Empire of doom, p.16
EMPIRE OF DOOM, page 16
Green-clad men rushed into the streets, aiming rifles at the bullet-proof glass that protected the driver and his three helpers. Even as Wentworth raced near, his cold engine stammering, green vapor, coiling, greasy fingers of it, rushed out of the hose nozzles at the tank wagon's back. They struck the ground, mushroomed and lifted thick heads like a nest of venomous snakes. They slithered, crawling, rolling, streaming, toward the fans, carrying death toward the White House. Wentworth jerked the hose of the carboy into his hand, loosed the petcock, and with the neutralizing gas hissing from the nozzle, charged into the green vapors of death!
THE green soldiers were reeling back, stretched in writhing agony upon the ground, the tearing teeth of the flesh-eating gas gnawing at their vitals. Wentworth's wheels churned the gas, as his own vapors spurted to meet it.
The world turned into white flame. Searing, leaping tongues of it raced across the earth, wherever the poison gas had run. The truck was enveloped in a blanket of fire. Wentworth felt its scorching breath, but he was traveling at terrific speed. Before the flames could do more than singe his face, he had burst through and
was racing down a Pennsylvania Avenue that was lit as brilliantly as day by the leaping tongues of white fire that towered behind.
All over the city similar pillars of flame were stretching white fingers toward the night sky, as Wentworth's patrolling men pierced the tanks of gas, and set them blazing with Professor Brownlee's invention. Here and there a patrolman was killed, and the horror gas got loose, drifting over the city, wiping out its hundreds before another patrolman could reach the scene and set it afire. Where the battle of the gases occurred, trees became charred stakes. Houses were enveloped in flame and destroyed in a few moments' time.
But in the end the victory went to Wentworth. Everywhere people fled in panic, filling the streets with screaming, hoarsely terrified crowds. Women with children in their arms ran until exhaustion dropped them in their tracks. Grim- faced men, white with dread and anxiety, raced with them. But at last, when the tide of battle turned, they returned wearily to their homes, happily free of the Green Hand's death fog.
Wearily, at last, Wentworth too, left off the battle and returned to the hotel. This skirmish was won, but another, greater battle remained. The Green Hand was still at large, and Jonathan Love— Wentworth's face twisted with mockery— Jonathan the Just still was dictator.
His strength would be consolidated by the victory tonight. His would be the credit for the rout of the Green Hand. The country would be knocking its head on the floor at his feet, and the Green Hand would reap the loot of billions that Scott's scrawled figures upon a sheet of paper had revealed as its goal. Wentworth's smile was bitter. The Spider had not yet finished his task.
CHAPTER TWENTY Jonathan the Just
BACK at the Ambassador, Wentworth conferred briefly with Ram Singh. “Did the Missie Sahib report?” he asked.
Ram Singh bowed.
“And the radio company?” “Han, Sahib”
Wentworth smiled. “It is well.” Ram Singh bowed again, left the room and Wentworth sank into a chair and closed his eyes.
Minutes later, stealthy feet crept upon him. The pasty-faced gunman Wentworth had captured was free!
He stole into the room, his right hand gripping a revolver, and behind him, whispering encouragement, crept Ram Singh!
Swiftly the two strode toward Wentworth. “Hands up!” the gunman barked. And Wentworth, jerking open his eyes, stared with apparent fright into the muzzle of a leveled gun.
He looked beyond the gunman to Ram Singh, and his face became distorted with anger. “You traitor!” he rasped. “False to your salt. Son of a pig!” He lapsed into Hindustani, his face still twisted with anger.
“Shut up,” said the gunman. “You're making too much noise.”
Wentworth cowered away from the man. “Don't shoot,” he said.
The gunman grinned. “I won't if you're good. You're coming along with me. A certain party I know will pay plenty to get hold of you.”
Wentworth submitted to the man, and after the gunman had talked over the phone to four different parties, he allowed himself to be taken to the street, thrust into a taxi and trundled through the streets of Washington. Finally, at the side entrance of a great hall, the taxi drew up and Wentworth was hustled into the building.
“Mr. Crosswell,” the gunman said, when a guard opened the door.
