Gold of the Gods Part 31

"What was it you had Inez drop into Whitney's coffee?" I asked Craig as we parted from him and rode uptown.

"You saw that?" he smiled. "It was pilocarpine, jaborandi, a plant found largely in Brazil, one of the antidotes for stramonium poisoning.

It doesn't work with every one. But it seems to have done so with him.

Besides, the caffeine in the coffee probably aided the pilocarpine.

Then, too, I made them smoke cigarettes without the dope that is being fed them. Lockwood's case, for some reason, hasn't gone far. But did you notice how the treatment contracted the pupils of Whitney's eyes almost back to normal again?"

I had and said so, adding, "But what was your idea?"

"I think I've got at the case from a brand-new angle," he replied.

"Unless I am greatly mistaken, when the person who is doing the doping sees that Whitney is getting better--why, I think you all noticed it, Inez and Lockwood as well as you--it will mean another attempt to subst.i.tute more cigarettes doped with that drug. I think it's by subst.i.tution that it's being done. We'll see."

At the laboratory, Kennedy called Norton and described briefly what had happened, especially to Whitney.

"Now is your chance, Norton," he added, "to do some real good work. I want some one to watch the Senora, see if she, too, notes the difference in him. Understand?"

"Perfectly," returned Norton. "That is something I think I can do."

XIX

THE BURGLAR POWDER

It was not until after dinner that we heard again from Norton. He had evidently spent the time faithfully hanging about the Prince Edward Albert, but Whitney had not come in, although the Senora and Alfonso were about.

"I saw them leaving the dining-room," he reported to us in the laboratory directly afterward, "just as Whitney came in. They could not see me. I took good care of that. But, say, there is a change in Whitney, isn't there? I wonder what caused it?"

"It's as noticeable as that?" asked Kennedy. "And did she notice it?"

"I'm sure of it," replied Norton confidently. "She couldn't help it.

Besides, after he left her and went into the dining-room himself she and Alfonso seemed to be discussing something. I'm sure it was that."

Kennedy said nothing, except to thank Norton and compliment him on his powers of observation. Norton took the praise with evident satisfaction, and after a moment excused himself, saying that he had some work to do over in the Museum.

He had no sooner gone than Kennedy took from a drawer a little packet of powder and an atomizer full of liquid, which he dropped into his pocket.

"I think the Prince Edward Albert will be the scene of our operations, to-night, Walter," he announced, reaching for his hat.

He seemed to be in a hurry and it was not many minutes before we entered. As he pa.s.sed the dining-room he glanced in. There was Whitney, not half through a leisurely dinner. Neither of the de Moches seemed to be downstairs.

Kennedy sauntered over to the desk and looked over the register. We already knew that Whitney and the Senora had suites on the eighth floor, on opposite sides and at opposite ends of the hall. The de Moche suite was under the number 810. That of Whitney was 825.

"Is either 823 or 827 vacant?" asked Kennedy as the clerk came over to us.

He turned to look over his list. "Yes, 827 is vacant," he found.

"I'd like to have it," said Kennedy, making some excuse about our luggage being delayed, as he paid for it for the night.

"Front!" called the clerk, and a moment later we found ourselves in the elevator riding up.

The halls were deserted at that time in the evening except for a belated theatre-goer, and in a few minutes there would ensue a period in which there was likely to be no one about.

We entered the room next to Whitney's without being observed by any one of whom we cared. The boy left us, and it was a simple matter after that to open a rather heavy door that communicated between the two suites and was not protected by a Yale lock.

Instead of switching on the lights, Kennedy first looked about carefully until he was a.s.sured that there was no one there. It seemed to me to be an unnecessary caution, for we knew Whitney was down-stairs and would probably be there a long time. But he seemed to think it necessary. Positive that we were alone, he made a hasty survey of the rooms. Then he seemed to select as a starting-point a table in one corner of the sitting-room on which lay a humidor and a heavy metal box for cigarettes.

Quickly he sprinkled on the floor, from the hall door to the table on which the case of cigarettes lay, some of the powder which I had seen him wrap up in the laboratory before we left. Then, with the atomizer, he sprayed over it something that had a pungent, familiar odour--walking backwards from the hall door to the table, as he sprayed.

"Don't you want more light?" I asked, starting to cross to a window to let the moonlight stream in.

"Don't walk on it, Walter," he whispered, pus.h.i.+ng me back. "No, I don't need any more light."

"What are you doing?" I asked, mystified at his actions.

"First I sprinkled some powdered iodine on the floor," he replied, "and then sprayed over just enough ammonia to moisten it. It will evaporate quickly, leaving what I call my anti-burglar powder."

"I'm sure I wouldn't be thought one of the fraternity for the world," I observed, stepping aside to give him all the room he wanted in which to operate.

He had finished his work by this time and now the evening wind was blowing away the slight fumes that had arisen. For a few moments he left our door into Whitney's room open, in order to insure clearing away the odour. Then he quietly closed it, but did not lock it again.

We waited a few minutes, then Craig leaned over to me. "I wish you'd go down and see how near Whitney is through dinner," he said. "If he is through, do something, anything to keep him down there. Only be as careful as you can not to be seen by any one who knows us."

I rode down in an empty elevator and cautiously made my way to the dining-room. Whitney had finished much sooner than I had expected and was not there. Much as I wanted not to be seen, I found that it was necessary to make a tour of the hotel to find him and I did so, wondering what expedient I would adopt to keep him down there if I found him. I did not have to adopt any, however. Whitney was almost alone in the writing-room, and a big pile of letters beside him showed me that he would be busy for some time. I rode back to the room to tell Craig, flattering myself that I had not been seen.

"Good," he exclaimed. "I don't think we'll have to wait much longer, if anything at all is going to happen."

In the darkness we settled ourselves for another vigil that was to last we knew not how long. Neither of us spoke as we half crouched in the shadow of our room, listening.

Slowly the time pa.s.sed. Would any one take advantage of the opportunity to tamper with the box of cigarettes on the table?

I fell to speculating. Who could it possibly have been that had conceived this devilish plot? What was back of it all? I wondered whether it were possible that Lockwood, now that Mendoza was out of the way, could desire to remove Whitney, the sole remaining impediment to possessing the whole of the treasure as well as Inez? Then there were the Senora and Alfonso, the one with a deep race and family grievance, the other a rejected suitor. What might not they do with some weird South American poison?

Once or twice we heard the elevator door clang and waited expectantly, but nothing happened. I began to wonder whether, even if some one had a pa.s.s-key to the suite, we could hear him enter if he was quiet. The outside hall was thickly carpeted, and deadened every footfall if one exercised only reasonable care. The rooms themselves were much the same.

"Don't you think we might have the door ajar a little?" I suggested anxiously.

"s.h.!.+" was Kennedy's only comment in the negative.

I glanced now and then at my watch and by straining my eyes was surprised to see how early it was yet. The minutes were surely leaden-footed.

In the darkness, I fell again to reviewing the weird succession of events. I am not by nature superst.i.tious, but in the black silence I could well imagine a staring succession of eyes, beginning with the dilated pupils of Whitney and pa.s.sing on to the corpse-like expression of Mendoza, but always ending with the remarkable, piercing, black eyes of the Indian woman with the melancholy-visaged son, as they had impressed me the first time I saw them and, in fact, ever since. Was it a freak of my mind, or was there some reason for it?

Suddenly I heard in the next room what sounded like a series of little explosions, as though some one were treading on match heads.

"My burglar powder works," muttered Craig to me in a hoa.r.s.e whisper.

"Every step, even those of a mouse running across, sets it off!"