“The window,” cried La Touche, and they swung round. The sashes opened readily, but outside were shutters of steel plate, closely fastened. Both men shoved and prised with all their might. But Boirac had done his work well. They were immovable.
As they stood panting and baffled, Mallet’s eye caught the switch of the electric light. It was off. He clicked it on. Though no answering flood of light poured down, he noticed something that interested him.
“Your torch, La Touche!” he cried, and then he saw what it was. Tied to the switch was a length of fisherman’s gut. Practically invisible, it passed down the wall and through a tiny hole in the floor. Anyone pulling it from below would switch off the light.
“I don’t understand,” said La Touche. “That means he had a confederate?”
“No!” cried Mallet, who had been looking about with the torch. “See here!”
He pointed to the chair Boirac had occupied and which now lay on its side on the floor. Fastened to the left arm was another end of gut which also entered a hole in the floor.
“I bet those are connected!”
Their curiosity temporarily overcame their fears. La Touche turned on the switch and Mallet, pulling the gut at the arm of the chair, heard it click off again.
“Ingenious devil,” he muttered. “It must go round pulleys under the floor. And now he has cut off the current at the meter.”
“Come on, Mallet,” La Touche called. “Don’t waste time. We must get out of this.”
Together they threw themselves on the door with all the weight of their shoulders. Again they tried, and again, but to no purpose. It was too strong.
“What does it mean, do you think?” panted Mallet.
“Gas, I expect. Perhaps charcoal.”
“Any use shouting at the window?”
“None. It’s too closely shuttered, and it only opens into a courtyard.”
And then suddenly they perceived a faint odour which, in spite of their hardened nerves, turned their blood cold and set them working with ten times more furious energy at the door. It was a very slight smell of burning wood.
“My God!” cried Mallet, “he’s set the house on fire!”
It seemed impossible that any door could withstand so furious an onslaught. Had it opened outwards, hinges and lock must long since have given away, but the men could not make their strength tell. They worked till the sweat rolled in great drops down their foreheads. Meanwhile the smell increased. Smoke must be percolating into the room.
“The torch here,” cried La Touche suddenly.
Taking his pistol, he fired a number of shots on the bolt of the lock.
“Don’t use them all. How many have you?”
“Two more.”
“Keep them.”
The lock seemed shattered, but still the door held. The men’s efforts were becoming frenzied when Mallet had an idea. Along the farther wall of the room stood a heavy, old-fashioned sofa.
“Let’s use the couch as a battering-ram.”
The room was now thick with smoke, biting and gripping the men’s throats. Hampered by coughing and bad light, they could not work fast. But at last they got the couch across the room and planted end on to the door. Standing one at each side, they swung it back and then with all their strength drove it against the timber. A second time they drove, and a third, till at the fourth blow there was a sound of splitting wood, and the job was done.
Or so they thought. A moment later they found their mistake. The right bottom panel only was gone.
“The left panel! Then the bar between!”
Though the men worked feverishly, their operations took time. The smoke was now increasing rapidly. And then suddenly La Touche heard a terrible, ominous sound. Crackling was beginning somewhere not far off.
“We haven’t much time, Mallet,” he gasped, as the sweat poured down his face.
Desperately they drove the couch against the bar. Still it held. The terrible fear that the couch would come to pieces was in both their hearts.
“The torch!” cried Mallet hoarsely. “Quick, or we’re done!”
Drawing his magazine pistol and holding it close to the door, he fired its full charge of seven shots at the vertical bar. La Touche instantly grasped his idea, and emptied his two remaining shots at the same place. The bar was thus perforated by a transverse line of nine holes.
There was a singing in the men’s ears and a weight on their chests as, with the energy of despair, they literally hurled the heavy couch against the weakened bar. With a tearing sound it gave way. They could get through.
“You for it, Mallet! Quick!” yelled La Touche, as he staggered drunkenly back. But there was no answer. Through the swirling clouds the detective could see his assistant lying motionless. That last tremendous effort had finished him.
La Touche’s own head was swimming. He could no longer think connectedly. Half unconsciously he pulled the other’s arms to the hole. Then, passing through, he turned to draw his confrère out. But the terrible roaring was swelling in his ears, the weight on his chest was growing insupportable, and a black darkness was coming down over him like a pall. Insensible, he collapsed, half in and half out of the doorway.
As he fell there was a lurid flicker and a little dancing flame leaped lightly from the floor.
XXX
Conclusion
When La Touche’s senses returned he found himself lying in the open air, with Farol, his other assistant, bending over him. His first thought was for his companion in misfortune.
“Mallet?” he whispered feebly.
“Safe,” answered Farol. “We got him out just in time.”
“And Boirac?”
“The police are after him.”
La Touche lay still. He was badly shaken. But the fresh air rapidly revived him, and he was soon able to sit up.
“Where am I?” he asked presently.
“Just round the corner from Boirac’s. The firemen are at work.”
“Tell me about it.”
Farol’s story