He was herded up dark stairs into a small cubby-hole of a room that was littered with stage properties.
Ram Singh had disappeared somewhere on the trip upstairs, and the gunman crouched alone against a trunkful of clothing, the gun held carelessly in his hand.
A few moments later the door was thrust open and another man with arms tied behind him was hustled in by the green-clad guards of Jonathan Love. The man's face was haggard; deep lines etched into his face, and his wiry red hair was tousled. But there was a fightgleam in his blue eyes. He glared about the room. His eyes lit on Wentworth, bound as was he himself.
His eyes widened. “So they got you, too, did they?”
Wentworth nodded slowly. “My own man betrayed me,” he said.
Delaney smiled grimly. “From what I hear we won't have long to worry about it.” He jerked his head toward the door. “Jonathan the Just,” his words were a sneer, “is out there telling a crowd of fifteen or twenty thousand just how he did it. The street is full of them too and the whole damn country is tuned in on the radio. It's my guess that when he gets through, he'll haul us out on the stage and say, 'Here's the Green Hand,' and throw us to the mob.”
Wentworth nodded gloomily. “That's a good guess, I suppose.”
The green guards laughed. “A damn good guess,” one jeered.
“All I hope,” said Delaney, “is that they cut my hands loose first. If I could go out fighting, it wouldn't be so bad.”
Wentworth grinned in spite of himself. That remark was so damned Irish.
A THUNDEROUS roaring filtered through to them, the crowd's shouting ovation to Jonathan Love. “Sounds like we're getting near the end,” Wentworth muttered. “Listen, here, Mr. Guard. I want to see Crosswell, Selden Crosswell, the big guy that's secretary to Jonathan Love. Get him in here, will you?”
“Aw, he won't come,” said the guard.
Wentworth smiled dryly. “Tell him Wentworth wants to confess. He'll come fast enough.”
The guard glowered at him. “So you want to confess, do you?”
“That's what I said.”
“O. K.,” the guard agreed, “I'll get him.” And he went out.
Delaney looked at Wentworth with doubting eyes.
“What's the idea?” he asked. “Or are you really that guy, the Green Hand?”
“Who me?” said Wentworth. “I thought you were. How about the gang that shot their way into jail to rescue you?”
Delaney smiled bitterly. “They kept me prisoner from that day until this, stuffed away in some hole of a cellar.”
“Think anybody will believe that?”
Delaney shook his head.
The door of the room flung open suddenly, and Jonathan Love stalked in. By his side, bundled to her ears in an ermine cloak, lolled Olga Bantsoff. Crosswell was with them, too.
“So you want to confess?” Love bit out at Wentworth. There was a fanatical exultation on his face. “That will be fine news to the crowd downstairs. I spoke first. They were impatient for me. But I promised my people that I would be back, that I would bring with me the Green Hand and that he would be executed on the stage where all could see!”
“And I,” Olga thrust forward, hate gleaming in her green eyes, her pale mouth smiling, “am going to give the signal for them to hang you.”
“How nice,” said Wentworth.
“Well, get on with your confession,” Love ordered.
Wentworth shook his head. “It would be useless,” he said.
“What?” roared Love. “You got me up here by a trick!”
“I didn't send for you at all,” Wentworth pointed out. “I sent for Crosswell. I wanted to talk to him. As I told you before, you have let this power bug go to your head. You think you are a great man. You're only the puppet of the master criminal calling himself the Green Hand. I know who the Green Hand is. When I am taken before the crowd downstairs, I shall reveal his identity and offer the proof. I think that even the crowd will be convinced.”
Love snorted. “A lot of silly nonsense. I'm going back to my people. In ten minutes I shall send for you to be executed.”
Wentworth smiled confidently. “It won't be I who is executed, Love. It will be another man, and that man will be the Green Hand. I tell you I have proof.”
Love threw back his head and laughed. “Proof! A trainload of proof would not convince me that you aren't the Green Hand.”
“I know that,” said Wentworth, and mockingly cried, “Long live Jonathan the Just.”
Love turned on his heel and stalked out of the door. “Come, Olga. Come Crosswell.”
