Part 5

In the concentrated light of the lantern, there stared up at them the livid face of Louie Martin. His glazed eyes protruded, and there was a trickle of blood running from his nostril to the left corner of his mouth. And in his face was an expression of frozen horror which stopped the hearts even of the hardened crooks who looked down in momentary paralysis.

With a scream, the “Kid” dropped the lantern and turned, treading upon the toes of the Strangler. Another scream sounded, high and shrill—it came from the direction of the bed.

“Why can’t you let me rest?” a quavering voice protested. “This is my room—”

They heard no more. The three swore and sobbed as they raced for the front room. They slammed doors behind them, and brought up, shaking as if in ague, directly under the big, brilliantly lighted chandelier.

“Somebody bumped him off—and he came back to tell us about it!” the “Kid” whispered.

_CHAPTER EIGHT_

AH WING LISTENS IN

“He’s certainly good and dead!” Monte said, as he stood looking down at the body of Louie Martin. “Whatever they did to him, it was a plenty! But you boys must be a little bilious—you can see for yourselves that he hasn’t been doing any talking for some time. What you heard was the wind, blowing around the corners of the house!”

The “Kid” drew the back of his hand across his glistening forehead. He was standing near the door.

“Don’t kid yourself, Chief!” he snarled. “We heard him talk—all of us did! And there’s another thing: us being bilious wouldn’t account for Louie Martin walking in on us here, and climbing into that bed!”

Monte was staring down at the dead man.

“You say you heard the windows back here rattling earlier in the evening?” he demanded.

“Sure. Why wouldn’t they? The whole house was rattling!”

Monte nodded. He had his own ideas on this subject, but he didn’t intend to spread them before his already demoralized followers.

“Well, the thing we’ve got to decide is what we’re going to do with him,” he commented. “We’ve got to handle the whole business ourselves, and say nothing. We can’t afford to have the dicks asking questions around here just now!”

Tacitly, Monte’s three companions agreed, but there was in their pale faces a question which none of them had the courage to voice. Monte continued, apparently unconscious of their emotions.

“Billy,” he said, “you get the spade and dig a grave over close to the fence. After we get him planted, we’ll move that pile of old bean poles over the place. It’s kind of tough, but Louie is dead—and we got to look out for ourselves!”

The Strangler went silently out into the dark. They heard him rummaging for a spade, and presently the _clink_ of the latter implement came industriously to them. The grave was finished by the time the first gray light of dawn began to filter down around the cottage, and presently the body of the dead crook, wrapped in a blanket, was lowered into it. Then the dirt was shoveled back till the cavity would hold no more, and the superfluous earth was scattered over the surface of the garden. The shifting of a pile of bean poles finished the ceremony.

“I’ll trade rooms with you, Kid,” Monte said to the saturnine strong-arm man—who for once looked rather cowed. “I never was afraid of a dead man—just so that he was really dead. I guess you’re kind of soured on that part of the house!”

“Soured is right,” mumbled the “Kid.” “Say, I wouldn’t sleep in there if you was to give me all the sparklers in New York! Just let me get my stuff out!”

As he went back toward the room from which the body had recently been removed, the “Kid” saw the mocking glance of the Strangler fastened upon him. Billy was enjoying his discomfiture. He went into the room and turned on the light—the burned-out bulb had been replaced, so that now he was able to see into all the corners. He began to gather up his property, staring nervously about him the while.

Cautiously, he approached the closet, where he had stored his bathrobe and an extra suit, a couple of pairs of shoes and a pearl gray hat. He opened the door wide and stepped back. Nothing inside. Hastily he carted the clothing out. Then he crossed over to the bureau and opened the left-hand upper drawer, in which he had placed his jewelry—some rings and tie pins.

The “Kid” drew the drawer fully open and stood looking down into it. Then a startled exclamation escaped him, and he bent nearer, staring wide-eyed.

All of his possessions were there; but in addition he saw, close to the back of the drawer, a morocco covered box of peculiar design. The “Kid” had seen that box once before!

With trembling fingers he undid the clasp and opened the lid. He could feel his heart pounding in the top of his head, and his throat seemed to contract, so that he fought for breath. The Resurrection Pendant! A single glance convinced him of that. But how had it come into this drawer?

The “Kid’s” mind deviated from the line of this natural inquiry. He could forget that for the moment—the fact was that here it was. But there was no reason why he should share this discovery with the other Wolves. This supreme good fortune had come to him, not to them! He quickly shut the lid of the case and slid the box into an inside pocket.

He removed his property to Monte’s room, hiding the jewel case under the mattress. His blood had turned to liquid fire. He had that for which they had all been searching—and it was his alone!...

Monte went on guard that evening, taking “Doc” with him: not that Monte was afraid, but he realized that the battle had now entered its final and decisive phase. And it was real war. Monte Jerome had no doubt that Martin had, in some mysterious way, been done to death in the house of Ah Wing.

