Authors: J. Allan Dunn
Tags: #Detective/Hard-Boiled
He had been worn, jaded in mind, in nerve and body, in that conflict. The morning after his appointment by the police commissioner, with its confirmation by the governor, the Griffin had called Manning and mockingly congratulated him. Then and there he challenged Manning to what the Griffin likened to a game of chess, with living pieces. Condescendingly, the Griffin averred that it amused him to play with such an opponent.
It was not a fair game. The Griffin always had the opening moves. He chose his own gambits, had his campaign worked out ahead. He professed to even matters by naming his next victim, and the day that he should die; but it was hard for a sane, well-balanced mind to cope with the deviltries of the Griffin’s diseased but potent brain. There had been victories on both sides. Now Manning was rested, ready with renewed energies to give battle to the monster.
He picked up the instrument, with the blood tingling in his veins, the zest of adventure upon him; much as he had felt when he saw in the jungle the spoor of some man-eating brute.
He heard again the weird music of the gong and then the deep tones of the Griffin, sinister and sneering.
“Ah, my dear Manning. Again we get in touch. No doubt you thought me dead. Doubtless you hoped so. I hear you have had a holiday. I trust it has refreshed you for the fray. I am busy to-night, so I am sending you a message that should arrive at any moment. I need hardly tell you that in it you will read a name, also the date of the departure of its owner to that bourne from which no traveler e’er returns. Also, there will be a slight demonstration of the fact that the Griffin has not lost any of his power.”
There came a chuckling laugh, dying away, lost in the eerie strains. Then silence—followed by a ringing of the door bell.
Manning rose from his deep chair without effort, moving as a roused animal moves, in perfect coördination. He slid an automatic from the side table into the pocket of his smoking jacket. Mati, the butler, was opening the door when Manning reached it. A lantern in the porch ceiling showed a sprawled body in the entry clad in the uniform of the local messenger service. A hand gripped a yellow envelope with a crimson, spreading stain in one corner.
It was addressed to Manning.
The boy lay face down, motionless and quite dead, and his blood pooled beneath him. The mark of entry from the missile showed as a slight snag in the cloth of his uniform, where a bullet had brought him down.
Manning picked up the yellow envelope, but he did not touch the body. Mati stood with his brown, Malaysian face the hue of putty, though he had seen sudden death before.
Manning spoke to him in his own language.
“I will call the police. The body must not be disturbed.”
Manning knew there would be no clews. The bullet might bear distinctive marks, but they were useless without the weapon. And that, Manning was certain, would not be found. He opened the outer, bloodstained envelope. It enclosed a sealed letter. There would be a name, an address, of the sender at the office, but nothing would come of that. Some nondescript would have handed it in.
The letter was on heavy, gray, handmade paper. It was sealed with a splotch of scarlet wax, imprinted with the seal of the Griffin. A demi-griffin rampant.
At the bottom of the short note, written in purple ink in striking chirography, there was an
affiche,
a scarlet oval, with the same design.
The content was short. A name—and a date.
Manning’s face became rigid as he read.
“My God!” he muttered. “Of all men—John Phillimore!”
Presently the police arrived, deferential to Manning, taking the body to the morgue, going through the routine of informing the boy’s parents, of questioning the messenger service. The medical examiner gave his findings, plain-clothesmen took measurements and photographs, reporters swarmed.
There were no results but flaring headlines, vague theories, fantastic stories. The Griffin was out to kill. He had struck again, at Manning’s door. But the press did not learn what the note had said. Manning did not mention it. The commissioner was silent.
The issue was up to Gordon Manning.
II
John Phillimore, M.A., M.D., F.R.S., D.S., etc., was scientist as well as practicing physician. His residence was on lower Fifth Avenue, his clientele was exclusive, and their fees served to not only maintain the doctor’s establishment, but enabled him to prosecute his important discoveries.
Aside from his private, paying patients, Dr. Phillimore gave two mornings a week to public clinics. He never neglected a case that he thought he could help because there was no money to give for his advice, and for medicines.