Olga followed with one last backward sneer at Wentworth above her ermine-clad shoulder.
Crosswell lingered behind. “With your permission, Sire, I will remain and see that these dogs are brought down for their execution at the proper time.”
Love nodded carelessly on his way out. Crosswell took the gun from one of the guards.
“You men go outside and stand guard at the end of the hall,” he ordered. “Let no one come near the door. I'm afraid that the gang may make some last-minute attempt to free their leader.”
The gunman swaggered forward. “Listen, Chief,” he said, “don't forget me. I'm the guy what brought him in here.”
Crosswell smiled at him. ‘You won't be forgotten.”
The gunman and the two guards went out. Crosswell closed and bolted the door behind them. Then, with the gun leveled, he advanced until he stood within six feet of where Wentworth was sprawled, bound hand and foot, upon the floor.
“I'm curious to hear, Mr. Spider,” he said, “who it is you mean to accuse when you stand upon the scaffold.”
“How curious are you, Crosswell?”
Crosswell leaned forward, thrusting out the gun. “Curious enough to put a bullet into your belly if you don't talk fast,” he rasped.
Wentworth smiled pleasantly up at Crosswell. “The man I will accuse,” he said, “is yourself, Selden Crosswell.”
CROSSWELL straightened, smiling also. “I thought so,” he said softly.
“You were damn clever,” said Wentworth. “You almost made me think Delaney was guilty, just as you succeeded in convincing Love that Delaney and myself were tied up with the Green Hand. But I'm curious to know just what made you think that I was the trapper who killed some men in the north woods.”.
Crosswell threw back his head and laughed. “That was rather good,” he said. “I see no harm in telling you, since you are so soon to die.” He spun the gun around his finger by the trigger guard. “In fact, you're going to die before Love sends for you to go to the scaffold. But I don't think you could possibly convince anyone that I am the Green Hand even though I should be foolish enough to let you try. I've got Love too much under my thumb for that. Olga is doing a good job there; she has him completely fooled. And Love will do anything that Olga and I tell him to do.”
He threw back his head and laughed. “Jonathan the Just!” he sneered. “Jonathan the Dumb!”
Wentworth nodded. “You're damn smart, all right. I showed how dumb I was when I tipped my hand by telling what I was going to say on the scaffold. But tell me, how did you trace me from the north woods?”
“It was very simple,” said Crosswell “I had a spy in police headquarters. When you filed a complaint against George Scott, I knew you were the man.''
“Then you were the one who phoned the guards at the Elkhorn plant and tried to have me killed, and you set the police on me afterward?” Wentworth went on. “You had Delaney accused of turning off that fan during the attack on Loveland, and later you had your men shoot him out ofjail so that suspicion would be directed toward him— so that in the end you could hang him as the Green Hand and take Renee for yourself.”
Crosswell started. “Oh, you knew about Renee, did you?”
Delaney surged against his bonds, tried to get to his feet. “You dog!” he cried. “So that's what behind all this! You want Renee!”
Crosswell nodded slowly. “I'll have Renee all right. But that's only a small part of it, part of the billions of dollars I'll get through Love's position as Dictator of the Government. I'll get government contracts and all sorts of concessions, not to mention a huge salary. Anything I want will be mine.”
Gloating crept into his voice. “Billions!” he said. “Billions will be mine!”
He laughed around in triumph. Delaney raged curses at him, and Crosswell leaned over and whipped him with the end of the pistol barrel, stretching the young Irishman unconscious and bleeding on the floor. There was ferocity in his face, as he straightened and glared at Wentworth.
“Some day I'm going to do that to Love. That fool, with his high and mighty airs! I was satisfied enough with my job, knowing I'd be rich some day, through him, but his airs got under my skin. I got to hate him, and now,” he threw back his head and laughed, “he is the puppet, and I am the Master. When I pull the strings, he'll dance!”
HE CHECKED himself and glared down at Wentworth. “You're a smart man yourself, Spider. A pity we can't work together. How did you figure that I was the Green Hand?”