“You boys better get to bed early,” he said. “Billy, you take the clock and set it for half past one. You wake the Kid as soon as you get up—we’ll stand double guard from now on!”

The “Kid” hardly heard Monte speaking. He wanted to examine the jewels again, wanted to figure out just how he was going to make the break which would free him from his comrades.

For a time, after the other two had departed, he sat around smoking and cleaning out the barrel of his pistol, which the fogs of this marshy neighborhood were corroding. He cleaned barrel and chamber and oiled the

## action, then replaced the clip of cartridges and slipped the gun into a

side pocket.

“Well,” he mumbled, half aloud, “I guess I’ll be getting to bed. An’ I hope to God there won’t be no voices around here tonight!”

The Strangler grunted, and the “Kid” slouched off up the stairs and into the room that had been Monte’s. He closed the door carefully, crossed over to the light, and then stood listening.

The night wind was stirring around the house, whistling and moaning down the chimney; but the “Kid” had an antidote for fear tonight: he went over to his bed and fumbled for the jewels. The touch of the smooth leather-covered box started his heart to pounding.

He laid the box on the bed and opened it. The light was reflected into his eyes from a thousand sharp facets, crimson and blue and white—but perhaps the charm was wearing off: the stones did not look as wonderful to him tonight as they had in that momentary view he had caught during the afternoon.

“And that’s the bunch of sparklers men go dippy about!” the “Kid” mumbled. “Hell, I wouldn’t give two bits for the whole bunch, if I couldn’t sell ’em! There’s too many of ’em, and they don’t shine so terrible much! I saw a big buck nigger on State Street once with a solitaire on that would have made them look phoney—and it was glass! Oh, well, I should worry. I ain’t going to wear ’em—I’m going to _sell_ ’em! I’ll have to play safe—”

At the ghost of a sound from behind, the “Kid” whirled. He had left the door closed, but now it was open—and the Strangler stood inside the room, grinning.

“So, that was the game!” he cried. “You’re a slick one, Kid, but you ain’t slick enough. I been watching you all evening. You ain’t yourself, old timer. You’re getting nervous. But I don’t wonder! You grabbed the sparklers, but how you done it I don’t know. And you was going to hold ’em out, was you? Well, well—”

The “Kid’s” lips jerked up into a wolfish smile, but he forced himself to go slow. He needed to think this thing out. He knew the Wolves well enough to be sure they would hold this affair against him, and sooner or later would try to play even. No use to try to explain—they wouldn’t understand.

The Strangler was watching him through chilly eyes. Casually, the Kid’s hand stole toward his side pocket. Instantly the man standing before him acted: with a bellow of rage he jerked out his own hand, which he had been holding under his coat: swinging it up he fired, then struck at the light globe with the smoking barrel.

To the “Kid” there came the sensation of suffocation and of darkness. His own gun was out, but his enemy had disappeared—and he himself was sprawled across the bed. That instant of falling had not registered in his consciousness: he had been standing, and now he was down; that was all he knew.

And he was fighting for breath—a great weight seemed to be crushing in his chest. He raised his left hand and gropingly explored the front of his shirt: it was already saturated, and from a hole to the left of his breast bone more blood was coming in a pulsing current.

“The dirty dog!” muttered the “Kid” thickly, pulling himself erect by grasping the foot of the bed. “He’s croaked me—”

Then suddenly the “Kid’s” whirling senses cleared. Billy the Strangler had done for him; but he would send Billy on ahead, to tell St. Peter he was coming! His yellow teeth came together. He felt something welling up in his throat and spat out a mouthful of blood.

“Not—much—time—left!” he muttered.

He dropped to his knees and for a moment everything went blank. Then he mastered himself, by a superhuman effort: and began to crawl stealthily along toward the dimly-lighted panel of the door. The Strangler had run out there after firing—now, undoubtedly, he was waiting till it should be safe for him to come back for his booty!

Slowly, the dying crook dragged himself across to the door and out into the hall. The training of a lifetime stood him in good stead now: he was as soundless as a shadow. He reached the top of the stairs and paused, leaning for a moment against the banisters—everything was going black before him. Then he pulled himself together with a disregard for his own suffering that in a better cause would have been heroic.

Inch by inch, he drew himself forward till he was sitting on the top step of the stair. He peered down into the lighted rooms below. Ah! There he was! The Strangler stood beyond the big chandelier in the front room, the “Kid” could see him plainly through an open door. His face was smiling, the crooked smile of a shark.

Resting his automatic across his bent knees, the “Kid” took steady aim at the man who had done for him.

“A little higher than the pockets!” he told himself, repeating the old gunman’s formula for a killing shot.