He had many friends, and he could have had a fortune, but he did not care for it save as a means to his philanthropic ends. His fame was growing, but he did not care for that, save as a visible sign of his progress in behalf of humanity; to which his life was devoted.
He was a bachelor, whose household was run by a housekeeper and two maids. He maintained an assistant and a nurse for his consulting room; and two well trained aides for his laboratory.
The laboratory was back of the paved court behind the house. The court had two flower beds, always bright and gay according to the season, fenced about with low iron hoops thrust into the dirt. There was a small fountain between them, with a basin for thirsty, dusty sparrows. Two ailanthus trees flourished, and there were statues, of marble and bronze, gifts from grateful sculptor patients.
Altogether the yard was a pleasant spot. It could be reached from the ground-floor rear, or by a stair that led from the metal balcony that reached the width of the house, outside the windows of the consulting room and the dining room.
The house was a corner one. The wall on one side of the court was a high one, between the court and the street. The other barrier was lower, separating the yard from the adjoining one.
The laboratory was entirely modern. From it had come miracles of medicinal research, serums to prevent and check leprosy, and the hookworm. Here the germ of infantile paralysis had at last been filtered, and Doctor Phillimore, ever conservative and modest, had let it be known to a group of his fellows that he expected within six months to be able to announce that the scourge of children could be stopped by the use of his anti-toxin. That secret had leaked out, and the general press had seized upon it.
With this publicity, the name of Phillimore was added to the death-list of the Griffin. Where others admired, the Griffin, with his warped nature, hated and sought to destroy. He believed in predestination, in the influence of the stars; including his own; and men like Phillimore were meddlers, to be despised the more because of the esteem in which they were held.
Now Phillimore sat in his upstairs library with Gordon Manning. His face was grave but serene as he offered his guest brandy, and an excellent cigar.
“Mind if I use a pipe?” asked Manning. With the other’s assent, he carefully filled his briar with his special blend, thrust the notched stem between his strong teeth, and lighted up.
Phillimore watched him with interest. Manning was a rather tall, lean man, tanned long ago by tropic suns. His gray eyes were steady and intent, one of them slightly puckered by a scar. He was dressed in rough tweeds, since he had dined in town, and had not had time to change before keeping his appointment with Phillimore. All of Manning’s movements were precise but swift. He had the efficiency of a born athlete who has kept himself in condition. Phillimore approved of him.
“I have heard of you, of course, Manning,” said the doctor. “Also of the Griffin. A purely pathological case.”
“He should have been executed, like a mad dog,” said Manning sternly. “He cannot be cured?”
Phillimore shook his head. “His fibers are rotten. He is a true paranoiac, and so incurable. A dangerous maniac, who should have been more closely conned. He is likely to end up in paralysis and epileptic fits, as deterioration leads towards dementia praecox. As a physician I may not agree with your belief he should be eliminated.”
Manning shrugged his shoulders. He was not going to argue about the Esculapian oath. “Meantime,
he
does the eliminating,” he said. “Your life is in grave danger, doctor. Two weeks from to-night he will strike. How, it is hard to predict. But he has never failed to attack, too often fatally.”
Phillimore surprised Manning as he turned to a wall desk, and took from a drawer one of the gray envelopes with which Manning was only too familiar. He handed it to Manning, who removed the letter. The envelope was fully addressed but it had not been mailed.
“It was delivered by hand one morning when I was at the clinic, no doubt deliberately timed,” said Phillimore. “He seems in earnest.”
“He is,” replied Manning grimly, as he read the distinctive script:
The stars announce your downfall. You presume to change the courses of Destiny. I am the appointed Scourge of those who would interfere with Nature’s methods. Who are you to ward off appointed death? You may not ward off your own.
Some time between midnight and midnight on the eleventh of November, on the day of your birth, but not necessarily at the hour, you will surely die.
