“Yes, sir,” the butler nodded. “All of us did, sir.”
The door opened again and a tall, severely dressed gentleman came in. His reserve matched the quietness of his clothes. He was Dr. Anton Kaler, who sometimes interested himself in crime—though his chosen professions were chemistry and traveling. “Hello, Kaler,” said Lane. “How did you get in?”
“Told the officer at the door I was a friend of yours,” Dr. Kaler smiled.
Dr. Anton Kaler
“I’m glad you happened along,” said the detective-sergeant. “Maybe you can give me a hand on this thing.”
“But certainly,” remarked Kaler, leaning on his cane. “I was ambling down the street, saw the police cars and thought I might be of help. You see, I know Gordon quite well.” His eyes swept over the still figure on the floor. “Or, rather, I did know him well.”
There was a step outside, and Reynolds stepped briskly back into the room.
“Forgot my gloves,” he said. He leaned beside the body and picked up a pair of gloves. The light from the windows made dancing lights on the odd snake-shaped emerald in the ring he wore.
“Like to stick around?” suggested Lane. “Dr. Kaler may be able to give us a different slant on this thing. Dr. Kaler, this is Dr. Reynolds, the coroner.”
The two men bowed. Reynolds walked over to a window, looked out at the setting sun.
“This is another of those cases,” Lane told Kaler. “A fellow by the name of Jackson murdered Gordon. Did you know his secretary, Jackson?”
“Why, yes,” returned Dr. Kaler. “He was quite a personable young chap. He died last week, you know. I attended his funeral.”
He looked down at the sprawled corpse and then, with an expression of sadness, knelt beside Gordon. “Poor devil. You certainly didn’t deserve this.”
The detective-sergeant took a turn about the room and then came back to the door. There, beside the wall, was a scrap of paper which had escaped his first examination. He picked it up idly, read the printing and writing on it.
“What the devil!” he ejaculated. “Here’s a pharmacy bill from Port-au-Prince, Haiti! What could this be doing here?”
Reynolds came quickly across the room and read over Lane’s shoulder.
“Hmmm! It says it hereby renders the account of Dr. Leroux to date,” stated the coroner. “My lord! That thing’s made out for fifty thousand gourdes! Why, that’s ten thousand dollars in our money.”
“Ten thousand dollars?” cried Lane. “Who ever heard of pharmacies charging ten thousand smackers for anything? Dr. Leroux, eh? Well, if Leroux’s got anything to do with this killing, he’ll be spilling me the beans by dark.”
“Never heard of a Dr. Leroux in this city,” muttered Reynolds.
“May I see it for a moment?” asked Kaler. “I’ve spent considerable time in Haiti, you know.” He examined the bill intently.
“Well, if you want my opinion, Lane, I don’t think this has much connection with the murder. This pharmacy is a pretty reliable one in Port-au-Prince. Probably Gordon had some dealings with the man there. You know he’s traveled—or rather did travel—quite a little.”
“I may be funny,” said Lane absently, “but I’ve got a hunch that this has some bearing on the case.” He turned toward the door. “I’m going to spot this doc.”
He walked quickly to the entrance of the room and then stopped as though he had been smashed in the face. His eyes opened wide and his jaw sagged.
There, on the inside of the door, where he could not have seen it before, was a note. The envelope was addressed in green ink to Terrence Lane. But worse than that—the paper was held up by a knife driven through its flap. The hilt of the weapon was also green and was carved—in the semblance of a snake!
Lane ripped it down, shoved the knife in his pocket, and read the message. It was simple and to the point.
Terry Lane:
You will leave this case immediately and resign from the force. If not, you will be killed as suddenly, as unexpectedly, and as horribly as either Burnham or Gordon.
The signature was also in green. The two words at the bottom left no clue to the writer’s identity: “Loup-garou.” The detective choked and whirled to see that the policemen, Reynolds and Kaler were all staring at him. He smiled thinly, shrugged and went out of the house with the missive in his coat pocket.
