"Their aircraft have not been dropping bombs, positively?"

A second officer glanced up from his own map.

"Our planes cover all that space, sir, and have for some time."

"They either have a noiseless tank," observed the general meditatively,

"or...."

The steady fingers placed a red pin at a certain spot.

"One observation-post, sir, has reopened communication. Two infantrymen,

separated from their command, came upon it and found the machine-gun

crew dead, with gas-masks adjusted. No tanks or tracks. They are

identified, sir, and are now looking for tank tracks or shells."

The general nodded emotionlessly.

"Let me know immediately."

* * * * *

He fell back to the ceaseless study of the board with its crawling

sparks and sudden flashes of light. Over at the left, there were four

white sparks crawling toward a spot where a blue flash had showed a

little while since. A red light glowed suddenly where one of the white

sparks crawled. One of the two officers behind the general spoke

crisply. Instantly, it seemed, the other three white sparks changed

their direction of movement. They swung toward the red flash--the point

where a wireless from the tank represented by the first white flash had

reported, contact with the enemy.

"Enemy tank destroyed here, sir," said the voice above the steady

fingers.

"Wiped out three of our observation posts," murmured the general, "His

side knows it. That's an opportunity. Have those posts reoccupied."

"Orders given, sir," said a staff officer from behind. "No reports as

yet."

The general's eyes went back to the space two miles wide and two miles

deep in which there was only a single observation-post functioning, and

that in charge of two strayed infantrymen. The battle in the fog was in

a formative stage, now, and the general himself had to watch the whole,

because it was by small and trivial indications that the enemy's plans

would be disclosed. The dead area was no triviality, however. Half a

dozen tanks were crawling through it, reporting monotonously that no

sign of the enemy could be found. One of the little sparks representing

those tanks abruptly went out.

"Tank here, sir, no longer reports."

The general watched with lack-luster eyes, his mind withdrawn in

thought.

"Send four helicopters," he said slowly, "to sweep that space. We'll see

what the enemy does."

One of the seated officers opposite him spoke swiftly. Far away a

roaring set up and was stilled. The helicopters were taking off.

* * * * *

They would rush across the blanket of fog, their vertical propellers

sending blasts of air straight downward. For most of their sweep they

would keep a good height, but above the questionable ground they would

swoop down to barely above the fog-blanket. There their monstrous screws

would blow holes in the fog until the ground below was visible. If any

tanks crawled there, in the spaces the helicopters swept clear, they

would be visible at once and would be shelled by batteries miles away,

batteries invisible under the artificial cloud-bank.

No other noises came through the walls of the monster tank. There was a

faint, monotonous murmur of the electric generator. There were the

quiet, crisp orders of the officers behind the general, giving the

routine commands that kept the fighting a stalemate.

The aircraft officer lifted his head, pressing his headphones tightly

against his ears, as if to hear mores clearly.

"The enemy, sir, has sent sixty fighting machines to attack our

helicopters. We sent forty single-seaters as escort."

"Let them fight enough," said the general absently, "to cause the enemy

to think us desperate for information. Then draw them off."

There was silence again. The steady fingers put pins here and there. An

enemy tank destroyed here. An American tank encountered an enemy and

ceased to report further. The enemy sent four helicopters in a wide

sweep behind the American lines, escorted by fifty fighting planes. They

uncovered a squadron of four tanks, which scattered like insects

disturbed by the overturning of a stone. Instantly after their

disclosure a hundred and fifty guns, four miles away, were pouring

shells about the place where they had been seen. Two of the tanks ceased

to report.

The general's attention was called to a telephone instrument with its

call-light glowing.

"Ah," said the general absently. "They want publicity matter."

The telephone was connected to the rear, and from there to the Capital.

A much-worried cabinet waited for news, and arrangements were made and

had been used, to broadcast suitably arranged reports from the front,

the voice of the commander-in-chief in the field going to every

workshop, every gathering-place, and even being bellowed by

loud-speakers in the city streets.

* * * * *

The general took the phone. The President of the United States was at

the other end of the wire, this time.

"General?"

"Still in a preliminary stage, sir," said the general, without haste.

"The enemy is preparing a break-through effort, possibly aimed at our

machine-shops and supplies. Of course, if he gets them we will have to

retreat. An hour ago he paralyzed our radios, not being aware, I

suppose, of our tuned earth-induction wireless sets. I daresay he is

puzzled that our communications have not fallen to pieces."

"But what are our chances?" The voice of the President was steady, but

it was strained.

"His tanks outnumber ours two to one, of course, sir," said the general

calmly. "Unless we can divide his fleet and destroy a part of it, of

course we will be crushed in a general combat. But we are naturally

trying to make sure that any such action will take place within

point-blank range of our artillery, which may help a little. We will cut

the fog to secure that help, risking everything, if a general engagement

occurs."

There was silence.

The President's voice, when it came, was more strained still.

"Will you speak to the public, General?"

"Three sentences. I have no time for more."

There were little clickings on the line, while the general's eyes

returned to the board that was the battlefield in miniature. He

indicated a spot with his finger.

"Concentrate our reserve-tanks here," he said meditatively. "Our

fighting aircraft here. At once."

The two spots were at nearly opposite ends of the battle field. The

chief of staff, checking the general's judgment with the alert suspicion

that was the latest addition to his duties, protested sharply.

"But sir, our tanks will have no protection against helicopters!"

"I am quite aware of it," said the general mildly.

He turned to the transmitter. A thin voice had just announced at the

other end of the wire, "The commander-in-chief of the army in the field

will make a statement."

* * * * *

The general spoke unhurriedly.

"We are in contact with the enemy, have been for some hours. We have

lost forty tanks and the enemy, we think, sixty or more. No general

engagement has yet taken place, but we think decisive action on the

enemy's part will be attempted within two hours. The tanks in the field

need now, as always, ammunition, spare tanks, and the special supplies

for modern warfare. In particular, we require ever-increasing quantities

of fog-gas. I appeal to your patriotism for reinforcements of material

and men."

He hung up the receiver and returned to his survey of the board.

"Those three listening-posts," he said abruptly, indicating a place near

where an enemy tank had been destroyed. "Have they been reoccupied?"

"Yes, sir. Just reported. The tank they reported rolled over them,

destroying the placement. They are digging in."

"Tell me," said the general, "when they cease to report again. They

will."

He watched the board again and without lifting his eyes from it, spoke

again.

"That listening-post in the dead sector, with the two strayed

infantrymen in it. Was it reported?"

"Not yet, sir."

"Tell me immediately it does."

The general leaned back in his chair and deliberately relaxed. He

lighted a cigar and puffed at it, his hands quite steady. Other

officers, scenting the smoke, glanced up enviously. But the general was

the only man who might smoke. The enemy's gases, like the American ones,

could go through any gas-mask if in sufficient concentration. The tanks

were sealed like so many submarines, and opened their interiors to the

outer air only after that air had been thoroughly tested and proven

safe. Only the general might use up more than a man's allowance for

breathing.

* * * * *

The general gazed about him, letting his mind rest from its intense

strain against the greater strain that would come on it in a few

minutes. He looked at a tall blond man who was surveying the board

intently, moving away, and returning again, his forehead creased in

thought.

The general smiled quizzically. That man was the officer appointed to I.

I. duty--interpretative intelligence--chosen from a thousand officers

because the most exhaustive psychological tests had proven that his

brain worked as nearly as possible like that of the enemy commander. His

task was to take the place of the enemy commander, to reconstruct from

the enemy movements reported and the enemy movements known as nearly as

possible the enemy plans.

"Well, Harlin," said the general, "Where will he strike?"

"He's tricky, sir," said Harlin. "That gap in our listening-posts looks,

of course, like preparation for a massing of his tanks inside our lines.

And it would be logical that he fought off our helicopters to keep them

from discovering his tanks massing in that area."

The general nodded.

"Quite true," he admitted. "Quite true."

"But," said Harlin eagerly. "He'd know we could figure that out. And he

may have wiped out listening posts to make us think he was planning just

so. He may have fought off our helicopters, not to keep them from

discovering his tanks in there, but to keep them from discovering that

there were no tanks in there!"

"My own idea exactly," said the general meditatively. "But again, it

looks so much like a feint that it may be a serious blow. I dare not

risk assuming it to be a feint only."

He turned back to the board.

"Have those two strayed infantrymen reported yet?" he asked sharply.

"Not yet, sir."

* * * * *

The general drummed on the table. There were four red flashes glowing at

different points of the board--four points where American tanks or

groups of tanks were locked in conflict with the enemy. Somewhere off

in the enveloping fog that made all the world a gray chaos, lumbering,

crawling monsters rammed and battered at each other at infinitely short

range. They fought blindly, their guns swinging menacingly and belching

lurid flames into the semi-darkness, while from all about them dropped

the liquids that meant death to any man who breathed their vapor. Those

gases penetrated any gas-mask, and would even strike through the

sag-pastes that had made the vesicatory gases of 1918 futile.

With tanks by thousands hidden in the fog, four small combats were kept

up, four only. Battles fought with tanks as the main arm are necessarily

battles of movement, more nearly akin to cavalry battles than any other

unless it be fleet actions. When the main bodies come into contact, the

issue is decided quickly. There can be no long drawn-out stalemates such

as infantry trenches produced in years past. The fighting that had

taken place so far, both under the fog and aloft in the air, was

outpost skirmishing only. When the main body of the enemy came into

action it would be like a whirlwind, and the battle would be won or lost

in a matter of minutes only.

The general paid no attention to those four conflicts, or their possible

meaning.

"I want to hear from those two strayed infantrymen," he said quietly, "I

must base my orders on what they report. The whole battle, I believe,

hinges on what they have to say."

