THE SECRET HOUSE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LII, Issue 16035, 29 September 1915, Page 10

THE SECRET HOUSE.

BY EDGAR WALLACE, Author of "Four Just Ifen." "Print* Selby, " tic. COPYRIGHT. CHAPTER XX,-(Continued.) "Ladt Constance,'' gasped T.B. in surprise. A woman, who was sitting in a choir near the reading lamp in the centre of the room, rose quickly, and turned her startled face to the detective. "Mr. Smith," she' said, and run towards him; "oh, thank God, yon have come!" They passed through the door together. She pointed to a red door, some twenty paces from that room from which they were emerging. There was another pause whilst Elk made an examination of the! door. • > Apparently they all worked on the prick system, a method which mediaeval! conspirators favoured, and which the, Italian workmen probably imported from i • the land of their birth, a land which has given the. world the Borgias, and the Media's, and the Viscontis. Stay here,". said T.B. in a low voice, and Lady Constance shrunk back against the wall. ' . Elk pressed in his little needle and again the result "was satisfactory; the door opened slowly, and T.B. stepped in. He stood for a moment trying to understand all that the terrible scene signified. The limp body on the floor, the three remorseless men standing" around Farrington with folded arms, and iiis eyes glowering down upon the dead man at his feet, Fall at the switchboard. Then v T.B.'B revolver rose swiftly. "Hands.up 1" he cried." Th« words were hardly out of his mouth, when the room" was plunged in darkness, his companion "was flung violently backward as the electrical control came into operation, and the door slammed to in his face. Elk pressed it without avail; ho brought to his aid the needle, but this time the lock would not more; a greater force than the power of mechanics was holding that iron portal in its place. Elk'e face went deathly white. "My God," he gasped, "they have got T. 8.!" ; ' T.B.'a car was outside. "Yon had better come with me," said Elk quickly. Lady Constance jumped into the car after him. To the Secret House," said Elk to the chauffeur. In the darkness of the underground chamber T.B. faced his enemies, striving to pierce the gloom, his fingir pressed lightly upon the delicate trigger of his automatic pistol. " Do hot move," he said softly ; " I will shoot without any hesitation." "There is no need to shoot," said the suave voice of the doctor; "the lights went out quite by accident, I assure you, and you and your friends have no need to fear." T.B. groped his way along the wall, hie revolver extended. In the gloom he felt rather than saw the bulky figure of the doctor, and reached out his hand gingerly. Then something touched the outstretched palm, something that might in ordinary circumstances have felt like the rough points of a bass broom. T.B. was flung violently backwards, and fell heavily to the ground. "Get him into the chair quick," he heard Famngton's voice say, "that was a good idea of yours, doctor.!' , ' Just a sprayed wire," said Dr. Fall, complacently, " it is a pretty useful check upon a man. You took a, wonderful assistant when you pressed electricity to your aid, Farrington." The lights were all on now, and T.B. was being strapped to the chair. He had recovered from the shock," but he had recovered too late. In that interval of his' unconsciousness the body of Poltavo had been removed out of his sight. They were doing to him all that they had done to Poltavo He felt the electrodes at his calf and on his wrists, and clenched his teeth, for ho knew in what desperate straits he stcod. " You know, exactly how you are situated, Mr. Smith," said Farrington, '' and now I am going to tell you exactly how you may escape'from your present position." ''I shall be interested to learn," said T.B. coolly, " but I warn you before you tell mo that if my escape is contingent on yours then I am afraid I am doomed to dissolution." The other nodded.

"As you surmise," he said, "your escape is indeed contingent upon mine and that of my friend. My terms to you aro that you shall pass me out of England. You will be interested, Mr. Smith, to learn that v you nearly had me once: you see the whole wing of the house in which Mr. Moole lies,' he smiled, " works on the principle of a huge elevator. Tho secret of the , Secret House is really the secret of peri fectly arranged electrical lifts, that is U. say,' he went on, " I can take my room on the first floor, and I can transport it to the fourth floor with greater ease than you can carry a chair from a basement to an attic. What are you going to do?" 1.-B. smiled "I am going to do nothing, he said cheerfully, "unless it be that I am going to die, for I can imagine no circumstance of danger that threatens me or those I love best which would induce me to let loose upon the world so dangerous a enroll « you and .your Jjarrington; whether my time comes a faSV°? Mr or lat *. ' doos not »Her the fact that you are within a month of. your own death, whether you kill me' or whether you let me go.'