On the steps were newspapermen, and at Lane’s appearance a barrage of questions ripped through the air.
“Was it the same as Burnham?”
“If Jackson’s been dead a week, how could he possibly murder Gordon?”
“Who do you suspect?”
“C’mon, give us a break! We gotta print somethin’.”
“Okay by us, flatfoot, it ain’t our funeral.”
Lane was on the sidewalk, trying to worm his way through the gathering crowd. Hands tore at him, people stared in his direction, cameras snapped hungrily. One hand in particular was insistent. Lane gazed back at its owner with annoyance.
And then his annoyance faded, for the owner of the white hand was a vividly beautiful girl. In spite of his worries, Lane stopped abruptly, satisfied for the moment just to fill his eyes with this vision. About him people snickered and he quickly plunged on, dragging the girl with him until they stood a good hundred feet away from the nearest of the morbid crowd.
“You had something to say to me?” asked Lane.
“Yes, but this isn’t the place,” she said. Her voice seemed to vibrate with excitement—or perhaps fear.
“Come on up to Headquarters with me.” He turned quickly to hail a cruising cab and when it had stopped Lane said, “Let’s get going, miss.”
He reached back for the girl’s arm to help her into the machine, and then he stopped and stared quickly about him. There was a second taxi further along the street, but it was unoccupied. The girl had no time to walk away. No one had come near them in that brief instant. But the girl was gone! Completely and mysteriously!
CHAPTER TWO
Beneath the Mound
ON Detective-Sergeant Lane’s desk there lay a weird assortment of articles, and each time Inspector Leonard marched past on his endless stride up and down the room, he looked at the objects. First, there was the blue gray glove. Next came the Haitian pharmacy bill. Then there were the note and the knife with the snake handle.
Lane leaned back with a distraught face and ran his fingers, comblike, through his black hair. “But, Inspector, if I can’t open the grave, how the devil do I know whether or not this guy Jackson is still buried?”
“It’s your case,” snapped Leonard.
“Yeah. But how about a little cooperation? I’ve tried to connect with Jackson’s family and all I can find is an old hag that says no. I can’t exhume that body without an order!” Lane picked up the note he had found on the door. “And as for this thing, how the devil could it get there? Whoever wrote it knows I’m on the case and they think I’ve got the evidence.”
“Did you find out what that signature ‘Loup-garou’ means?” asked Leonard.
“It means,” intoned Lane, “the ‘human hyena.’ Is that gruesome enough for you? It’s part of a voodoo fetish. One of the priests, or something, in a black magic cult.”
“Well,” snapped Leonard, “if you can’t do anything but sit there and twiddle your thumbs, I’d take that note’s advice and resign!”
“Yes,” growled Lane, “I suppose you would. I can’t seem to set my teeth into anything. Here’s this business of a green serpent and a human hyena or wolf, and next comes Leroux who can’t be located. The only way I can find out if dead men really are coming back to life, and killing, is by digging up Jackson—and you won’t let me do that!”
“The family has the first say in that!” exclaimed Leonard impatiently. “The whole town is down on our necks! The papers are tooting up this thing until I can’t eat or sleep. They say—and they’re right—that not one rich man in this town is safe!
“Gordon was the
object of an extortion attempt three weeks before he was murdered. The next man will either pay or be killed. The town’s crazy with fear!”
“All right,” sighed Lane. “I’m no ghoul and I didn’t think I’d ever dig graves, but order or no order, tonight I’m going to exhume Jackson. If I’m caught—well, what the devil? It couldn’t be worse!”
The cemetery was ringed by giant weeping willow trees which swayed under the ghostly moan of the night wind. Under the light of the half-moon, white tombstones stood out spectrally.
Stealthy shadows marched along the pathways each time the breeze tugged at the bending willows, and over all hung the terrible silence of death.