He fell silent, watching the board without the tense preoccupation he

had shown before. He knew the moves he had to make in any of three

eventualities. He watched the board to make sure he would not have to

make those moves before he was ready. His whole air was that of waiting:

the commander-in-chief of the army of the United States, waiting to hear

what he would be told by two strayed infantrymen, lost in the fog that

covered a battlefield.

* * * * *

The fog was neither more dense nor any lighter where Corporal Wallis

paused to roll his pre-war cigarette. The tobacco came from the gassed

machine-gunner in the pill-box a few yards off. Sergeant Coffee, three

yards distant, was a blurred figure. Corporal Wallis put his cigarette

into his mouth, struck his match, and puffed delicately.

"Ah!" said Corporal Wallis, and cheered considerably. He thought he saw

Sergeant Coffee moving toward him and ungenerously hid his cigarette's

glow.

Overhead, a machine-gun suddenly burst into a rattling roar, the sound

sweeping above them with incredible speed. Another gun answered it.

Abruptly, the whole sky above them was an inferno of such tearing noises

and immediately after they began a multitudinous bellowing set up.

Airplanes on patrol ordinarily kept their engines muffled, in hopes of

locating a tank below them by its noise. But in actual fighting there

was too much power to be gained by cutting out the muffler for any minor

motive to take effect. A hundred aircraft above the heads of the two

strayed infantrymen were fighting madly about five helicopters. Two

hundred yards away, one fell to the earth with a crash, and immediately

afterward there was a hollow boom. For an instant even the mist was

tinged with yellow from the exploded gasoline tank. But the roaring

above continued--not mounting, as in a battle between opposing patrols

of fighting planes, when each side finds height a decisive advantage,

but keeping nearly to the same level, little above the bank of cloud.

Something came down, roaring, and struck the earth no more than fifty

yards away. The impact was terrific, but after it there was dead silence

while the thunder above kept on.

Sergeant Coffee came leaping to Corporal Wallis' side.

"Helicopters!" he barked. "Huntin' tanks an' pill-boxes! Lay down!"

He flung himself down to the earth.

Wind beat on them suddenly, then an outrageous blast of icy air from

above. For an instant the sky lightened. They saw a hole in the mist,

saw the little pill-box clearly, saw a huge framework of supporting

screws sweeping swiftly overhead with figures in it watching the ground

through wind-angle glasses, and machine-gunners firing madly at dancing

things in the air. Then it was gone.

"One o' ours," shouted Coffee in Wallis' ear. "They' tryin' to find th'

Yellows' tanks!"

* * * * *

The center of the roaring seemed to shift, perhaps to the north. Then a

roaring drowned out all the other roarings. This one was lower down and

approaching in a rush. Something swooped from the south, a dark blotch

in the lighter mist above. It was an airplane flying in the mist, a

plane that had dived into the fog as into oblivion. It appeared, was

gone--and there was a terrific crash. A shattering roar drowned out even

the droning tumult of a hundred aircraft engines. A sheet of flame

flashed up, and a thunderous detonation.

"Hit a tree," panted Coffee, scrambling to his feet again. "Suicide

club, aimin' for our helicopter."

Corporal Wallis was pointing, his lips drawn back in a snarl.

"Shut up!" he whispered. "I saw a shadow against that flash! Yeller

infantryman! Le's get 'im!"

"Y'crazy," said Sergeant Coffee, but he strained his eyes and more

especially his ears.

It was Coffee who clutched Corporal Wallis' wrist and pointed. Wallis

could see nothing, but he followed as Coffee moved silently through the

gray mist. Presently he too, straining his eyes, saw an indistinct

movement.

The roaring of motors died away suddenly. The fighting had stopped, a

long way off, apparently because the helicopters had been withdrawn.

Except for the booming of artillery a very long distance away, firing

unseen at an unseen target, there was no noise at all.

"Aimin' for our pill-box," whispered Coffee.

They saw the dim shape, moving noiselessly, halt. The dim figure seemed

to be casting about for something. It went down on hands and knees and

crawled forward. The two infantrymen crept after it. It stopped, and

turned around. The two dodged to one side in haste. The enemy

infantryman crawled off in another direction, the two Americans

following him as closely as they dared.

He halted once more, a dim and grotesque figure in the fog. They saw him

fumbling in his belt. He threw something, suddenly. There was a little

tap as of a fountain pen dropped upon concrete. Then a hissing sound.

That was all, but the enemy infantryman waited, as if listening....

* * * * *

The two Americans fell upon him as one individual. They bore him to the

earth and Coffee dragged at his gas-mask, good tactics in a battle where

every man carries gas-grenades. He gasped and fought desperately, in a

seeming frenzy of terror.

They squatted over him, finally, having taken away his automatics, and

Coffee worked painstakingly to get off his gas-mask while Wallis went

poking about in quest of tobacco.

"Dawggone!" said Coffee. "This mask is intricate."

"He ain't got any pockets," mourned Wallis.

Then they examined him more closely.

"It's a whole suit," explained Coffee. "H-m.... He don't have to bother

with sag-paste. He's got him on a land diving-suit."

"S-s-say," gasped the prisoner, his language utterly colloquial in spite

of the beady eyes and coarse black hair that marked him racially as of

the enemy, "say, don't take off my mask! Don't take off my mask!"

"He talks an' everything," observed Coffee in mild amazement. He

inspected the mask again and painstakingly smashed the goggles. "Now,

big boy, you take your chance with th' rest of us. What' you doin'

around here?"

The prisoner set his teeth, though deathly pale, and did not reply.

"H'm-m...." said Coffee meditatively. "Let's take him in the pill-box

an' let Loot'n't Madison tell us what to do with him."

They picked him up.

"No! No! For Gawd's sake, no!" cried the prisoner shrilly. "I just

gassed it!"

* * * * *

The two halted. Coffee scratched his nose.

"Reckon he's lyin', Pete?" he asked.

Corporal Wallis shrugged gloomily.

"He ain't got any tobacco," he said morosely. "Let's chuck him in first

an' see."

The prisoner wriggled until Coffee put his own automatic in the small of

his back.

"How long does that gas last?" he asked, frowning. "Loot'n't Madison

wants us to report. There's some fellers in there, all gassed up, but we

were in there a while back an' it didn't hurt us. How long does it

last?"

"Fur-fifteen minutes, maybe twenty," chattered the prisoner. "Don't put

me in there!"

Coffee scratched his nose again and looked at his wrist-watch.

"A'right," he conceded, "we give you twenty minutes. Then we chuck you

down inside. That is, if you act real agreeable until then. Got anything

to smoke?"

The prisoner agonizedly opened a zipper slip in his costume and brought

out tobacco, even tailor-made cigarettes. Coffee pounced on them one

second before Wallis. Then he divided them with absorbed and scrupulous

fairness.

"Right," said Sergeant Coffee comfortably. He lighted up. "Say, you, if

y' want to smoke, here's one o' your pills. Let's see the gas stuff.

How' y' use it?"

Wallis had stripped off a heavy belt about the prisoner's waist and it

was trailing over his arm. He inspected it now. There were twenty or

thirty little sticks in it, each one barely larger than a lead pencil,

of dirty gray color, and each one securely nested in a tube of

flannel-lined papier-mache.

"These things?" asked Wallis contentedly. He was inhaling deeply with

that luxurious enjoyment a tailor-made cigarette can give a man who had

been remaking butts into smokes for days past.

"Don't touch 'em," warned the prisoner nervously. "You broke my goggles.

You throw 'em, and they light and catch fire, and that scatters the

gas."

* * * * *

Coffee touched the prisoner, indicating the ground, and sat down,

comfortably smoking one of the prisoner's cigarettes. By his air, he

began to approve of his captive.

"Say, you," he said curiously, "you talk English pretty good. How'd you

learn it?"

"I was a waiter," the prisoner explained. "New York. Corner Forty-eighth

and Sixth."

"My Gawd!" said Coffee. "Me, I used to be a movie operator along there.

Forty-ninth. Projection room stuff, you know. Say, you know Heine's

place?"

"Sure," said the prisoner. "I used to buy Scotch from that blond feller

in the back room. With a benzine label for a prescription?"

Coffee lay back and slapped his knee.

"Ain't it a small world?" he demanded. "Pete, here, he ain't never been

in any town bigger than Chicago. Ever in Chicago?"

"Hell," said Wallis, morose yet comfortable with a tailor-made

cigarette. "If you guys want to start a extra war, go to knockin'

Chicago. That's all."

Coffee looked at his wrist-watch again.

"Got ten minutes yet," he observed. "Say, you must know Pete Hanfry--"

"Sure I know him," said the enemy prisoner, scornfully. "I waited on

him. One day, just before us reserves were called back home...."

In the monster tank that was headquarters the general tapped his fingers

on his knees. The pale white light flickered a little as it shone on the

board where the bright sparks crawled. White sparks were American tanks.

Blue flashes were for enemy tanks sighted and reported, usually in the

three-second interval between their identification and the annihilation

of the observation-post that had reported them. Red glows showed

encounters between American and enemy tanks. There were a dozen red

glows visible, with from one to a dozen white sparks hovering about

them. It seemed as if the whole front line were about to burst into a

glare of red, were about to become one long lane of conflicts in

impenetrable obscurity, where metal monsters roared and rumbled and

clanked one against the other, bellowing and belching flame and ramming

each other savagely, while from them dripped the liquids that made their

breath mean death. There were nightmarish conflicts in progress under

the blanket of fog, unparalleled save perhaps in the undersea battles

between submarines in the previous European war.

* * * * *

The chief of staff looked up; his face drawn.

"General," he said harshly, "it looks like a frontal attack all along

our line."

The general's cigar had gone out. He was pale, but calm with an iron

composure.

"Yes," he conceded. "But you forget that blank spot in our line. We do

not know what is happening there."

"I am not forgetting it. But the enemy outnumbers us two to one--"

"I am waiting," said the general, "to hear from those two infantrymen

who reported some time ago from a listen-post in the dead area."

