! It would be a matter of split-second timing with Kirkpatrick racing to the scene, and his own advantage a matter of seconds only. He could rely on Jackson, but . . . . Why didn't Jackson come!
Why?
His mind flicked back to Nita, racing across the city with those gangsters on her trail. Even she had been shaken with horror at the mention of Munro's name, and she knew him only by reputation. Wentworth had met him once in battle, and the Spider had barely escaped alive from that trap! Munro was damnably shrewd, utterly ruthless, one of the great minds of the criminal world. He . . . .
A battered coupe whipped around the corner with a purring power in the motor beneath the hood that belied the ancient body. Wentworth stepped from cover and the coupe swung in, the door already open. Wentworth leaped in, and Jackson drove the accelerator to the floor. His hands were white upon the wheel, the muscles ridged out along the broad line of his jaw. More clearly than any words, his tension told how well he recognized the need for haste.
Wentworth was crouched on the floor instantly. He whipped forward the right half of the front seat, and a secret compartment was revealed behind it. No time for the full Spider make-up, but there was a steel mask that he sometimes used in such emergency. It reproduced the Spider's features exactly, but if it should slip, or Wentworth should be captured! With a grim thinning of lips, Wentworth took that risk. Wig, cape, hat . . . twin automatics.
"Nice timing, Jackson," Wentworth said quietly. "Details!"
"Gave you everything," Jackson's voice had a rasp of taut nerves. "I was at headquarters, according to the Major's instructions, keeping an eye on the commissioner. Told him the Major sent me down to check on records of forgers. Stalled along until this call came in. Headquarters was so upside down I called over Kirkpatrick's own phone!"
"Good work," Wentworth nodded. He was on the seat now, and it was no longer Richard Wentworth who rode beside Jackson, but a hunched and sinister figure, whose eyes gleamed coldly beneath the broad black brim of a slouch hat; whose hands clutched the twin butts of deadly automatics. Damnable having to lose these minutes that might make all the difference between life and death, but he had no choice save to return to Eggendorfer's room as the Spider—and he had been forced to destroy his previous disguise with a vial of acid carried for that purpose.
So far, he seemed to be ahead of the police. He had heard no distant wail of sirens . . . . His keen eyes reached ahead, narrowed as he spotted two men lounging against the front wall of the tenement building that he must enter.
"Shoot past!" he snapped at Jackson. "Then slow on the back street. Those are Duncan's men!"
Jackson twisted about his broad, honest face and there was worry in the eyes that held always a hint of idolatry when they rested on Wentworth's face.
"There'll be a lot of those hoods, Major," he growled. "Couldn't you let me . . . ."
"Just stand by, Jackson," Wentworth ordered quietly. "Usual orders. I'll signal if I need help. Eggendorfer's room is on the third floor, southeast corner."
"Stand by, sir," Jackson acknowledged with a growl, and Wentworth knew that no more was necessary. More than once Jackson had walked into what seemed certain death to serve him . . . .
The car slowed to the curb, seemed barely to hesitate, but when it passed the street light at the next corner, the seat beside Jackson was empty . . . and on that ominously dark street, a darker shadow had merged with the shadows that cringed against the wall. The Spider moved into battle!