Terry Lane stood in the hushed night and rattled the padlock on the gates. With the key he had taken from Reynolds, he gained entrance. As he swung back the iron bars, the rusty hinges creaked and groaned, as ominous as death itself. A shiver ran up Lane’s spine but he straightened his shoulders, hefted shovel and pick that he carried, and walked in.
“Whatever teeth,” he muttered to himself, “that note might have had—they’ll sink now, if ever.”
He looked about him across the dead white array of marble rows, glanced up at the shadows the trees made against the sky, and then began the task of finding Jackson’s grave.
One by one he inspected the stones, careful not to tread upon the mounds. Then he came to a patch of earth where the sod had not yet had time to set, and he quickly read the inscription by the moonlight: “William Jackson—by his ever-loving sister.”
Lane stared about him, and then with a sigh of repulsion, sank his pick into the center of the mound. He worked feverishly at his gruesome task, for he did not know but that he was being watched. Somehow, he felt the presence of eyes.
At last his shovel scraped against metal. Redoubling his efforts, he undermined the casket until he could stand to one side. Above him an owl hooted weirdly, sending countless shivers up and down Lane’s spine. He remembered having heard that the presence of an owl meant death.
Lane wrapped his grimy fist about the half of his flashlight and pried up the outer lid of the casket. He was surprised to find that it was not sealed, as it should have been. The round beam of cold light probed into the interior and lit up the glass front of the box through which one should be able to see the corpse.
Then a low whistle escaped the detective, and he bent to look more closely. No, there was no mistake. The coffin was—empty!
As he stood beside the casket, trying to make himself realize that he was not a victim of a hallucination, small clods of dirt fell from above and struck his head. Lane froze with horror and he felt the dread premonition of a presence.
Seconds ticked by before he dared move. He whirled suddenly, stepped to one side. The icy beam of his light bit up toward the sky and lit up—the ghastly face of a dead man!
There was no mistake. Lane knew that the man was a corpse. The eyes held that glassy, hard light; the flesh was gray; there was no expression in the face. The man stood quietly looking down at Terry.
The lips moved slowly. The voice was harsh but toneless. “I have come to kill you, Lane!”
Lane braced himself for a spring upward and felt tentatively for his gun. Then he writhed inwardly as he realized that he had left it with his coat on top of the ground. What a fool he was!
Again the detective was about to leap up when he caught sight of another movement to the right of the hulk above him. He changed the beam of his light and there again was the expressionless face of a corpse!
Another movement across the grave, another change of the light, and still another death mask!
Lane felt his blood freeze in his veins as he realized his peril. Three men, dressed in the black of the grave, were about to take his life. It was not until now that Lane really understood the look of horror on the faces of Burnham and Gordon.
It was true, then, that the murderers he had been trying to bring to justice were dead men. The empty grave was the proof. Lane felt certain that some fiendish hand was guiding this entire fantastic scheme and he knew that he was close to a solution of the crimes.
But he also knew that he was about to die. There was no fighting or killing that would serve against men already dead.
But Lane had not reached his present position on the force by sidestepping fights, and though he did not have his gun, he had his two fists—and they were enough.
He lunged for the legs of the first one he had seen and felt his arms close around solid flesh. The figure reeled back, dragging Terry out of the grave.
The detective let go. He rolled to one side. He tried to scramble to his feet but, like maniacs, the three were upon him, pinning him down.
Lane caught a glimpse of an expressionless face and saw grasping hands reach out for his throat. He struck out savagely and his fist thudded against clammy flesh. The man’s expression did not change—he didn’t reel. The hands came closer.
Gathering all of his strength for one frantic lunge, Lane shot away from them and managed to get to his knees. But the three were not to be denied. They rose up, slowly, relentlessly, and came forward on three sides.
The detective scrambled to his feet and stood weaving, fighting hard to retain control of himself. He struck at the nearest one, driving it back by the sheer force of the blow. He whirled to strike at another. His fist crashed out like a pile driver. The knuckles crunched into cold flesh. But before he could recover himself he sensed a presence behind him.