The chief of staff pointed to the outline formed by the red glows where

tanks were battling.

"Those fights are keeping up too long!" he said sharply. "General, don't

you see, they're driving back our line, but they aren't driving it back

as fast as if they were throwing their whole weight on it! If they were

making a frontal attack there, they'd wipe out the tanks we have facing

them; they'd roll right over them! That's a feint! They're concentrating

in the dead space--"

"I am waiting," said the general softly, "to hear from those two

infantrymen." He looked at the board again and said quietly, "Have the

call-signal sent them. They may answer."

He struck a match to relight his dead cigar. His fingers barely quivered

as they held the match. It might have been excitement--but it might have

been foreboding, too.

"By the way," he said, holding the match clear, "have our machine-shops

and supply-tanks ready to move. Every plane is, of course, ready to take

the air on signal. But get the aircraft ground personnel in their

traveling tanks immediately."

Voices began to murmur orders as the general puffed. He watched the

board steadily.

"Let me know if anything is heard from these infantrymen...."

* * * * *

There was a definite air of strain within the tank that was

headquarters. It was a sort of tensity that seemed to emanate from the

general himself.

Where Coffee and Wallis and the prisoner squatted on the ground,

however, there was no sign of strain at all. There was a steady gabble

of voices.

"What kinda rations they give you?" asked Coffee interestedly.

The enemy prisoner listed them, with profane side-comments.

"Hell," said Wallis gloomily. "Y'ought to see what we get! Las' week

they fed us worse'n dogs. An' th' canteen stuff--"

"Your tank men, they get treated fancy?" asked the prisoner.

Coffee made a reply consisting almost exclusively of high powered

expletives.

"--and the infantry gets it in the neck every time," he finished

savagely. "We do the work--"

Guns began to boom, far away. Wallis cocked his ears.

"Tanks gettin' together," he judged, gloomily. "If they'd all blow each

other to hell an' let us infantry fight this battle--"

"Damn the tanks!" said the enemy prisoner viciously. "Look here, you

fellers. Look at me. They sent a battalion of us out, in two waves. We

hike along by compass through the fog, supposed to be five paces apart.

We come on a pill-box or listenin' post, we gas it an' go on. We try not

to make a noise. We try not to get seen before we use our gas. We go on,

deep in your lines as we can. We hear one of your tanks, we dodge it if

we can, so we don't get seen at all. O'course we give it a dose of gas

in passing, just in case. But we don't get any orders about how far to

go or how to come back. We ask for recognition signals for our own

tanks, an' they grin an' say we won't see none of our tanks till the

battle's over. They say 'Re-form an' march back when the fog is out.'

Ain't that pretty for you?"

"You second wave?" asked Coffee, with interest.

The prisoner nodded.

"Mopping up," he said bitterly, "what the first wave left. No fun in

that! We go along gassin' dead men, an' all the time your tanks is

ravin' around to find out what's happenin' to their listenin'-posts.

They run into us--"

Coffee nodded sympathetically.

"The infantry always gets the dirty end of the stick," said Wallis

morosely.

* * * * *

Somewhere, something blew up with a violent explosion. The noise of

battle in the distance became heavier and heavier.

"Goin' it strong," said the prisoner, listening.

"Yeh," said Coffee. He looked at his wrist-watch. "Say, that twenty

minutes is up. You go down in there first, big boy."

They stood beside the little pill-box. The prisoner's knees shook.

"Say, fellers," he said pleadingly, "they told us that stuff would

scatter in twenty minutes, but you busted my mask. Yours ain't any good

against this gas. I'll have to go down in there if you fellers make me,

but--"

Coffee lighted another of the prisoner's tailor-made cigarettes.

"Give you five minutes more," he said graciously. "I don't suppose it'll

ruin the war."

They sat down relievedly again, while the fog-gas made all the earth

invisible behind a pall of grayness, a grayness from which the noises of

battle came.

In the tank that was headquarters, the air of strain was pronounced. The

maneuver-board showed the situation as close to desperation, now. The

reserve-tank positions had been switched on the board, dim orange glows,

massed in curiously precise blocks. And little squares of green showed

there that the supply and machine-shop tanks were massed. They were

moving slowly across the maneuver-board. But the principal change lay in

the front-line indications.

The red glows that showed where tank battles were in progress formed an

irregularly curved line, now. There were twenty or more such isolated

battles in progress, varying from single combats between single tanks to

greater conflicts where twenty to thirty tanks to a side were engaged.

And the positions of those conflicts were changing constantly, and

invariably the American tanks were being pushed back.

* * * * *

The two staff officers behind the general were nearly silent. There were

few sparks crawling within the American lines now. Nearly every one had

been diverted into the front-line battles. The two men watched the board

with feverish intensity, watching the red glows moving back, and

back....

The chief of staff was shaking like a leaf, watching the American line

stretched, and stretched....

The general looked at him with a twisted smile.

"I know my opponent," he said suddenly. "I had lunch with him once in

Vienna. We were attending a disarmament conference." He seemed to be

amused at the ironic statement. "We talked war and battles, of course.

And he showed me, drawing on the tablecloth, the tactical scheme that

should have been used at Cambrai, back in 1917. It was a singularly

perfect plan. It was a beautiful one."

"General," burst out one of the two staff officers behind him. "I need

twenty tanks from the reserves."

"Take them," said the general. He went on, addressing his chief of

staff. "It was an utterly flawless plan. I talked to other men. We were

all pretty busy estimating each other there, we soldiers. We discussed

each other with some freedom, I may say. And I formed the opinion that

the man who is in command of the enemy is an artist: a soldier with the

spirit of an amateur. He's a very skilful fencer, by the way. Doesn't

that suggest anything?"

The chief of staff had his eyes glued to the board.

"That is a feint, sir. A strong feint, yes, but he has his force

concentrated in the dead area."

"You are not listening, sir," said the general, reprovingly. "I am

saying that my opponent is an artist, an amateur, the sort of person who

delights in the delicate work of fencing. I, sir, would thank God for

the chance to defeat my enemy. He has twice my force, but he will not

be content merely to defeat me. He will want to defeat me by a plan of

consummate artistry, which will arouse admiration among soldiers for

years to come."

"But General, every minute, every second--"

"We are losing men, of whom we have plenty, and tanks, of which we have

not enough. True, very true," conceded the general. "But I am waiting to

hear from two strayed infantrymen. When they report, I will speak to

them myself."

"But, sir," cried the chief of staff, withheld only by the iron habit of

discipline from violent action and the taking over of command himself,

"they may be dead! You can't risk this battle waiting for them! You

can't risk it, sir! You can't!"

"They are not dead," said the general coolly. "They cannot be dead.

Sometimes, sir, we must obey the motto on our coins. Our country needs

this battle to be won. We have got to win it, sir! And the only way to

win it--"

* * * * *

The signal-light at his telephone glowed. The general snatched it up,

his hands quivering. But his voice, was steady and deliberate as he

spoke.

"Hello, Sergeant--Sergeant Coffee, is it?... Very well, Sergeant. Tell

me what you've found out.... Your prisoner objects to his rations, eh?

Very well, go on.... How did he gas our listening-posts?... He did, eh?

He got turned around and you caught him wandering about?... Oh, he was

second wave! They weren't taking any chances on any of our

listening-posts reporting their tanks, eh?... Say that again, Sergeant

Coffee!" The general's tone had changed indescribably. "Your prisoner

has no recognition signals for his own tanks? They told him he wouldn't

see any of them until the battle was over?... Thank you, Sergeant. One

of our tanks will stop for you. This is the commanding general

speaking."

He rang off, his eyes blazing. Relaxation was gone. He was a dynamo,

snapping orders.

"Supply tanks, machine-shop tanks, ground forces of the air service,

concentrate here!" His finger rested on a spot in the middle of the dead

area. "Reserve tanks take position behind them. Draw off every tank

we've got--take 'em out of action!--and mass them in front, on a line

with our former first line of outposts. Every airplane and helicopter

take the air and engage in general combat with the enemy, wherever the

enemy may be found and in whatever force. And our tanks move straight

through here!"

Orders were snapping into telephone transmitters. The commands had been

relayed before their import was fully realized. Then there was a gasp.

"General!" cried the chief of staff. "If the enemy is massed there,

he'll destroy our forces in detail as they take position!"

"He isn't massed there," said the general, his eyes blazing. "The

infantrymen who were gassing our listening-posts were given no

recognition signals for their tanks. Sergeant Coffee's prisoner has his

gas-mask broken and is in deadly fear. The enemy commander is foolish in

many ways, perhaps, but not foolish enough to break down morale by

refusing recognition signals to his own men who will need them. And look

at the beautiful plan he's got."

* * * * *

He sketched half a dozen lines with his fingers, moving them in

lightning gestures as his orders took effect.

"His main force is here, behind those skirmishes that look like a feint.

As fast as we reinforce our skirmishing-line, he reinforces his--just

enough to drive our tanks back slowly. It looks like a strong feint, but

it's a trap! This dead space is empty. He thinks we are concentrating to

face it. When he is sure of it--his helicopters will sweep across any

minute, now, to see--he'll throw his whole force on our front line.

It'll crumple up. His whole fighting force will smash through to take

us, facing the dead space, in the rear! With twice our numbers, he'll

drive us before him."

"But general! You're ordering a concentration there! You're falling in

with his plans!"

The general laughed.

"I had lunch with the general in command over there, once upon a time.

He is an artist. He won't be content with a defeat like that! He'll want

to make his battle a masterpiece, a work of art! There's just one touch

he can add. He has to have reserves to protect his supply-tanks and

machine-shops. They're fixed. The ideal touch, the perfect tactical

fillip, will be--Here! Look. He expects to smash in our rear, here. The

heaviest blow will fall here. He will swing around our right wing, drive

us out of the dead area into his own lines--and drive us on his

reserves! Do you see it? He'll use every tank he's got in one beautiful

final blow. We'll be outwitted, out-numbered, out-flanked and finally

caught between his main body and his reserves and pounded to bits. It is

a perfect, a masterly bit of work!"

