Page:The Whisper on the Stair by Lyon Mearson (1924).djvu/142

 “I?” expostulated the other. “How could I, with nothing but these—these⸺” he said no more, but exhibited his handless wrists. “You flatter me, my friend.”

“I don’t know how you did it—but I guess you have your methods,” suggested Val. “Excellent and efficient ones, I imagine, too.

The other nodded, smiling a trifle. He was in great good humor with himself at the moment. Things were going right. His enemy had been delivered—with a bit of help on his own part—into his hands. He was in a position to draw his teeth—or render his information valueless. He could afford to be a trifle amused and self-satisfied.

“I am glad to hear that you recognize the efficiency of my methods. You realize, perhaps, that I get what I go after. In fact, I might say I never fail,” he told Val, who watched him curiously. “I have never failed,” he repeated impressively.

“So?” queried Val nonchalantly. “Ah, well, people die to-day who never died before.”

The other smiled. “Don’t delude yourself. If there’s any dying to be done around here, my lad, it isn’t going to be me.” He paused and looked at him significantly, his meaning plain. There was something fearsome about this man, in spite of his assumed pleasant manner, his finely modulated tones. There was an underlying threat in every syllable, in every lithe move of his big body, in every glance of his greenish tinged eyes. On his lips a well-bred smile became a leer and a pleasant word veiled a curse. Val was supremely conscious of the fact that here was a man who would stop at nothing to attain his end, whatever that was. Here was a man to whom no villainy was too