He tried to spin about, but he was too late. Icy, bony fingers were closing about his windpipe. He struggled, tried to writhe away, but the thing which had him was not to be eluded. The hands tightened with a strength which was demoniacal.
The two others were again closing in from the front. Their hands were held out in front of them, dead white in the moonlight. Somewhere in the weeping willows, the owl hooted.
Lane struggled fiercely, gasping for breath. He knew it was a question of seconds before he would lose consciousness.
One of those who came on in front spoke. Its voice was flat, toneless, harsh. “I have come to kill you, Lane!”
The whole ghastly scene had begun to spin before Terry’s tortured eyes. The half-moon dipped crazily and all the silhouettes of the moaning trees blended into one mad whirl before the detective’s protruding eyes.
In a moment . . .
Then a harsh voice cut through the night. An ugly, snarling voice. “Drop him! Drop him! Drop him!”
The trio backed away. The fingers about Lane’s windpipe relaxed and allowed him to sink down on the sod. He gasped hoarsely for breath, unable, for the moment, to offer further resistance.
Dimly he saw that a fourth member of the party was approaching. The newcomer was burly, thick in both speech and build. As he walked, he hunched forward like a beast. But Lane almost welcomed his appearance, for he knew that the man was alive and human.
Staccato orders were snapped about by the fourth man while the three who had attacked Lane stood stiffly, looking straight ahead, seeing nothing out of their dead eyes. Then the three bent down, and before Lane could move, they picked him up in clammy arms and bore him away toward the rusty gates of the cemetery.
One walked on each side of the detective and the third plodded at his head. Three pairs of arms pinioned him tightly and he was unable to move. The footsteps of the trio thudded dully, lifelessly upon the pathway.
Lane saw the gate-tops float past him and knew that they were on the road. How far they would carry him he did not know, nor did he dare contemplate the fate which he approached. As the district was an abandoned one, there was no hope that the party would be noticed and reported. Whatever happened to save Lane would occur only through his own initiative.
Through the trees overhead the detective caught an occasional glimpse of the half-moon and he heard, from the back of the burying ground, the derisive hoot of the owl.
After an interval of several minutes, the group approached a black limousine which was
parked on the side of the road. The burly one rasped an order and took hold of the door handle. Lane was dropped to the gravel. The three men who had carried him backed away, staring straight ahead out of sightless eyes.
The car door opened suddenly, flooding the roadside with a strange greenish light which blended with that of the moon. An impersonal voice reached Lane from within.
“Get in. Do not try to get away. I have you covered.” A low chuckle followed, its note pitched in a cruel key. “Those dead men would be only too glad to track you down if you tried to escape.”
Lane blinked at the light. He climbed stiffly to his feet, shrugged and stepped inside the car. There was nothing to lose by entering—quite the contrary.
A man clad in a black overcoat and hat sat on the far side of the limousine, but all that Lane could see of his face was two piercing eyes which seemed to glow like those of a wolf. The man’s face was entirely obscured by a green mask.
The detective sat down on the soft seat. The door was slammed shut from without, cutting off the night and replacing it with the greenish glow which came from the floor.
The car’s occupant thrust an automatic savagely into Lane’s side—and in spite of himself the detective winced from the pressure of the barrel. Still, he thought, hot lead was by far preferable to eternity at the hands of dead men.
“You found Jackson gone?” queried the masked man.
Lane drew a long breath and carefully steadied his jumping nerves. “Yes. Seems to have walked out on us. Have I the doubtful honor of talking with Loup-garou?”
“You have,” came the thick answer.
“The human hyena, eh?” mocked Lane. The best he could do would be to meet death halfway. “I have something you want?”
“Quite right,” snapped Loup-garou. “You have a certain pharmacy bill addressed to a Dr. Leroux of this city. I must have that bill!” The last sentence was harshly punctuated by a thrust of the automatic muzzle deeper into the detective’s side.