“By a number of things, Crosswell,” Wentworth said slowly. “I'll admit that this Delaney trick fooled me for a long time. But I couldn't figure how Delaney planned to rule Love, once Love had become Dictator; and it was obvious that that was the crux of the entire plot. So I looked for a man of the build of George Scott, who could have a hold over Love; a man who could rule Maggie Foley; also for a man who had the opportunity to make the phone call to the Elkhorn plant and knowing your secret identification, give an order for my arrest. All these things, Crosswell, pointed to you.
“And then I did another thing. I got your finger prints, Crosswell; and they proved to be those of a notorious crook who went to prison at the same time that Maggie Foley, whom you call Olga Bantsoff, went up for highway robbery!”
Crosswell had grown restless during the recitation he had asked for and which Wentworth had made more detailed than seemed necessary.
“Very neat, Spider,” said Crosswell. “Now the time has come for you to die. Shall I shoot you, or Delaney, first?”
“Won't King Love be angry with you if you shoot his sacrifices to the mob?”
“I can take care of Love,” snarled Crosswell and raised the gun.
Fists pounded on the door! A woman's voice cried out: “Selden, Selden, for God's sake, let me in!”
Crosswell whirled toward the door with a leveled gun.
“Who is it?” he demanded.
“Maggie,” the woman's voice was hoarse. “Open up, Selden! The radio!'
Crosswell strode to the door, jerked it open. The door flung wide, and Olga rushed into the room, threw her arms around Crosswell's and pinned them to his sides. Jonathan Love strode in behind her, his face a thunder cloud of wrath.
“You dog!” he shouted. “You betrayed me. You are the Green Hand! We heard your confession over the radio.”
“The radio!” Crosswell gasped. He was still struggling with Olga. Her blonde hair came down and streamed across her shoulders. “You will throw me over for that little tramp, Renee,” she gasped. Her face was distorted with hate.
Wentworth laughed mockingly. ‘Yes, Crosswell, the radio. Every word you have said has gone out on a national hookup to millions of listeners throughout the country. I arranged in advance for this. Nita van Sloan made sure you'd come here. My friends rigged up a microphone for this room as soon as they found in what prison you were putting me. They tapped in on the wires over which Jonathan Love was speaking. The whole Nation heard you confess.
“You're doomed, Mr. Green Hand, doomed!”
THE WORDS seemed to lend Crosswell new strength. He wrenched free of Olga, slammed her against Love, and the two sprawled to the floor. The woman clawed into the neck of her dress, yanked out a gun. Crosswell threw up his heavy pistol and fired point blank. The bullet ripped through Olga's forehead.
Love seemed stunned by the brutal violence of the attack. He stared at Crosswell, staggered to his feet, groping for the sword at his side. He caught the hilt, half dragging the blade clear.
“The puppet's master needs you no longer, Jonathan Love,” Crosswell laughed, a little wildly. He drew up the gun and fired.
Love stared at him with wide, dazed eyes, then looked down at his breast, where blood was welling from his wound.
He looked back at Crosswell again. His eyes rolled up and he pitched to the floor, dead, across the body of the woman who had betrayed him.
Crosswell sprang across their bodies, slammed and bolted the door. He whirled back to Wentworth.
“I'm doomed,” he said “Thanks to you, Spider. But you're going with me.”
Wentworth had struggled to a sitting position, his bound hands touching his shoes. As Crosswell threw up the gun, the Spider pressed a spot on the side of his shoe.
There came a muffled explosion, and Crosswell's head jerked back, showing a bullet wound beneath his chin. Wentworth had once more used the pistol hidden in the sole of his shoe.
Crosswell, swaying on his feet, trying vainly to drag up the heavy gun, had paid the penalty for the crimes of the Green Hand!
A crooked smile was on Wentworth's face. The score was settled. Delaney could be left here. He would go free. But the Spider, great as had been his service to humanity, still would be held accountable for the crimes he had committed for the sake of justice.
Wentworth's hands went swiftly to the kit beneath his arm, drew out a chisel, a duplicate of the one which had served him so well in the cabin in the northwoods and began to hack at his bonds. As he worked, he spoke in the dulcet, singing tones of a Radio Announcer:
