The Eagle's eye

The Naval Ball Conspiracy-2

Then a sudden change. The beating of his heart slowed. The sparkle of his eyes dulled. The smile faded from his lips—for just behind the girl whose name he had vaguely heard to be Miss Dixie Mason, had shown the figure of her escort, a man whom Grant had come to hate, a man he knew to be responsible for the working out of the plot against the Ansonia Hotel that night, Heinric von Lertz, unofficial agent for Imperial Germany's murderers.

As for Von Lertz, he turned somewhat quizzically toward the policeman at the door of the ballroom, looked at him in a sneering fashion, then with a short nod in acknowledgment of the introduction to Grant, he asked:

"Police? Is it the usual thing in America for them to attend social functions?"

"Not unless they're invited—or needed," answered Harrison Grant caustically.

A quick glance shot between the two men. A moment more and Von Lertz had turned to the ballroom, taking Dixie Mason with him, while Harrison Grant watched after her, wondering what such a pretty, wholesome appearing girl could be doing in the company of a man whose business was the representation of murderers. That she carried a Secret Service commission, Grant did not know. The instructions of Chief Flynn, ordering her to work into the confidence of the Germans without letting even the fellow members of the Secret Service know her true purpose, had attended to that. And Grant saw in her only a girl who had chosen as a companion a man who was at that moment plotting the very downfall of America!

However, it was only natural that they should meet again during the evening. And it was only natural that Grant should ask her to dance with him. More, it was only natural that as he looked into her eyes, as he felt the firm swing and graceful lift of her to the swaying music of the foxtrot, that he should wish more than ever that the stain of her apparent friendship for Von Lertz should some day resolve into an innocent one after all. As for Dixie—

As she was swept away again in the arms of Harrison Grant, following the encore, Dixie wished with a sudden impulse that the touch of those arms might some day mean more than the embrace of a dance, she wished that she might tell this man whom she knew to be the president of the Criminology Club that she was really a compatriot, that she was working along the same lines as himself, struggling for the same ideals fighting for—

But one could only obey orders. Besides, the dance had ended, and in the foreground, waiting and fretting, stood Heinric von Lertz.

A few brief acknowledgments of the pleasure of the dance and they parted, Dixie Mason to take her place at the side of the German plotter, Harrison Grant to hurry forward at the signal of Cavanaugh from the doorway. Grant found him nervous, irritable.

"The dangerous moment has come," he announced shortly. "Look!"

Far at one side of the room stood a tall German, apparently chatting with his fellow country-people as they strolled about after the dance. But as he watched, Grant saw that the conversations were extremely short and that following each one, every German and his companion turned toward the cloakrooms. Billy Cavanaugh's voice broke in once more.

"He's warning them all to leave," said the operative. "He's been doing it for the last five minutes. Half the Germans in the place are gone now. It's nearly time for the attempt."

Harrison Grant bent close.

"Send the men to make the rounds of the patrolmen," he ordered quickly. "Tell them to keep their eyes open wider than ever. Allow absolutely no one to enter this hotel."

"Yes sir."

"Double the guards on every door. What has been done in regard to the other searches that I ordered?"

"Everything's been accomplished. The hotel management has made the rounds of the whole place with pass keys. Every piece of baggage that cannot be vouched for has been examined. Nothing has been found."

"Good. Hurry to those patrolmen. I—"

For Grant had seen in the entrance to the cloakroom, the form of Heinric von Lertz, his coat over his arm, waiting impatiently for Dixie Mason. With a sudden determination, he hurried forward, to reach the entrance, just as Miss Mason came forth, adjusting a loose fold of her opera cloak. Grant bowed.

"Not going?" Miss Mason smiled.

"I assure you it isn't my desire," she said quickly. "Mr. Von Lertz simply insists on it, though. I never was having a better time in my life!"

Harrison Grant turned, to smile into the face of Heinric von Lertz.

"Surely, you wouldn't spoil the pleasure of anyone so sweet as Miss Mason."

"I can't help it, you know," answered Heinric von Lertz somewhat testily. "My head aches."

"Your head aches?" Grant laughed. "And you're going home on account of that? I'd lose my head for a person like Miss Mason!"

"Mr. Grant, you're Irish!" Dixie laughed up at him. Grant smiled again.

"I only wish I were, so I could say the things I'd like to say in the way I'd like to say them. But come now, Mr. Von Lertz, you're only joking about leaving. Why it's only midnight."

"Midnight?" Von Lertz started. "Then we must go. It's imperative. That is—"

And while he hesitated and explained, a taxi had driven up outside, at the little triangle which divides Broadway at 72nd Street. From the darkness within, a high cheeked, raw-boned man had started forward, a grip in his hand, only to be halted by a cowering individual who shot forth from a bench at the sidewalk.