He watched the board, hawklike.

"We'll concentrate, but our machine-shops and supplies will concentrate

with us. Before he has time to take us in rear we'll drive ahead, in

just the line he plans for us! We don't wait to be driven into his

reserves. We roll into them and over them! We smash his supplies! We

destroy his shops! And then we can advance along his line of

communication and destroy it, our own depots being blown up--give the

orders when necessary--and leaving him stranded with motor-driven tanks,

motorized artillery, and nothing to run his motors with! He'll be

marooned beyond help in the middle of our country, and we will have him

at our mercy when his tanks run out of fuel. As a matter of fact, I

shall expect him to surrender in three days."

* * * * *

The little blocks of green and yellow that had showed the position of

the reserve and supply-tanks, changed abruptly to white, and began to

crawl across the maneuver-board. Other little white sparks turned about.

Every white spark upon the maneuver-board suddenly took to itself a new

direction.

"Disconnect cables," said the general, crisply. "We move with our tanks,

in the lead!"

The monotonous humming of the electric generator was drowned out in a

thunderous uproar that was muffled as an air-tight door was shut

abruptly. Fifteen seconds later there was a violent lurch, and the

colossal tank was on the move in the midst of a crawling, thundering

horde of metal monsters whose lumbering progress shook the earth.

Sergeant Coffee, still blinking his amazement, absent-mindedly lighted

the last of his share of the cigarettes looted from the prisoner.

"The big guy himself!" he said, still stunned. "My Gawd! The big guy

himself!"

A distant thunder began, a deep-toned rumbling that seemed to come from

the rear. It came nearer and grew louder. A peculiar quivering seemed to

set up in the earth. The noise was tanks moving through the fog, not one

tank or two tanks, or twenty tanks, but all the tanks in creation

rumbling and lurching at their topmost speed in serried array.

Corporal Wallis heard, and turned pale. The prisoner heard, and his

knees caved in.

"Hell," said Corporal Wallis dispairingly. "They can't see us, an' they

couldn't dodge us if they did!"

The prisoner wailed, and slumped to the floor.

Coffee picked him up by the collar and jerked him out of the pill-box.

"C'mon Pete," he ordered briefly. "They ain't givin' us a infantryman's

chance, but maybe we can do some dodgin'!"

* * * * *

Then the roar of engines, of metal treads crushing upon earth and

clinking upon their joints, drowned out all possible other sounds.

Before the three men beside the pill-box could have moved a muscle,

monster shapes loomed up, rushing, rolling, lurching, squeaking. They

thundered past, and the hot fumes of their exhausts enveloped the trio.

Coffee growled and put himself in a position of defiance, his feet

braced against the concrete of the pill-box dome. His expression was

snarling and angry but, surreptitiously, he crossed himself. He heard

the fellows of the two tanks that had roared by him, thundering along in

alignment to right and left. A twenty-yard space, and a second row of

the monsters came hurtling on, gun muzzles gaping, gas-tubes elevated,

spitting smoke from their exhausts that was even thicker than the fog. A

third row, a fourth, a fifth....

The universe was a monster uproar. One could not think in this volume of

sound. It seemed that there was fighting overhead. Crackling noises came

feebly through the reverberating uproar that was the army of the United

States in full charge. Something came whirling down through the

overhanging mist and exploded in a lurid flare that for a second or two

cast the grotesque shadows of a row of tanks clearly before the trio of

shaken infantrymen.

Still the tanks came on and roared past. Twenty tanks, twenty-one ...

twenty-two.... Coffee lost count, dazed and almost stunned by the sheer

noise. It rose from the earth and seemed to be echoed back from the

topmost limit of the skies. It was a colossal din, an incredible uproar,

a sustained thunder that beat at the eardrums like the reiterated

concussions of a thousand guns that fired without ceasing. There was no

intermission, no cessation of the tumult. Row after row after row of the

monsters roared by, beaked and armed, going greedily with hungry guns

into battle.

* * * * *

And then, for a space of seconds, no tanks passed. Through the

pandemonium of their going, however, the sound of firing somehow seemed

to creep. It was gunfire of incredible intensity, and it came from the

direction in which the front-rank tanks were heading.

"Forty-eight, forty-nine, forty-ten, forty-'leven," muttered Coffee

dazedly, his senses beaten down almost to unconsciousness by the ordeal

of sound. "Gawd! The whole army went by!"

The roaring of the fighting-tanks was less, but it was still a monstrous

din. Through it, however, came now a series of concussions that were so

close together that they were inseparable, and so violent that they were

like slaps upon the chest.

Then came other noises, louder only because nearer. These were different

noises, too, from those the fighting-tanks had made. Lighter noises. The

curious, misshapen service tanks began to rush by, of all sizes and all

shapes. Fuel-carrier tanks. Machine-shop tanks, huge ones, these.

Commissary tanks....

Something enormous and glistening stopped short. A door opened. A voice

roared an order. The three men, beaten and whipped by noise, stared

dumbly.

"Sergeant Coffee!" roared the voice. "Bring your men! Quick!"

Coffee dragged himself back to a semblance of life. Corporal Wallis

moved forward, sagging. The two of them loaded their prisoner into the

door and tumbled in. They were instantly sent into a heap as the tank

took up its progress again with a sudden sharp leap.

"Good man," grinned a sooty-faced officer, clinging to a handhold. "The

general sent special orders you were to be picked up. Said you'd won the

battle. It isn't finished yet, but when the general says that--"

"Battle?" said Coffee dully. "This ain't my battle. It's a parade of a

lot of damn tanks!"

There was a howl of joy from somewhere above. Discipline in the

machine-shop tanks was strict enough, but vastly different in kind from

the formality of the fighting-machines.

"Contact!" roared the voice again. "General wireless is going again! Our

fellows have rolled over their reserves and are smashing their

machine-shops and supplies!"

Yells reverberated deafeningly inside the steel walls, already filled

with tumult from the running motors and rumbling treads.

"Smashed 'em up!" shrieked the voice above, insane with joy. "Smashed

'em! Smashed 'em! Smashed 'em! We've wiped out their whole reserve

and--" A series of detonations came through even the steel shell of the

lurching tank. Detonations so violent, so monstrous, that even through

the springs and treads of the tank the earth-concussion could be felt.

"There goes their ammunition! We set off all their dumps!"

There was sheer pandemonium inside the service-tank, speeding behind the

fighting force with only a thin skin of reserve-tanks between it and a

panic-stricken, mechanically pursuing enemy.

"Yell, you birds!" screamed the voice. "The general says we've won the

battle! Thanks to the fighting force! We're to go on and wipe out the

enemy line of communications, letting him chase us till his gas gives

out! Then we come back and pound him to bits! Our tanks have wiped him

out!"

* * * * *

Coffee managed to find something to hold on to. He struggled to his

feet. Corporal Wallis, recovering from the certainty of death and the

torture of sound, was being very sea-sick from the tank's motion. The

prisoner moved away from him on the steel floor. He looked gloomily up

at Coffee.

"Listen to 'em," said Coffee bitterly. "Tanks! Tanks! Tanks! Hell! If

they'd given us infantry a chance--"

"You said it," said the prisoner savagely. "This is a hell of a way to

fight a war."

Corporal Wallis turned a greenish face to them.

"The infantry always gets the dirty end of the stick," he gasped. "Now

they--now they' makin' infantry ride in tanks! Hell!"

Invisible Death

_By Anthony Pelcher_

[Illustration: _Wildly racing through the night, missing other cars by a

breath, the visible car continued its pursuit of--what?_]

[Sidenote: On Lees' quick and clever action depended the life of "Old

Perk" Ferguson, the millionaire manufacturer threatened by the uncanny,

invisible killer.]

The inquest into the mysterious death of Darius Darrow, savant,

inventor, recluse and eccentric, resembled a scientific convention. Men

and women of high scientific attainment, and, in some instances, world

fame, attended to hear first hand the strange, uncanny, unbelievable

circumstances as hinted by the newspapers.

Mrs. Susan Darrow, the widow, was the paramount witness. She appeared a

quaint figure as she took the stand. Tearful, yet alert, this little

woman betrayed the intelligence that had made her one of the world's

foremost chemists. She gave her age as fifty-eight, but if it had not

been for her snowy hair she would have looked much younger. She was

small but not frail, and had expressive blue eyes. She had a firm little

nose and chin, and was garbed in black silk garments of a fashion

evidently dating back a decade.

Although not modern in dress, her answers to questions regarding

scientific and business affairs involved in the mysterious case, proved

she was thoroughly abreast of the times in all other particulars.

"You believe your husband was murdered?" bluntly asked the examiner at

one stage.

"That is my opinion," she said, then added: "It might have been some

scientific accident, the nature of which I cannot fathom. We were

confidential in all matters except my husband's work. He reserved the

right to be secretive about the scientific problems on which he was

working."

"Can you throw any light on a motive for such a crime?"

"The motive seems self-evident. He was working on an invention that he

said would do away with war and would make the owner of the device a

practical world dictator, should he choose to exercise such power. The

device was completed. The murderer killed him to secure his device. That

all seems plain enough."

"Was anything else of value taken?"

"We had nothing else of value about the place. I was never given to

jewelry. The furnishings and equipment were undisturbed. It is quite

evident, I think, that the thief was no ordinary petty burglar."

* * * * *

The attorney interposed: "I believe we had better let Mrs. Darrow tell

this story from the beginning in her own way. There are only two really

important witnesses. Whatever she can remember to recite might be of

value to the authorities. Now, Mrs. Darrow, how long had you lived at

Brooknook? Begin there and just let your story unfold. Try to control

your nerves and emotions."

