Like Connie Myers, he, too, put his head into the opening; and then, a queer, unpleasant smile on his lips, he bent quickly over the man on the floor.Hagan was no more than stunned, and was even then beginning to show signs of returning consciousness.There was a rattle, a clang, a thud--and the bar, too long to come all the way through, dropped into the opening and stood upright.Connie Myers'
footsteps sounded again, returning on the run--and Jimmie Dale was back once more on the other side of the kitchen doorway.
It was all simple enough--once one understood! The same queer smile was still flickering on Jimmie Dale's lips.There was no way to get the money out, except the way Connie Myers had got it out--by digging it out! With the irrational cunning of his mad brain, that had put the money even beyond his own reach, old Doyle had built his fireplace with a hollow some eighteen inches square in a great wall of solid stonework, and from it had run a two-inch pipe up somewhere to the story above; and down this pipe he had dropped his little string-tied cylinders of banknotes, satisfied that his hoard was safe! There seemed something pitfully ironic in the elaborate, insane craftiness of the old man's fear-twisted, demented mind.
And now Connie Myers was back in the room again--and again a puzzled expression settled upon Jimmie Dale's face as he watched the other.
For perhaps a minute the man stood by the table sifting the little rolls of money through his fingers gloatingly--then, impulsively, he pushed these to one side, produced a revolver, laid it on the table, and from another pocket took out a little case which, as he opened it, Jimmie Dale could see contained a hypodermic syringe.One more article followed the other two--a letter, which Connie Myers took out of an unsealed envelope.He dropped this suddenly on the table, as Mike Hagan, three feet away on the floor, groaned and sat up.
Hagan's eyes swept, bewildered, confused, around him, questioningly at Connie Myers--and then, resting suddenly on his bound wrists, they narrowed menacingly.
"Damn you, you smashed me with that sledge on PURPOSE!" he burst out--and began to struggle to his feet.
With a brutal chuckle, Connie Myers pushed Hagan back and shoved his revolver under the other's nose.
"Sure!" he admitted evenly."And you keep quiet, or I'll finish you now--instead of letting the police do it!" He laughed out jarringly."You're under arrest, you know, for the murder of Luther Doyle, and for robbing the poor old nut of his savings in his house here."Hagan wrenched himself up on his elbow.
"What--what do you mean?" he stammered.
"Oh, don't worry!" said Connie Myers maliciously."I'M not making the arrest, I'd rather the police did that.I'm not mixing up in it, and by and by"--he lifted up the hypodermic for Hagan to see--"I'm going to shoot a little dope into you that'll keep you quiet while I get away myself."Hagan's face had gone a grayish white--he had caught sight of the money on the table, and his eyes kept shifting back and forth from it to Myers' face.
"Murder!" he said huskily."There is no murder.I don't know who Doyle is.You said this house was yours--you hired me to come here.
You said you were going to tear down the fireplace and build another.You said I could work evenings and earn some extra money.""Sure, I did!" There was a vicious leer now on Connie Myers' lips.
"But you don't think I picked you out by ACCIDENT, do you? Your reputation, my bucko, was just shady enough to satisfy anybody that it wouldn't be beyond you to go the limit.Sure, you murdered Doyle! Listen to this." He took up the letter:
"TO THE POLICE: Luther Doyle was murdered this evening in the tenement at 67 ---- Street.You'll find his body in a room on the second floor.If you want to know who did it, look in Mike Hagan's room on the floor above.There's a paper stuck under the edge of Hagan's table with a piece of chewing gum, where he hid it.You'll know what it is when you go out and take a look at Doyle's house in Pelham.Yours truly, A FRIEND."Mike Hagan did not speak--his lips were twitching, and there was horror creeping into his eyes.