Next moment the pistol roared; and the man standing down there in the light jerked up his hands and staggered backward. Greedily, the “Kid’s” fast glazing eyes drank in every detail of the Strangler’s agony. He knew what that look meant—

Billy the Strangler began to pivot on his heels, staring with blind eyes into space.

“Where is he?” he cried. “Damn your soul and body—you—”

He pitched forward to his face. And the “Kid,” leaning peacefully back, felt himself snatched up into a great red cloud that has descended out of the roof upon him.

* * * * *

In an upper room in the house of Ah Wing, the Chinaman sat at an instrument that resembled a telephone switchboard. There were on its surface eight little globes, each with a plug socket beneath.

Ah Wing had an operator’s head-piece in position, and he seemed to be listening attentively to something that came to him over the wires.

There had been voices, loud and angry. He heard the Strangler denouncing the “Kid.” Then came the shot—and silence.

Ah Wing waited an appreciable time, then shifted the plug from socket to socket. Not a sound from any of the rooms in the distant cottage. He returned the plug to its central position and waited.

Presently another shot sounded, and a scream. He heard the Strangler curse his enemy.

Without a word, Ah Wing removed the head-piece and glanced up at a chart fastened to the wall before him. It contained the names of five men, against one of which a black cross had been inscribed.

Now he picked up a pencil and filled in two additional crosses.

There were but two of the Wolves left!

_This Fascinating Story Has An Amazing Climax. It Will Be Concluded in the Next Issue of WEIRD TALES. Tell Your Newsdealer To Reserve Your Copy._

Snatched from the Grave, Woman Tells of Death

A weird adventure befell Mrs. Rafaela Mercurio, an Omaha woman who, after apparently dying, awoke in the land of the living instead of the spirit world. After her physician had pronounced her dead, her life was restored by an injection of adrenalin, administered by Dr. W. A. Gerrie.

To all outward appearance, she was quite dead. There was no indication of breathing or heart action. Prayers for the dead were started in the bed chamber where her body lay.

Then Dr. Gerrie injected the gland extract in her heart, and after several days she showed signs of returning life. Upon regaining consciousness, she was confused and puzzled, uncertain, it seemed, whether she was alive or dead. Later she described her strange experience.

“I could feel death pulling me,” she said. “I was slipping. I tried to find something to hold to, but could not. I felt far away and alone, yet it seemed there was something I must do before I slipped entirely away.

“I had just a few minutes. I must straighten out in bed. I must cross my hands on my breast. I must smile. My children must know that I died in peace. From far away there seemed to be people around me. But their voices grew more distant.

“Then there seemed to come to me the comforting words of a priest. They added to my peace and content. I was ready for death. I smiled, I think. I know I wanted to. It was the last thing I remember.”

And then, days after the first injection of adrenalin, the “dead” woman regained consciousness. It was four o’clock in the afternoon.

“I shall never forget that hour,” she said. “I heard the clock strike four times—and I realized I was a living person in a living world.”

_A Fanciful Novel of the Red Desert Complete In This Issue_

DESERT MADNESS

_By_ HAROLD FREEMAN MINERS

_CHAPTER ONE_

THE GIRL AND THE HANDCUFFS

[Illustration]

For a long moment the man surveyed with tired eyes the queer cleft in the canon wall and the beaten trail that led into it.

Finally he addressed the nearest of his two burros in a listless, half humorous voice:

“Well, Archibald, it looks interesting—what say we try it?”

Archibald made no reply. Archibald was asleep. Immediately upon the halting of the little cavalcade the burro had sunk into a state of dejection more apathetic than usual and had promptly gone to sleep. In fact, it is doubtful if Archibald had not been asleep the greater part of the afternoon.

“You don’t care, eh, Archibald? Well, for that matter, neither do I. But let’s consider this matter, old timer. For the last hundred years, more or less, we’ve been strolling around this accursed desert, and we have made the acquaintance of a few cottontail rabbits, one or two coyotes, and a rattlesnake. The rabbits showed their distaste for our society by running away; the coyotes did nothing but deride us with mournful voices; the rattlesnake certainly showed no desire to be friendly. We’ve met no human being; we’ve discovered no fabulously rich gold mine; we’ve had our fill of scenery.

“There lies a well-beaten trail, disappearing into the face of solid rock. At its end lies mystery, adventure. Possibly romance. Also, possibly, cattle rustlers, who may greet us with anything but enthusiasm. In which case we’ll throw in our lot with them, and I’ll ride you across the desert to eternal glory. The idea intrigues me, Archibald. I think we shall investigate.”

At this moment an over-industrious flea must have launched a determined attack on one of the few vulnerable parts of Archibald’s anatomy, for he suddenly nodded his head vigorously.

“Ah, you agree with me? I knew you would. We will now follow the trail to adventure—or a sheep herder’s camp. Let’s go!”

