The Mystery of the Four Fingers. Fred M. White
rattled on the pavements. To walk half a mile on such a night meant getting wet through; and Gurdon somewhat ruefully regarded his thin slippers and his light dust overcoat. Half a dozen times the night porter blew his whistle, but no sign of a cab could be seen.
"We shan't get one to-night," Venner said. "They are all engaged. There is only one thing for it—you must take a room here, and stay till the morning. I've no doubt I can fit you up in the way of pyjamas and the things necessary."
Gurdon fell in readily enough with the suggestion. Indeed, there was nothing else for it. He took his number and key from the sleepy clerk in the office, and made his way upstairs to Venner's bedroom.
"I'll just have one cigarette before I turn in," he said. "It seems as if Fate had ordained that I am to keep in close touch with the leading characters of the mystery. By the way, we never took the trouble to find out who the handsome cripple was."
"That is very easily done in the morning," Venner replied. "A striking personality like that is not soon lost sight of. Besides, he has doubtless been here before, for, if you will recollect, his attendants took him to the right table as if it had been ordered beforehand. And now, if you don't mind, I'll turn in—not that I expect to sleep much after an exciting evening like this. Good night, old fellow."
Gurdon went on to his own room, where he slowly undressed and sat thinking the whole thing out on the edge of his bed. Perhaps he was suffering from the same suppressed excitement which at that moment was keeping Venner awake, for he felt not the slightest disposition to turn in. Usually he was a sound sleeper; but this night seemed likely to prove an exception to the rule.
An hour passed, and Gurdon was still sitting there, asking himself whether it would not be better to go to bed and compel sleep to come to him. Impatiently he turned out his light and laid his head resolutely on the pillow.
But it was all in vain—sleep was out of the question. The room was not altogether in darkness, either; for the sleeping apartments on that landing had been arranged back to back with a large, open ventilator between them. Through this ventilator came a stream of light; evidently the occupant of the adjoining room had not yet retired. The light worried Gurdon; he asked himself irritably why his neighbor should be permitted to annoy him in this way. A moment or two later the sound of suppressed voices came through the ventilator, followed by the noise of a heavy fall.
At any ordinary time Gurdon would have thought nothing of this, but his imagination was aflame now, and his mind was full of hidden mysteries. It seemed to him that something sinister and underhand was going on in the next room.
Usually, no one would identify the Grand Empire Hotel with crime and intrigue; but that did not deter Gurdon from rising from his bed and making a determined effort to see through the ventilator into the adjoining room. It was not an easy matter, but by dint of balancing two chairs one on top of the other the thing was accomplished. Very cautiously Gurdon pushed back the glass slide and looked through. So far as he could see, there was nothing to justify any suspicion. The room was absolutely empty, though it was brilliantly lighted; and for a moment Gurdon felt ashamed of his suspicions, and turned away, half determined to try and sleep. It was at that instant that he noticed something out of the common. To his quickened ear there came a sound unmistakably like a snore, and pushing his body half through the ventilator he managed to make out the bed in the next room. On it lay the body of a boy in uniform, unmistakably a messenger boy or hotel attendant of that kind. Gurdon could see the hotel name embroidered in gold letters on his collar.
Perhaps there was nothing so very suspicious in this, except that the boy was lying on the bed fully dressed, even to his boots. It was a luxurious room; not at all the class of apartment to which the hotel management would relegate one of their messenger boys, nor was it possible that the lad had had the temerity to go into the vacant room and sleep.
"Something wrong here," Gurdon muttered. "Hang me if I don't get through the ventilator and see what it is."
It was no difficult matter for an athlete like Gurdon to push his way through and drop on to the bed on the other side. Then he shook the form of the slumbering lad without reward. The boy seemed to be plunged in a sleep almost like death. As Gurdon turned him over, he noticed on the other side of the lad's collar the single word "Lift." It began to dawn upon Gurdon exactly what had happened. In large hotels like the Grand Empire there is no fixed period when the lift is suspended, and consequently, it has its attendants night and day. For some reason, this boy had evidently been drugged and carried into the room where he now lay. There was no doubt whatever about it, for it was impossible to shake the lad into the slightest semblance of life. Gurdon crossed to the door, and found, not to his surprise, that it was locked. His first impulse was to return to his room and call the night porter; but a strange, wild idea had come into his mind, and he refrained from doing so. It occurred to him that perhaps Mark Fenwick or the cripple had had a hand in this outrage.
"I'll wait a bit," Gurdon told himself. "It is just possible that my key will fit this door. Anyway, it is worth trying."
Gurdon made his way back to his own room again, to return a minute or two later with his key. To his great delight the door opened, and he stood in a further corridor, close against the cage in which the lift worked noiselessly up and down.
It was absolutely quiet, so that anybody standing there would have been able to carry out any operation of an unlawful kind without observation. Gurdon stood, looking down the lift shaft, until he saw that the cage was once more beginning to ascend. It came up slowly and smoothly and without the least noise, until it was level with the floor on which Gurdon was standing. It was one of the open kind, so he could see inside quite clearly. To all practical purposes, the lift was empty, save for the presence of one man, who lay unconscious on the floor. The cage was ascending so leisurely that Gurdon was in a position to make a close examination of the figure before the whole structure had risen to the next floor. It did not need a second glance to tell Gurdon that the man in the cage was the attendant, and that he was suffering from the same drug which had placed his boy assistant beyond all power of interfering.
"Now what does all this mean?" Gurdon muttered. "Who is there on the floor above who is interested in getting these two people out of the way? What do they want to bring up or send down which it is not safe to dispose of by the ordinary means? I think I'll wait and see. No sleep for me to-night."
The lift vanished in the same silent way. It hung overhead for some little time, and once more appeared in sight, this time absolutely empty, save for a small square box with iron bands at the corners, which lay upon the floor. As the cage descended, Gurdon suddenly made up his mind what to do. He sprang lightly on to the top of the falling cage, and grasped the rope with both hands. A moment later and he was descending in the darkness.
As far as he could judge, the lift went down to the basement, where, for the time being, it remained. There was a warm damp smell in the air, suggestive of fungus, whereby Gurdon judged that he must be in the vaults beneath the hotel. As his eyes became accustomed to the gloom, he could make out just in front of him a circular patch of light, which evidently was a coal shoot.
He had no need to wait now for the full development of the adventure. He could hear whispered voices and the clang of metal, as if somebody had opened the door of the lift. One of the voices he failed to understand, but with a thrill he recognised the fact that the speaker was talking in either Spanish or Portuguese. Instantly it flashed into his mind that this was the language most familiar to the man who called himself Mark Fenwick. Beyond doubt he was quite right when he identified this last development with the actors in the dramatic events earlier in the evening.
"Now don't be long about it," a hoarse voice whispered. "There are two more cases to send up, and two more to come down here. Has that van come along, or shall we have to wait until morning?"
"The van is there right enough," another hoarse voice said. "We have the stuff out on the pavement. Let's have the last lot here, and get it up at once."
Gurdon could hear the sound of labored breathing as if the unseen man was struggling with some heavy burden. Presently some square object was deposited on the floor of the lift. It seemed to slip from someone's hands, and dropped