There was no
affiche,
but a clever drawing of the upper body of a griffin; wings spread, talons extended, fangs apart.
“He is ingenious in his suggestion that disease is part of general evolution, and the survival of the fittest. Ingenious, but false,” Phillimore said, as Manning returned the letter to him after reading it.
“It doesn’t seem to have disturbed you much,” Manning suggested. “But I warn you that letter is not far from a death-warrant unless we can find means to guard you. I believe that if he fails on this date he will not repeat the attempt on you. He will think the stars have deceived him. And each failure will hasten the course of his disease no doubt.”
“No doubt. I am willing to place myself in your hands, Manning; with the proviso that my regular routine is not interfered with. That day I do not go to the clinic. I shall have some visits to make. Certain patients will come here in the late afternoon and the early evening. I shall do some work in my laboratory, perhaps.”
“You must do nothing that takes you outside the house,” Manning said positively. “Not even to your laboratory. You must receive no new patients. That is essential. I shall be here for the whole of that twenty-four hours, and there will be other precautions taken. Even to your food.”
“It is absurd to mistrust my servants. They are devoted to me,” objected Phillimore. “I will consent to your terms, otherwise. Since it is only for one day.”
“I do not mistrust them,” said Manning. “Nevertheless, I shall provide your food, and my own, that day. Bring it myself, and prepare it myself. I am not a bad cook. But I have seen a man poisoned with one half of a melon that was sliced before me. The other half was innocuous. I have known that fiend to kill in a place apparently as secure as a safety-deposit vault. I admire your attitude. But I do not minimize your danger, or my responsibility.”
III
It was “murder weather” on the eleventh of November. When Manning entered Phillimore’s house shortly before midnight, after a personal round of the guards he had set in strategic places, the night was murky with rain and mist. Melancholy hootings came from the river. Street lights were veiled in vapor, and the air was raw and chill.
There had been no further demonstration from the Griffin, nor had Manning expected any. He entered upon his twenty-four hours’ vigil in excellent condition to go without sleep. The plain-clothes men who were watching were picked men who would be relieved every eight hours, and during one meal. But Manning would have no break. He brought two men into the house, gave them their instructions.
Phillimore greeted him cheerfully. After a cigar, a high ball, and some chat upon places Manning had seen, and which the doctor hoped to visit, Phillimore went to his bedroom. He did not lock the door. Half an hour later, Manning looked in and found the other sleeping peacefully. Phillimore was up at seven o’clock, and enjoyed the simple but appetizing breakfast Manning served for them both.
The bad weather continued, the day dragged on. Phillimore spent his morning in his library, working over formulas and writing letters. Some of them were prepared in the event of his death. He was perfectly calm, without a trace of bombast. Manning envied him his nerves as the hours ticked off. His own were steady enough, but he was tensed, while Phillimore remained placid.
In the afternoon he received patients. His assistant was with him, most of the time, in the consulting room. He had been warned. No patients were to be received whose names were not on the appointment list. At dinner, Phillimore was cheery. He made only one allusion to the situation, when he pledged Manning in a glass of Pol Roger the latter had brought.
“I, who
may
be about to die, salute you,” said the doctor with a laugh. “I know how Damocles felt, at
his
banquet. Five more hours to go. I suppose the Griffin counts on the stress of suspense as part of his punishment for my presumption.”
“Perhaps,” said Manning. He did not agree. He was sure the Griffin had fixed on his time, and had not changed it—that some minute of the three hundred remaining would see the attack delivered.
“Have you many patients for to-night?” he asked.
“Three only. None very serious. They should not take long. A woman with nerves, a man with arthritis, and another man who drinks too much, and eats too much.”
“Will your assistant be there? And your nurse?”
“Only the nurse,” said Phillimore.
“I would like to see her when she comes,” said Manning.
The nurse was neither young nor old, self-possessed, and evidently very efficient. She had been with Phillimore for years. Manning liked her. She knew about the Griffin. Her eyes were brave, her mouth firm, and she made no comments.