Percy, the second burro, was with difficulty herded into the narrow trail. Archibald followed him with great reluctance, but finally the man succeeded in driving his tiny pack train into concerted action, and they slowly trudged up the narrow defile.

Stanley Ross had been exiled to the desert country because certain eminent New York doctors had come to the conclusion that he had contracted a disease which yields itself to treatment most readily in the dry desert uplands.

Ross had not been breathing the dry air of the desert for a month before he was as healthy as a prize fighter. The fact was that Stanley Ross had over-indulged in a certain pastime known as “reading the tape,” and Nature had gone on a strike. The New York doctors had provided the first step toward recovery; the desert had done the rest.

But there had been another hurt that had not healed so readily—or at least Ross had so convinced himself. Stanley Ross fondly believed that he was heart-broken. The cause was a blonde bit of New York femininity who had fancied Ross for a while, but in the end had fancied the millions of an oil man more.

So he had stayed on in the West. A healthy restlessness had driven him out to explore the uncharted wastes of the vast Red Desert, and the ever changing wonders of rock, and sand, and sky, of sagebrush and cactus, of sparkling night-heavens had beckoned him on. For months now he had been wandering up and down this immeasurable wonderland, obeying every vagary of mind, exploring every nook and cranny that caught his itinerant fancy, his only companions the two burros which he had so whimsically named.

Mirages had beckoned. Colors so bizarre that no artist had dared to give them to canvas had soothed his soul. Grotesqueries of rock and sand and canon had intrigued him.

Ross still believed that the old hurt was still present in his bosom. Actually he had been having a capital time for months, and the girl no longer mattered. However, he had allowed himself gradually to fall into a state of whimsical melancholy. What he needed was adventure. He was bored, but had he known what lay at the end of the thin twisting trail before him his boredom might not have been so acute.

The rock defile, through which the trail led, was narrow, and the walls were nearly perpendicular. The passage was twisting, but a tiny trickle of water gave promise of a broader canon farther up. The trail, while very narrow, was well-defined and worn deep. It looked as though it had been in constant use for years.

Ross had progressed along this strange passage for about a quarter mile when his attention was suddenly arrested by something on the canon wall. Involuntarily, he stopped. Instantly the burros halted as though their motive power was automatically turned off whenever their master stopped walking.

“Great Horned Toads!” ejaculated Ross in a low voice. “Archibald, do you see what I see, or has the sun gone to my head? Has the world slipped back three centuries, or is it actually nineteen-twenty-three? ’Tain’t possible, Archibald, but nevertheless I see what I see!”

There, not thirty feet distant, was a girl—a pretty girl—and she was shackled to four great iron rings, fastened in the canon wall, by means of handcuffs, ankle fetters, and four heavy chains!

_CHAPTER TWO_

BROKEN SHACKLES AND A MYSTERY

Ross stood spellbound. He could not believe his own eyes.

That he should meet a human being in this vast waste of rock and sand and cactus was possible. That he should find a girl chained to a rock, like a felon of the black ages, was nothing short of incredible.

There was no denying the girl’s existence, however. She was there, and she was in need of help.

His incredulity shattered, Ross was beside the girl in a bound. Even a cursory glance showed her to be undeniably pretty, and it also showed her to be quite as undeniably in a state of total exhaustion.

At Ross’s approach, the girl raised her head with difficulty. Her eyes opened and she smiled slowly. Then her whole body suddenly fell forward against the chains that held her. She had fainted.

No stranger situation could be imagined than the finding of a beautiful girl chained to a rock in the midst of the great Red Desert. This, however, was a matter for future consideration. The girl needed immediate attention, and Ross’s first thought was to release her.

When he examined her shackles Ross realized that release was not going to be easy. The four rings to which the chains were fastened were secured to the canon wall by means of heavy iron staples driven deep into fissures in the rock. A test of strength showed that nothing short of a charge of dynamite would ever loosen them.

The chains were comparatively heavy and well forged. A file was the only solution—and Ross did not possess a file.

Not till he examined the handcuffs did he see any hope of releasing the girl. These were not of the ordinary type. They were not the steel manacles of the sort used today, but were about two inches wide, heavy in construction and made of cast iron. The locking device was old-fashioned. They were a type of handcuff that had been obsolete for nearly three quarters of a century.

Having satisfied himself that they were really made of cast iron, Ross at once realized that it would be a comparatively easy task to free the girl. Securing a small rock for a hammer, he braced the girl back against the canon wall and held her wrist against the rock. A few well directed blows with the improvised hammer easily cracked the rusty cast iron and the handcuff fell away in two pieces.

The girl’s wrist had been freed without more than slightly bruising the skin. The second handcuff was broken quite as easily. Ross gently lowered the girl to the ground.