"I am not emotional. I am not nervous," said the quaint little woman,

bravely. "My heart hurts, that is all.

"The place was named by my father. We inherited it at his death, thirty

years ago, and moved in. My two children were born and died there. At

first we kept the servants and maintained all of the thirty-two rooms.

But after the children were gone, we both gave ourselves over to study

and we began to close one room after another, releasing the servants one

by one."

"How many rooms do you occupy now?"

"We lived in three, a living-room, kitchen and bedroom. The two big

parlors were turned into a laboratory. We both worked there. It was

there my husband met his death at his work. Sometimes we worked

together, sometimes independently. I did all my own housework, except

the laundry, which I sent out. We had no visitors. We lived for each

other and our work."

"Tell us about the rooms that were not occupied."

"We left them just as they always had been. I have not been in any of

these rooms for twenty years. Once I looked into the little girl's

room--my daughter's room. It was dusty and cobwebby, but undisturbed by

human hand. My husband peered in over my shoulder. I closed the door. We

turned away in each other's arms."

* * * * *

Here the little old woman fell to weeping softly into her lace

handkerchief. Minutes lapsed as the court waited, respecting her grief.

"Were these rooms locked?" asked the attorney finally.

"No," said the widow, recovering, as she dabbed at her eyes. "We feared

no one. All the rooms were closed, but not locked. The outside doors

were seldom locked. We lived in our own world. For appearance sake we

kept up the grounds. Peck, the gardener, kept the grounds, as you know.

He called in outside help when necessary. This was his affair. We never

bothered him. He lived probably a half mile up the road. The first of

each month he would come for his pay. He was practically our only

visitor.

"When it was necessary to see our attorney or other connections, Peck

would drive us. At first he used to drive our horses. Ten years ago we

pastured the horses for life and bought the small car. We seldom went

out. We have no close friends and no relatives nearer than the Pacific

coast. They are distant cousins. You see, we were rather alone in the

world since the children went away--we never spoke of them as being

dead."

Again the court was hushed. The coroner and the attorney took occasion

to blow their noses rather violently.

"On May 27th, the day your husband died, what happened, as you

re-remember it?" asked the attorney.

"We arose and had breakfast as usual. I was puttering about the rooms.

My husband kissed me and started for the laboratory. I was in the

kitchen. It was about ten o'clock when I finished in the kitchen and

went into the living room which adjoins the laboratory. I had been

rather fretted, something unusual for me. It seemed I dimly sensed the

presence of someone near me, someone I did not know, an outsider. I

thought it was foolish of me and buckled up.

"But when I went into the living room, it seemed as if some invisible

presence were following me. I could hear the low hum of my husband's

device. The door of the laboratory was open. He called to me and said:

"'Sue dear, it seems strange, but I made two models of this set and now

I can find only one. You could not have misplaced the other by any

chance, could you?'

"I assured him I knew nothing of it and he said, 'Hum-m, that's funny.'

Then he went back into the library and closed the door. The humming

continued. I was more annoyed than ever, but I did not want to bother my

husband. Then a queer thing happened. I saw the door of the laboratory

open and close, but I did not see anyone. The next instant, I heard my

husband's outcry. It was more a groan than a scream.

* * * * *

"I rushed into the laboratory. My husband was lying by his slate-topped

table. The device, I noticed, was gone. It was no bigger than a

coffee-mill, I thought, as I bent over my husband. Strange how such a

thought could have crowded in at such a time.

"My husband's head was bleeding. It was cut, a long gash over the ear,

just below the bald spot. It must have been a frightful blow. I looked

in his eyes. My nurse's and pharmaceutical course gave me knowledge

which sent a chill to my heart. He was dead. I must have fainted.

"When I recovered I ran for Peck. I found him near the house, coming my

way and holding his right eye.

"'Something struck me,' he said. Then, seeing me so pale, he said, 'My

God! Mrs. Darrow, what has happened?'

"'Run for the doctor,' I said. When the doctor came he called the police

and coroner. They told me not to disturb the body. Later they took it

away, and the gardener told me--"

"Never mind what Peck told you," interrupted the attorney. "We will let

him tell it. Is that all you can tell us about the death itself?"

But the widow was weeping now, so violently that the court ordered her

excused.

* * * * *

The gardener was called and took the stand displaying a big, black eye,

which offered comedy relief to a pathetic situation.

"On the main road to the east," he began after preliminary questioning,

"was a small car which had been parked there all morning. I noticed it

because it had no license plates. It was visible from the inside of the

grounds, but was hidden from the road by a hedge. It made me wonder

because it was just inside our grounds.

"I had some very special red flags which I planted as a border back of

pink geraniums. They were doing fine. I got them from the Fabrish seed

house. There are no plants like Fabrish's--I wouldn't give a snap of my

finger for all the other--"

"Just a minute," interrupted the attorney. He told the gardener to never

mind the geraniums and flags, but to tell just what happened.

"Well, I was bending over the border bed when I heard sounds like

someone running along the gravel path towards me. I heard a humming like

a bumble bee and I jumped to my feet. Just then something hit me in the

eye and knocked me down. Yes sir, knocked me plumb down, and--"

"Then what happened? Never mind the asides, the extras--tell us just the

simple facts," instructed the attorney.

"Well, you won't believe it, but I heard the footsteps leave the road.

The geraniums were badly trampled. I looked at the parked automobile and

could hear the hum coming from there.

"The machine started and turned into the road--"

"Did you notice anyone at the wheel?"

"That's what you're not going to believe. There wasn't anybody in that

auto at all. I didn't see anyone at any time. The auto started itself,

and what is more, that auto only went about a hundred yards when it

disappeared altogether--like that--like a flash."

"Did it turn off the road?"

"I didn't turn anywhere. It was in the middle of the road. It just

disappeared right in the middle of the road. It started without a

driver, it turned north without a driver, and went on by itself for

about a hundred yards. Then it vanished in the middle of the road. Just

dropped out of sight."

The court-room was hushed. The audience and court attaches were awe

stricken and looked their incredulity.

"Do you mean to tell us that auto drove itself?" asked the court

sternly.

* * * * *

The witness was completely confused. The attorney came to his rescue,

looked at the court, and said:

"He has told that same story a hundred times, and he will stick to it.

It seems impossible, but has not Mrs. Darrow told us she heard this

humming and saw nothing? With the purely perfunctory recitals of the

doctor and the constabulary this court and the jury have heard all there

is to hear. We have no more witnesses. That is all there is.

"The jury will have to decide from the evidence whether this case is

accident or murder. The doctor and two experts have reported that the

wound appeared to have been made by some blunt instrument, swung

powerfully. The skull under the wound and back of the ear was simply

crushed. Death was instantaneous. It all happened in broad daylight."

After an hour's deliberation the jury decided the savant came to his

death in his laboratory from a blow on the skull received in some manner

unknown.

The crowd filed out, spiritedly discussing the unusual crime. In the

crowd was Perkins Ferguson, known as "Old Perk," head of the Schefert

Engineering Corporation, who paid royalty on some of the Darrow patents.

With him was Damon Farnsworth, his first vice-president.

"Well, what do you think of it?" asked Farnsworth, biting into a black

cigar.

"Damned weird, isn't it?" replied "Old Perk." "I have my own theory,

however," he added, "but I am going to know a whole lot more about this

case before I venture it." The pair climbed into Ferguson's car

discussing the Darrow death case with furrowed brows.

* * * * *

What might be termed an extraordinary meeting of the directors of the

Schefert Engineering Corporation, was held a few days later in a big

building in the financial district.

The rich furnishings of the directors' room indicated, better than

Bradstreet's, the great wealth of the corporation. Uniformed pages stood

at attention at each end of the long, mahogany table at which were

seated the fourteen directors of the company. All were men of wealth,

standing and engineering knowledge. The departed Darrow often had been

summoned to such meetings, and at this one there was a hush because of

his recent demise.

After a batch of preliminary business had been transacted, Ferguson

arose and cleared his throat. The directors leaned forward in their

chairs expectantly. The page boys lost their mechanical attitude for the

instant and fairly craned their necks around the bulks of the forms in

front of them.

"The Darrow case has taken a sudden and sinister turn," said the

president. "I have a letter. I will read it:

"Old Perk: Get wise to yourself. We are in a position to destroy

you and all the pot-bellies in the Wall Street crowd. If you want

to die of old age, remember what happened to Darrow and begin

declaring us in on Wall Street dividends. If you do not you will

follow Darrow in the same way.

"Our first demand is for $100,000. Leave this amount in hundreds

and fifties in the rubbish can at the corner of 50th Street and

Broadway at 10 A. M. next Thursday. If you fail we will break your

damned neck. Bring the police with you if you like.

Invisible Death.

* * * * *

Ferguson passed the letter around for inspection. It was painstakingly

printed, evidently from the type in a rubber stamp set such as is sold

in toy stores.

"I have decided," said Perkins at length, "to give this case to Walter

Lees. He has never failed us in mechanical, chemical, or any form of

scientific problem. I hope he will not fail in this. He will work

independently of the police, who have requested that we keep the

appointment at 50th Street and Broadway at the hour named. We will

deposit a roll of newspapers, around which has been wrapped a fifty

dollar bill and then we will stand by while the awaiting detectives do

their duty."

"You do not think anyone is going to call for any supposed package of

money at one of the most congested corners in the world in broad

daylight?" asked a director at the end of the table.

"Why not?" asked Ferguson. "A seedy individual could pick a package from

a rubbish bin at that corner without attracting the least attention."

"I guess you're right," agreed the doubting one.

"I know I'm right," said the president. And he usually was.

"I have already arranged to have Lees instructed in his work," Ferguson

volunteered as a pause came in the buzz of conversation about the table.

"Lees is young, but he is capable." There was general discussion of the

strange case of Darius Darrow; the room filled with the blue haze of

many cigars.

Suddenly a low, humming sound was heard in the room.