"I give you three minute* to decide," said Farrington., < "You arc wasting three minutes," said the muffled voice of T. 8., from under the helmet. Nevertheless. Farrington took . out hie watch, and held it in an unshaking palm, and for the space of a hundred and eighty seconds there was no sound in the room save the loud ticking of the watch. At the end of that time he replaced it in his pocket. "Will you agree to do as I ask?" he said. , "No," was the reply with undiminished vigour. "Let him have it," said Farrington savagely. . Dr. Fall put up his hand to the switch, and as he did so the light* flickered for a moment and slowly their brilliancy diminished. "Quick." said Farrington, and the doctor brought the switch over just as the light went out. T.B. felt a sharp burning .sensation that thrilled his whole being, and lost consciousness. CHAPTER XXI. IN TIME. There was a group of police officers about the gates of the Secret House as the car bearing Elk and the woman came flying up. The detective leapt out. "They have taken T. 8.." he said; be addressed a divisional inspector who was in charge of the corps. "Close up tho cordon, he went on, " and men who are armed follow me." . Ho raced up the garden path, but it was not towards the Secret House that he directed his steps ; he made a detour through the little plantation to the power house. A man stood at the door, a grimy faced foreign workman, who scowled at the intruders. He tried to pull the sliding doors to their place, but Elk caught the bluecoated man under the jaw, and sent him sprawling into the interior. In an instant the detective was inside, and confronting the scowling workmen. A tall good-look-ing man of middle age, evidently a decent artisan, was in control, and he came forward, a spanner in hie hand, to repel the intruders, but the pistol Elk carried in his hand was eloquent of his earnestness. " Stand back,' he said. " Are you in charge?" Tho detective spoke Italian fluently. " What does this mean, eignor?" asked the foreman. " It means that I give you three minutes to stop the dynamo. ' "But that is impossible," said the other ; " I cannot stop the dynamo, it is against all orders." " Stop the dynamo," hissed Elk between his teeth, "stop it at once or you are a dead man." The man hesitated, then walked to the great switchboard, brilliant with a score of lights. " I will not do it," he said sulkily, "there is the signal, give it yourself." . A little red lamp suddenly glowed on the marble switchboard. ' "What i„ it?" asked Elk. "' That is a signal from the lower rooms," said the man sullenly. "They want more power." Elk turned on the man with a snarl, raised his pistol, and there was murder in his eyes. "Mercy," gasped the Italian, and putting out his hand he grapsnd a long red switch marked " danger,' and pulled it over. . Instantly all the lights in the power house wont dim, and the great whirling wheels slowed down and stopped, and only the light of day illuminated the power house. Elk, standing on the control platform, wiped his perspiring face with the back of a band which was shaking as though with ague. " I wonder if I was in time," he muttered. The big machinery hall was now alive with detectives. "Take charge of evejy man,*' Elk or. dered, "see that nobody touches any one of those switches, arrest th« etokers and

keen them apart, Now you," he said, addressing the foreman in Italian, "you eeem a decent fellow, and I am going to give you a chance of earning not only yoiir, freedom, mit a substantial reward. I am a police officer and I have some to make an inspection of this house." The man hesitated. " The lift cannot work, signor." he said with a shrug of the shoulders, " now that the electric current is stopped." "Is there no other way?" Again, the man hesitated. "there are stairs, eignor," lie stammered, after a while, then continued rapidly. "If this is a crime, and Signor Moole is an anarchist, I know nothing of it, I swear by the Virgin. lam an honest man from Padua, and I have no knowledge of such' things as your excellency speaks about." Elk nodded. " I am willing to believe that," he said in a milder tone. " Now, my friend, you shall undo a great deal of mischief that has been done%y showing mo the way to the underground rooms."

"I am at your service," said the man helplessly. "I will call all men to witness that I have done my best to carry out tho instructions which the padrone has given me." He led the way out of the power house through a door which communicated to a large stretch of private garden, behind tho main building, across a well kept lawn to an area basement which ran the whole length of the house. In this at tho far end was a door, and the man opened it with a key from a bunch of keys which he took "from his pocket. They had to pass through two more doors before they came to the spiral staircase, which led down into the gloomy depths beneath the Secret House. To Elk's surprise they were illuminated, and he feared that against his orders the dynamo had been restarted, but i ; ie man reassured him. "They are from the storage batteries," he said; " there is sufficient to afford light all over the house, but not sufficient to give power." The steps seemed never ending. Elk counted eighty-seven before at last thev came to a landing from which one donopened. The detective noticed that the man employed the same method of entering here as he himself had employed. A bodkin slipped into an almost invisible hole produced the mechanical unsealing of this doorway. Elk stepped through the open door. Two light* burned dimly; he saw the strapped figure in the chair, and his heart sank. He went forward at a run, and Farrington was the first to hear him. The big man turned, a. revolver in his hand. There was a quick report, and another, and a third, Elk stood up unmoved, unharmed, but Farrington, rock.ing as ho staggered to tho table, slid to the ground with a bullet through his heart. > " Take that man," said Elk, and m an instant Fall was handcuffed and secure. Two of the detectives were busy unfast-' ening the straps which bound T.B. " He is alive," said Elk, as he laid his ear to the heart of the insensible man, " thank God for that." Half an hour later T.B. was seated at Elk's side, driving slowly into Great Bradley. "Elk," he said after a wliile, "I think I shall have my house in Brakely Square fitted with gas lamps." "Why?" asked the startled detective. "Because," said T. 8., as he rubbed his head again with a rueful smile, "I do Dot think that I shall like to see electric switches about my house after this. I am glad Farrington was killed," he said thoughtfully, "it makes things easier for that poor girl in Paris'; as to Fall, he will die a normal death." " A normal death," repeated Elk in surprise. /• "Imean he will be hanged," said T.B. (fiuckly, "which seems horribly normal after my experience." , THE BifD.