"Back in that cab!" he ordered in a whisper. The raw-boned bomb maker started.

"Why—?"

"Don't ask any questions. Back in that cab!"

"But I've got the bomb! Von Lertz said everything would be ready for me. I—"

"Everything is ready—but in a way that we didn't look for," answered the spy on the sidewalk. "Look!"

Quickly and surreptitiously, he pointed upward. Where the flaring sign of the Ansonia Hotel blazed out upon the night, was silhouetted the figure of a man. Ten feet away was another—and another—and another. Down on the sidewalk, a solid cordon of police in uniform was drawn about the building. Not a person could approach without being seen—the guarding arm of the police was absolute.

"And that's not all," growled the spy on the sidewalk. "That's just the beginning. There are fifty secret service men scattered about the entrances and the areas. Bluer just signalled me by the electric light code that even the elevator shafts are full of them. I signalled him back to tell Von Lertz that everything is off. As for you—move away from here quick! There'll be twenty policemen on our shoulders in another minute!"

The taxicab turned swiftly. In another moment it had vanished down the street, while in the hotel—

Von Lertz still stood at the entrance of the cloakroom, arguing with Harrison Grant and Dixie Mason, a scant veneer of pleasantness covering his words.

"But I simply can't stay," he was repeating for the fiftieth time, "I tell you my head aches."

And certainly something was causing a pallor to spread over his features, and the cold sweat to break forth on his forehead. Harrison Grant knew what it was. From far away, the chimes of a church had sounded midnight and faded away into nothingness. Grant knew what Heinric von Lertz was thinking about—about that bomb and the fact that he was practically the only German left within the confines of the Ansonia Hotel. And so, that he might obtain a trifle of satisfaction against this cowardly plotter of Imperial Germany, he deliberately turned to Miss Mason and began the telling of an incident which could not be interrupted. And Grant knew how the passing of every second ate into the soul of Heinric von Lertz!

Then a movement. Someone passed—and in passing, slipped a bit of cardboard into the cupped hand of Heinric von Lertz. Hurriedly the German shifted his hand to the interior of his silk hat, and under its protection, read the message. Involuntarily, his hands clutched. For there, scrawled on the cardboard, were the words:

"Affair abandoned. Too dangerous."

Von Lertz coughed, and at the sound, Harrison Grant and Dixie Mason turned. The German forced a smile.

"I've changed my mind—er—that is, my headache's better," he announced. "We'll stay."

"Thank you," said Harrison Grant, with quietly suppressed meaning, "my hopes are raised on a veritable bomb of happiness. Miss Mason, may I have this dance?"

"Most certainly."

Happily, bouyantly they went toward the ballroom, while Heinric von Lertz stared after them.

"I wonder what that idiotic Yankee meant by a 'bomb of happiness,'" he mused, "Could he have known what I was plotting?"

The thought brought back the memory of that card. Once again he glanced at it, then tore it to bits and stuffed it in his pocket. Then, throwing his coat to the check boy, he strode toward the ballroom.

"At any rate," he growled under his breath, "they haven't stopped preparations at the shack."

And at the same moment, the taxicab containing the old bomb maker had drawn to the curbing, forty blocks away, where another cab stood waiting. A figure came forth from the darkness and peered into the first cab.

"Are you there, Kroner?"

"Yes."

"Alright. Everything's safe. Why don't you hurry?"

"There's no need. I didn't use the bomb."

"You didn't use it?"

"You heard what I said," came testily from within the taxicab. "It's up to you to hurry. Get out to the shack and tell those men to work night and day to finish up their job!"

A muffled conversation of an instant more, then the taxis parted. An hour later, as Harrison Grant again danced with Dixie Mason and Von Lertz seethed over the frustration of his scheme, a man hurried into a ramshackle old building on Staten Island, near Fort Wadsworth, aroused the slumbering figures there and pushed them toward a great thing of polished steel, nickel and brass that lay nine-tenths finished before them.

"Get to work!" he ordered. "Is this the way Imperial Germany is to conquer the earth—by sleeping?"

Grumbling the men obeyed. The spy looked about him.

"Where's Schmidt?"

"Here," came a voice from a corner where a man was unrolling himself from a dirty blanket.

"How's that wireless controller?"

"I'm having trouble with it."

"And yet you sleep?" The spy was raging now. "You get up here and find out what's wrong and remedy it. That wireless controller must be in absolute working order—understand? It can't fail! And what's more, it's night and day work for every one of you men from now on. This thing must be ready to launch the minute the fleet weighs anchor. The Ansonia plot's failed. Everything depends on us now!"

The men grumbled again in answer. A curse from the spy and they settled down to work—to put the finishing touches on a wireless controller and on a torpedo, large enough and powerful enough to tear even a battleship to fragments!