Papers on the directors' table were bunched as if by unseen hands, and

thrown to the ceiling, from which they descended like flakes of snow and

scattered about the room.

A book of minutes was torn from the hands of a secretary. It was raised

and brought down on vice-president Farnsworth's head. A chair was pulled

out from under another direction and he was deposited in an undignified

heap on the floor.

Another director acted as though he had been tripped, and he fell on top

of Farnsworth. Two big vases crashed to the floor in bits. Other

decorative objects were scattered about.

The directors who had been hurtled to the floor stood up with

expressions of comical surprise on their features. Their chairs

catapulted into a far corner of the room, one after the other.

Startled expressions resounded from the group.

A small bookcase fell on its front with a crash of glass. Ferguson's

cane jumped in the air and crashed a window pane.

The humming ceased suddenly.

* * * * *

The room was a wreck. The assembled men stood aghast. They were simply

nonplussed. Finally they phoned for the police.

After hearing the strange recital from so many highly reputable

witnesses, a detective sergeant, who had responded to the call with

others, reported to headquarters.

A uniformed police guard was sent to the place with instructions to

remain on duty until relieved.

Ferguson sent for Walter Lees, the young engineer of whom he had spoken

to the directorate. Assigned to the task of unraveling the Darrow death

mystery, Lees ran true to form by getting busy at once. This was at

midnight of the day of the surprising directors' meeting. Lees owned a

big car; he piled into it and started for the scene of the crime.

Daybreak found him examining every inch of the road around the Darrow

estate. Then he searched the hedge along the east road, where the

phantom auto had disappeared after the crime. The brush along the

opposite side of the thoroughfare was also gone over.

Passing autos had stopped to ask the meaning of his flashlight. Lees

explained he had lost a pocketbook. It was as good an excuse as any and

served to keep him from drawing a crowd. He found nothing to reward his

long and painstaking efforts.

At seven A. M. he decided to interview the Darrow widow, and found her

already up and about her kitchen, weeping softly as she worked.

She bade him be seated in the living room.

"No, I am not afraid to stay here alone," she said in reply to Lees'

first question. "Whoever killed my husband did so to get possession of

his second model. They had already stolen the first. I have thought

since that they were afraid that the finding of the second model after

his death would aid in their detection. For some reason they had to have

both models."

She agreed to tell all she knew of the case. Lees listened to the long

recital as already recorded at the coroner's inquest. By adroit

questioning Lees gained just one new fact. Mrs. Darrow remembered that

she had called her husband, just before he retired to his laboratory, to

fix a towel hanger in the kitchen. "He found the pivot needed oiling,"

explained the widow. "That was all. He oiled it and went into the

laboratory."

* * * * *

The idea of one of the world's greatest mechanical engineers stopping

his work to oil a towel hanger caused Lees to smile, but Mrs. Darrow did

not smile.

"My husband was a genius at repairing about the house," she said, in all

seriousness.

"I can imagine so," agreed Lees.

The conversation ceased. Lees sat for a few minutes with his head in his

hands, thinking deeply. Finally he said:

"I am convinced that someone who was well aware of your husband's habits

committed this crime. Do you believe, positively, that the gardener is

above suspicion?"

"Oh, it couldn't have been Peck," insisted Mrs. Darrow. "I had seen him

down near the gate from the window. He was too far from the house, and

besides, he was devoted to us both."

"Then it was somebody from the neighborhood," said Lees.

"Maybe so," replied Mrs. Darrow, noncommittally.

"Who lives in the next house south?"

"That is towards the city," mused the widow. "There are no houses south

on either side of the road for a little further than a mile, when you

reach the town limits of Farsdale. The town line is about half-way

between, and marks the southern end of this estate."

"Who lives in the first house to the north?"

"That is the cottage of Peck, the gardener."

"How near is the next house?"

"That was the parcel my father sold. It is about three acres, and in the

center, or about the center, is the house built by Adolph Jouret, who

bought the land. He lives there with his daughter. They built a

magnificent place. The brook that traverses our grounds rises at a

spring back of his house. Save for two West Indian servants, they are

alone. The servants live in Farsdale and motor back and forth."

* * * * *

"What do you know of this--what's his name?" queried Lees, who had

assumed the role of examiner.

"Jouret? Very little. He is some sort of a circus man or showman, or was

before he retired. He once had wealth, but my husband, some weeks ago,

said that because of ill-advised investments he was not so well rated as

formerly. I had the feeling that he might be forced to give up the

place. I just felt that. I never heard it. I am so sorry because of the

daughter. She is a beautiful girl, and seemed kindly, the one time I saw

her. She was about twelve then. I do not like to say it, but she seemed

a little dazed or slow witted, but really beautiful." Mrs. Darrow fell

to smoothing out the folds in her house apron as Lees asked:

"When was the only time you saw her?"

"Ten years ago, about. Just after my father's death. They called on us.

We did not care to continue the friendship, as Jouret seemed a little

flamboyant--his circus nature, I suppose. Anyway, we were quiet folks,

and there was no need of close association with neighbors.

"I remember," continued the widow, after a pause, "that Jouret, when he

heard my husband was a scientist, simulated an interest in science. He

did have a smattering knowledge of science, but he was plainly affected,

so we decided to just let him drop. No ill-feeling. We just--well, we

were not interested."

"You do not approve of circus people?"

"It is not that. Any honest work is honorable. It seems commendable to

furnish amusement for the public. I know little about people of his

profession but I am sure they are perfectly all right. It was Jouret,

personally. He seemed noisy and insincere. The girl was nice. I loved

her."

"That is all you know of the Jourets?"

"That is all."

"Mrs. Darrow, I wish to go through this house from attic to basement.

Have you any objections?"

"None whatever. Make yourself free, but do not attach any significance

to what appears to be a secret passageway and cave. My father was a

biological chemist. He used to experiment much with small animals. He

had a cave where he stored chemicals, and I believe you will find old

chemicals stored down there now. I disturbed nothing."

The widow forced a smile to her lips. "Will you excuse me?" she

concluded. "I am trying to carry on."

* * * * *

Lees, carrying a flashlight, began a systematic search of the premises.

He made his way up a winding staircase, through dust and cobwebs to the

attic. He found the top story filled with trunks and bits of furniture

of a previous generation. All was in order, but dust-covered and

cobwebby.

"Someone has been here before me," he said to himself, brushing a mist

of cobwebs from his coat sleeves. "There is a path brushed through the

spiderwebs." Turning his flashlight on the floor, he exclaimed:

"And here are footprints in the dust. Well I'll be--!"

Then, after some study, he mused:

"Of course there has been someone here. The killer of Darrow probably

has been here to see what he could see. It was no great task. The doors

were never locked. The footprints are of no value except to give me the

size of his shoes."

He measured the footprints carefully. Then he went downstairs and phoned

the measurements to a local shoe dealer, asking him to give him the

trade size of shoes which would make such prints.

"They are number nines," decided the shoe dealer.

Lees then returned to resume his search in the rooms and corridors.

"Wonder if Jouret wears nines," he questioned himself. "But what if he

does? I couldn't convict him on that score. However, it might help."

Then he fell to searching through the old trunks. He found old

photographs, articles of apparel, knicknacks--grandmother's and

grandfather's belongings all of them, and some children's clothes of the

days when little boys wore ruffles about their necks and little girls'

pantalettes reached to their ankles.

Carefully each article was replaced. He made his way down to the third

and then the second floor. Through cobwebby corridors and bedchambers he

searched, but found nothing further to aid his case.

In the unused rooms on the first floor he found an old spinning-wheel,

candle moulds and utensils used in cooking in the days when housewives

cooked over an open fire.

* * * * *

He did not find the "secret" passageway until Mrs. Darrow came to his

aid. Leading from the basement was a coal chute. This shoot was formed

in a triangle with the point under a trap. It was man-high at the cellar

opening and its floor was a slide for fuel. It had been in use,

evidently, quite recently.

At the cellar wall of this chute, Mrs. Darrow pressed what appeared to

be a knot in the old timber and pushed open a door.

A dank odor issued forth as the door was opened. Lees entered the

passage and Mrs. Darrow returned upstairs.

Following the underground passageway, Lees came onto a cave about 14 by

14 feet in size with a ceiling and walls of arched brick. It had

evidently been built before the days of cement construction.

A long bench and shelves with carboys and jars of chemicals were the

only furnishings. Lees sounded all the walls, but found nothing further

to interest him.

Lees returned to town at the urgent call of "Old Perk," who had arranged

with great care to keep the appointment at 50th street and Broadway,

where the decoy package was to be left. He had snipers in nearby

windows. He had detectives, dressed in the gay garb of the habitues of

the neighborhood, patrolling the corner, and he and his own guard parked

an automobile, against all traffic rule, at the curb near the rubbish

can.

An office boy sauntered up to the rubbish can, threw in the decoy

package, and sauntered away.

A second later there was a low humming sound. The decoy package fairly

jumped out of the rubbish can and disappeared in thin air.

The humming sound seemed to round the corner into 50th Street.

Detectives followed on the jump. The humming approached an auto at the

curb and the auto's self starter began to function. As the police stood

near by, enough to have jumped into the auto, the whole machine, a big

touring car, actually disappeared before their eyes.

Consternation is a mild word when used to describe the result.

* * * * *

All forces set to trap the extortionists gathered in a group, and in

their surprise and disappointment began discussing the queer case in

loud tones. A crowd was gathering which was blocking traffic.

"Old Perk" was the first to recover from his surprise.

"Get the hell out of this neighborhood," he yelled to his working

forces. "All of you get down to my office!"

The working force dissolved and "Old Perk" drove away.

At "Old Perk's" office shortly afterward a conference of the defeated

forces of the law and of science was held.

"Old Perk" stormed and raged and the detective captain in charge fumed

and fussed, but nothing came of it all. One was as powerless as another.

