The Exploits of Elaine Part 37

With a hasty look about, she saw no one. Then she went quickly to the panel, found the spring, and pressed it. So many queer things had happened to her since she went out that she had begun to worry over the safety of the papers.

The panel opened. They were there, all right. She opened the box and took them out, hesitating to break the seal before Kennedy arrived.

Stealthy and tiger-like the Clutching Hand crept up behind her. As he did so, Dan gazed in through the portieres from the hall.

With a spring, Clutching Hand leaped at Elaine, s.n.a.t.c.hing at the papers. Elaine clung to them tenaciously in spite of the surprise, and they struggled for them, Clutching Hand holding one hand over her mouth to prevent her screaming. Instantly Dan was there, aiding his chief.

"Choke her! Strangle her! Don't let her scream!" he ground out.

They fought viciously. Would they succeed? It was two desperate, unscrupulous men against one frail girl.

Suddenly, from the man in armor in the corner, as if by a miracle came a deep, loud voice.

"Help! Help! Murder! Police! They are strangling me!"

The effect was terrific.

Clutching Hand and Dan, hardened in crime as they were, fell back, dazed, overcome for the moment at the startling effect.

They looked about. Not a soul.

Then to their utter consternation, from the vizor of the helmet again came the deep, vibrating warning.

"Help! Murder! Police!"

Kennedy and I had been listening over the vocaphone, for the moment non-plussed at the fellow's daring.

Then we heard from the uncanny instrument, "For Heaven's sake, Chief, hurry! The falsers have fallen down. The girl herself is coming!"

What it meant we did not know. But Craig was almost beside himself, as he ordered me to try to get the police by telephone, if there was any way to block them. Only instant action would count, however. What to do?

He could hear the master criminal plainly fumbling, now.

"Yes, that's the Clutching Hand," he repeated.

"Wait," I cautioned, "someone else is coming!"

By a sort of instinct he seemed to recognize the sounds.

"Elaine!" he exclaimed, paling.

Instantly followed, in less time than I can tell it, the sounds of a suppressed scuffle.

"He has seized her--gagged her," I cried in an agony of suspense.

We could now hear everything that was going on in the library. Craig was wildly excited. As for me, I was speechless. Here was the vocaphone we had installed. It had warned us. But what could we do?

I looked blankly at Kennedy. He was equal to the emergency.

He calmly turned a switch.

Then, at the top of his lungs, he shouted, "Help! Help! Police! They are strangling me!"

I looked at him in amazement. What did he think he could do--blocks away?

"It works both ways," he muttered. "Help! Murder! Police!"

We could hear the astounded cursing of the two men. Also, down the hall, now, we could hear footsteps approaching in answer to his call for help--Aunt Josephine, Jennings, Marie, and others, all shouting out that there were cries in the library.

"The deuce! What is it?" muttered a gruff voice.

"The man in armor!" hissed Clutching Hand.

"Here they come, too, Chief!"

There was a parting scuffle.

"There--take that!"

A loud metallic ringing came from the vocaphone.

Then, silence!

What had happened

In the library, recovered from their first shock of surprise, Dan cried out to the Clutching Hand, "The deuce. What is it?"

Then, looking about, Clutching Hand quickly took in the situation.

"The man in armor!" he pointed out.

Dan was almost dead with fright at the weird thing.

"Here they come, too, Chief," he gasped, as, down the hall he could hear the family shouting out that someone was in the library.

With a parting thrust, Clutching Hand sent Elaine reeling.

She held on to only a corner of the papers. He had the greater part of them. They were torn and destroyed, anyway.

Finally, with all the venomousness of which he was capable, Clutching Hand rushed at the armor suit, drew back his gloved fist, and let it shoot out squarely in a vicious solar plexus blow.

"There--take that!" he roared.

The suit rattled, furiously. Out of it spilled the vocaphone with a bang on the floor.