Finally the conference adjourned.

The next morning in the mail, Perkins Ferguson, president of Schefert

Engineering Corporation, received a letter carefully printed in rubber

type. It read:

Thanks for the $50 bill. You cheated us by $99,950. This will never

do. Don't be like that. You poor fools, you make us increase our

demand. We double it. Leave $200,000 for us on your desk and leave

the desk unlocked. We will get it. Every time you ignore one of our

demands, one of your number will die. Better take this matter

seriously. Last warning.

Invisible Death.

"Not another dime will they get out of me," mused Ferguson.

He started opening the rest of his mail.

A clerk entered and handed him a telegram. It read:

"Damon Farnsworth struck down at breakfast table. Family heard

humming sound as he fell from his chair. Removed to Medical Center.

Skull reported fractured. May die.

"William Devins, Chief of Police, Larchmont."

Ferguson wildly seized the telephone. "Get me Farnsworth's house at

Larchmont!" he shouted to his operator.

* * * * *

The phone was answered by Jones, the butler.

"This is Ferguson."

An agitated voice replied:

"'Ow sir, yes sir. It's true, sir. 'E was bleeding at the 'ead, sir.

Something 'it 'im."

"Let me talk to Mrs. Farnsworth."

"They are at the 'ospital, sir."

"One of the boys."

"Both are at the 'ospital, sir."

"Do you think he will live?"

"An' 'ow could I say, sir?"

Ferguson called the Medical Center. They permitted him to talk to a

doctor and a nurse. The nurse referred him to the doctor, who said:

"He is unconscious. There is a wicked fracture at the base of the brain.

He was struck from the back--a club, I believe. He may die without

regaining consciousness. I am hoping he will rally and that he will be

all right."

Ferguson ordered his car and, with Lees at his heels, jumped in the

tonneau. He heard a humming sound back of him. He looked back and saw

nothing. Both he and Lees were too impressed for words.

"Step on it," Ferguson ordered the chauffeur. "Drive us to the Medical

Center."

At the world's largest group of hospitals, Ferguson's worst fears were

confirmed. The patient was reported sinking.

* * * * *

Ferguson, giant of Wall Street, was a low spirited man as he drove back

down town to his office. With Lees he passed through the outer offices,

buzzing with business and the click of typewriters. Not a head was

raised from a desk or machine. It was a well-drilled force.

Into his private sanctum he walked or rather dragged himself, and

wearily he sat down. He pushed a pile of papers from him and ran his

hand over his hot brow.

Blood pounded at his temples.

For the first time in his life he faced a situation which was too deep

for his understanding.

Over and over again he reviewed the uncanny events as Lees sat awaiting

orders.

"I cannot have them killing off my friends like that," he mused finally.

He called a clerk.

"Go to the bank and get $200,000 in fifties and one hundreds," he

commanded.

When the clerk returned with the money he laid the package on his desk

and left the desk open. "This might appear cowardly, but it will give us

time," he said. Lees did not offer an opinion.

Ferguson drew a personal note for $200,000 and sent it to the Schefert

Corporation's attorneys. This amount represented a large part of

Ferguson's personal assets, not involved with any company with which he

was connected. He told Lees to go about his further investigations. Then

he left the office and started for his home. "I'll bank my life Lees

will have those crooks lined up within a week," he assured himself as he

lolled in his auto, bound homeward. But his voice sounded hollow, and

the blood still pounded at his temples.

* * * * *

Reaching home, he found a call from the western plant, at Chicago. He

phoned the superintendent with a foreboding that all was not well.

"This you, Perk?" sounded the voice on the wire.

"Yes, what's up?"

"I had not intended bothering you with this, but in the light of all

that has happened I guess you had better know that one of our engineers

went stark mad out here about three weeks ago. He was a very brainy man

but his reason snapped. He first appeared queer when he began talking of

anarchy and cursing capitalists. Then one afternoon he struck a shop

foreman down with a heavy wrench and rushed out of the plant. We have

not seen him since. The police have been looking for him, but he is

still at large."

"That explains a lot of things," said "Old Perk." "Tell the police to

keep after him. We'll look for him here. File me a complete detailed

report of the incident by telegraph," he instructed. Then he asked:

"How is the foreman? Badly hurt?"

"He dodged; it was a glancing blow. The foreman was back to work in a

week. But he is nervous and has armed himself. We have put on extra

guards."

"Good," commended Ferguson. "Don't hesitate to spend tolls to keep me

advised of any developments."

An hour and a half later, Ferguson phoned the chief clerk in his

offices:

"Go into my private office," he ordered, "and see if there is a package

on my desk. It is a bank package."

The clerk returned in a few moments.

"There is no package on your desk, Mr. Ferguson."

"That is all I wanted to know," said Ferguson, and hung up the receiver.

Then Ferguson called up the Darrow home and tried to get in touch with

Lees, but was unable to do so, as Mrs. Darrow said she had not seen him

since he had been called back to the office.

* * * * *

The reason Ferguson could not reach Lees was because Lees had decided to

learn once and for all if Jouret wore number nine shoes. He had started

for Jouret's in his own car. It was a beautiful country he was

traversing, but he had no time to note that the tree branches almost met

over his head and that his way was bordered with a profusion of wild

flowers, displaying a rainbow of colors.

The house of Jouret, the retired circus performer, sat back far from the

road, against the side of a beautiful hill, and was surrounded by

poplars. The landscape was wilder and more natural than that of the

Darrow place adjoining.

The door was opened by a Porto Rican boy. Lees lost no time. He said

bluntly:

"Tell your master that a gentleman is here to see him on very particular

business."

Jouret, himself, came back with the boy.

"What is it?" he asked, smiling a welcome.

"I am working on the case of the death of Mr. Darrow, your neighbor. I

believed you might have seen something. I thought you might aid me."

* * * * *

Jouret betrayed no surprise.

"Come in," he said. He led the way to a large reception room and asked

his visitor to be seated. He was the soul of affability. Short, husky

and florid. His eyes large, black and staring. His hair black, quite

long and curling upward at the ears. He was dressed in black, and he had

the appearance of a big, fat crow.

"I am glad you came," he greeted his guest, "for I have far too few

callers." He switched on a big electric bunch-light in the center of the

room, for it was dusk.

"We have been told that you are a retired circus man," said Lees, in his

usual frank manner.

"Not exactly," said Jouret. "I traveled on the continent, finally

journeying to Australia and then to the States. I crossed the country

from San Francisco and settled down here. I was known as 'Elias, the

Great.' I had my own company and property. It was a magic show. It was

not a circus, although we did carry two elephants, three camels, some

ponies, snakes, and birds and smaller animals. That's where the circus

report came from.

"When I retired I sold my stock to a circus. The newspapers regarded it

as funny, and one of them printed a half page story with pictures about

the public sale. It was very much exaggerated. They mentioned giraffes,

hyenas, and a lot of other animals I never possessed. Odd, wasn't it,

getting so much publicity after I was through needing it? However I

never, in those days, dodged the limelight." Jouret ended his speech

with a loud and hearty guffaw.

"I will call my daughter," Jouret appended. "She will be glad to meet

you." He left the room.

Lees had taken occasion to note the size of Jouret's feet. They were

small, almost effeminate. More likely fives or sixes than nines.

Soon Jouret returned with a girl in her early twenties. She was blond

and radiantly beautiful.

* * * * *

Doris Jouret bowed and smiled in a perfectly friendly manner. Lees noted

that there was something about her eyes that made her appear dazed.

Jouret monopolized the conversation, giving no one a chance to edge in a

word.

"This gentleman desires information in connection with the death of our

neighbor Mr., or is it Dr., Darrow? I want you to assure him, as I will,

that we have seen or noted nothing that could possibly throw light on

the strange case."

The girl nodded, it seemed a little wearily, and Jouret was off on

another conversational flight:

"I too am a man of scientific attainments," he chattered. "I am a

biologist, toxicologist, doctor of medicine, a geologist, metalurgist,

mineralogist, and somewhat of a mechanic and electrician. I have given

long hours to the study of strange sciences in meta-physics, to which

you men give too little attention. There are sciences which transcend

any of this sphere. There is a higher astronomy. I neglected to say that

I am an astronomer."

"Yes?" drawled Lees.

"Yes!" said Jouret emphatically.

The girl had adopted rather a theatrical pose, which disclosed

considerable of her nether charms, and said nothing at all.

"When you find your man," volunteered Jouret, "you will find a madman."

He said this ponderously and with a gesture meant evidently to be

impressive.

"You believe a madman did it?" asked Lees, as Jouret paused, expecting a

question.

"Undoubtedly. It was a paranoic with delusions of money, grandeur and a

strongly developed homicidal mania. To me, that is the only sensible

solution. I am quite sure that I am correct."

Lees arose to go and Jouret did not urge him to stay. He bowed Lees out

and Doris bowed with him.

"She is a beautiful girl," mused Lees once he was outside.

Lees ran over in his mind the circumstances of his visit to Jouret.

There was no doubt in his mind that Jouret's shoes were too small to be

number nines, and he reasoned that that fact might tend to eliminate

Jouret. But he was not satisfied.

"I am going to get some gas," he told himself, "and then I am going to

get two private detectives to assist me, for I'm going right back there.

For the first time in my life I am going to be a Peeping Tom.

"There is no moon. The poplars will give us a view of all three floors

of that house, if they leave their blinds up enough, and three of us can

watch all three floors at once."

He phoned Ferguson that he might be busy for days, joined his pair of

operatives from the detective agency and for some time the three

operated on a well conceived plan.

* * * * *

It was probably a week later that Lees rendered a report to Perkins

Ferguson, which for a time proved one of the strangest documents in the

weird case. It read:

"You will probably think I am crazy, and for this reason I am having

this report subscribed and sworn to, jointly and severally. With my two

detectives I have seen Miss Jouret, the girl I told you about over the

phone, in three places at one and the same time. Not once but twice this

has happened.

"Looking through the windows of the Jouret place at night, we saw the

girl on the first, second and third floor of the house. We believed this

due to a clever arrangement of mirrors. But figure this out:

"The next day she drove a car to town. We followed. She got out at one

theater and entered. She did not come back, that we could see, but the

car drove off. There was no chauffeur, and we thought we had discovered

the driverless auto, until we looked and saw Miss Jouret still at the

wheel.

"She got out and entered another theater. She did not come back, but the

car drove off with her still at the wheel. She entered a third theater

after parking the car and this time the driver's seat and the tonneau

was empty.

"Reverse the reel and you will see her coming out of three theaters and

driving home. That is what happened. There must be three of her, all

identical, but only one shows at a time. If it's some of Jouret's

far-famed magic, I'll say he's some conjurer. The explanation is not yet

forthcoming. We want to shadow Jouret, but he never goes anywhere. The

girl has only been out the one time when she attended three matinees as

described. Believe it or not.

"The next night we each--the two detectives and I--tried to steal a

march on one another and called her up and asked her to go out. To our

individual surprise, she agreed in each case. To our collective

surprise, she kept all three dates on the same night. She walked

through the trees in this vicinity with me. She also drove down the road

in the auto with one of my detectives, and she went dancing with the

other. She was in three places miles apart at one and the same time.

"We each brought her home within a half hour of the other and we are

swearing to that. Either we are all hypnotized or else there are three

identical Misses Jouret.

"Jouret himself treats us all wonderfully, gives us the run of the

house, and tries to talk us to death."

* * * * *

The strange document was subscribed by Lees and the two detectives and

was held by Ferguson pending developments.

The next report from Lees read:

"I had a chance to prowl around the Jouret house a little while waiting

for Miss Jouret to dress. I met her twice in my ramblings and a few

minutes later she met me again, this time in a different costume.

"I got a chance to search the woods back of Jouret's house in the

evening. I found a spot where the earth had been disturbed, and dug up a

pair of shoes. They were number nines."

A fourth report from him read:

"We found the body of the crazed engineer. He had drowned himself in a

lake. This eliminates him as a murder suspect."

* * * * *

Two weeks passed with no new developments in the "Invisible Death" case

except for the arrival of a letter demanding $1,000,000 and threatening

the life of Perkins Ferguson if the demand was ignored. It was ignored,

and only served to spur Lees and his detectives on to decisive action.

They decided to rush the Jouret house and kidnap Jouret with the idea of

holding him until he agreed to explain the presence of the number nine

shoes buried back of his house.

A low moon hung over the poplars when Lees rang the Jouret front door

bell. One detective was guarding a side door and the other a back door.

Suddenly Jouret was seen to jump from a second-story window. As he did,

a car driven by one of his Porto Ricans came along the drive and he

leaped into it. Lees, first to see Jouret, called his detectives. They

came running. Their car was waiting in the road.

The Porto Rican was seen to jump from the Jouret car just as it started

south towards New York.

Lees took up the race. Both cars had plenty of power, but the Jouret car

suddenly disappeared as a low humming noise began to break the stillness

of the night.

One of the detectives was at the wheel. Lees, as usual, was giving

orders:

"Keep close to that hum. Never mind that you cannot _see_ the car. It is

there all right. If you can gain on it enough, drive right into it."

"Righto!" shouted the detective. "We're wise to him now."

The humming noise was taking on speed with every second. So was Lees'

car. Soon Lees' car was making sixty miles an hour with the hum just

ahead and barely audible.

Past traffic lights, over bridges and grade crossings the mad chase of

the phantom continued.

Wildly racing through the night, missing other cars by a breath, the

big, visible auto continued its pursuit of--what?

Careening, Lees' car rounded a curve, and, above the hum just ahead,

they heard the shouted curses of their quarry. But he could not be seen.

Lees could only see the road marked by his lights.

Mile after mile the wild, uncanny chase of the phantom continued.

* * * * *

Soon the lights of New York could be seen in the distance. The cars were

forced to slow down somewhat. Suddenly there was a thundering crash

ahead. A car was twisted in a mass of tangled wreckage.

Feminine and masculine shrieks blended as Lees' car piled up on the

wrecked heap. A third car, becoming suddenly visible, rolled over and

brought up at the edge of the road. From this car emerged the limping,

cursing form of Jouret.

From the wreckage three painfully injured young men dragged and tore

themselves. Then they leaped--ignoring their hurts--at the limping

figure.

The fight was on. Jouret was heavy and powerful and proved an obstinate

fighter, for he knew he was fighting for his life. He bit and clawed. He

kicked with one uninjured leg and butted with his massive head.

Lees and his detectives were fighting with no respect for the rules.

Lees managed to get his two hands on the bull-neck of Jouret just as one

detective connected a duet of blows to the man's wind.

Lees' hands closed in a steely grip, and soon Jouret was limp and

helpless.

They held him there. An ambulance arrived. A few minutes later a police

auto with reserves came on the scene. The police shackled Jouret.

The car that had been hit by the phantom was a light sedan. It was

occupied by two women. Their bodies were drawn from the wreckage. Both

were dead--innocents sacrificed to the blood madness of a maniac.

Jouret was right about himself. He was a paranoic with a strongly

developed homicidal mania.

In the wreckage was found a package containing $200,000 and also two

twisted and broken mechanisms. One of these was about the size of an

ordinary kitchen coffee-mill, and the other slightly larger.

* * * * *

Regarding these machines, Lees wrote in a report:

"While making a fourth search of Darrow's laboratory, I found the

equations, specifications and what I believe to be the full plans for

the last invention of the ingenious Darius Darrow.

"Many of the most astounding inventions and discoveries have resulted

from theories which were laughed to scorn at the time they were

advanced. Roebling's plans for the Brooklyn Bridge resulted in a meeting

of the foremost engineers of the day. All agreed that the plans were

built on a false premise. They argued that the bridge would fall of its

own weight. Then they all had a good laugh. The bridge still stands.

"Watching smoke float over a hill from army camp fires caused an early

French scientist to dream of filling a bag full of smoke and riding with

it over the hill. The first balloon was the answer to this dream.

"James Watt is said to have gotten his idea for a steam engine from

watching a lid on a tea-kettle dance under steam pressure.

"When Langley was flying his man-carrying kites the Wright brothers

dreamed of hitching an engine and a propeller to a giant kite. The

airplane was the result of these experiments.

* * * * *

"Darrow got his idea from watching a rapidly revolving wheel. He noticed

that the spokes and rim blended into a blurred disc when a certain speed

was reached. The entire wheel was practically invisible, under certain

lighting conditions, when a higher speed was attained.

"Darrow went further and reached the conclusion that there was a rate of

vibration that would produce invisibility. This was accepted in

practically all engineering research plants, long before it was

perfected by Darrow.

"The facts are that any rapidly vibrating object becomes more and more

difficult to outline as its rate of vibration increases. All that was

left for Darrow was to arrive at the exact mathematical time, tone, or

rate of vibration producing invisibility and to construct a vibrator

tuned to produce this condition.

"His first machine produced the vibrations of invisibility in a field

with a three-foot radius in all directions. That is, it caused every

solid object, within this atmospheric field, to vibrate at the rate,

tone, or speed of invisibility. This machine was in no sense rotary. It

departed from the original example of a revolving wheel and entered

instead into general vibration in a given or measured field.

"The pulsations or vibrations of an ordinary automobile engine will

cause every ounce of metal, or solid, in the automobile--including the

driver--to vibrate at the same rate or momentum. This is a known fact,

and it provided the basis for Darrow's experiments.

* * * * *

"Darrow built two machines. The first had a field with a radius of three

feet on all sides. This was used by the killer in his murders. Jouret

stole this machine first, thus paving his way for the second robbery.

"With the first machine in his possession, Jouret was able to commit the

Darrow murder without being seen. He had to have the second and larger

machine, however, to make his auto disappear. He stole the larger

machine at the time of the Darrow murder, and with it he had his auto

vanish, as the gardener testified.

"Both machines were hopelessly smashed in the wreck, but with Darrow's

documents at hand, we might be able to construct another and a larger

model. A machine built on the proper scale will make a plane or a

battleship invisible and should, as Darrow said, make war against this

country impossible.

* * * * *

"Digging into Jouret's history we found that the 'Misses Jouret' were

one-cell triplets. Their mother, Mrs. Doris Nettleton, an English woman,

was a member of Jouret's troupe, as was the father.

"The mother died at the birth of the triplets. The father died a few

years later. The company was touring Australia at the time. Jouret and

the father had the birth of only one baby recorded. She was named Doris,

after the mother. The other girls also used this one name. They now have

only one name among them until the court gives them individual names.

"Jouret never let but one girl be seen at a time. The reason was that he

and the father had planned to use the girls, when grown, to create a

surprising stage illusion. In this illusion, one girl was to act as the

earthly body and the other girls as the astral bodies of the same

purported individual.

"The father died, and Jouret retired before he ever got around to

staging the illusion. Jouret continued the deception, however, because

it appealed to his showman's nature.

"The girls, at all times, were under the hypnotic control of Jouret,

and, of course, knew nothing of his crazed intellect or crimes. Upon his

arrest Jouret released the girls from the spell of years.

"The Misses Nettleton say that Jouret was always kind to them and was an

ethical showman until his mind gave way.

"I told the triplets that I might find them employment with our concern,

but they prefer to follow in the footsteps of their mother and father,

and return to the stage."

Ferguson, quite his normal self once more, since Farnsworth was

recovering slowly, twitted Lees about being in love with one of the

triplets. Lees admitted they were most gorgeous blondes, but insisted he

preferred one brunette.

"Then another thing," added Lees. "Any man who falls in love with one of

the Nettleton triplets will never be sure just which one he fell in love

with."