Chapter VI

"Hello, Gramps," grinned Atkill as he came into the sedate, carefully furnished office of Thaddeus Nestor, "I've been making inquiries, and a friend of mine tried to steal those things, or have them stolen. Three men went, but Putney's no fool, as I said, and he had the whole place lit up with ultra-violet floodlights, and the men didn't even know they were walking under brilliant lights. They watched my friends come across the yard, and finally captured them. They've wired the big fence with A.C. evidently, for when they touched it they just bounced off again. Looks as though we'll have to work through Wilson if at all. Maybe he can give us some plans of the fortifications."

"In the first place," Nestor snapped irritably, "I'm not your grandfather—praise the good Lord—and in the second place I don't like this sending thieves. Did they tell anything?"

"Did they talk?" Atkill smiled faintly. "Did you think Putney wouldn't make them? He strapped 'em in a big wooden chair and set up a Tesla coil behind their ears. Loud noises, big sparks, spectacular display—and heavy copper conductors strapped on their wrists. I'll bet they talked so fast a dictaphone couldn't keep up." Atkill smiled faintly. "But don't worry, they didn't know anything anyway—or they'd have had the sense to carry a fluorescent screen of some sort to warn them. I asked a friend and he asked a friend of his and the friend of his confidentially told a friend of his, who sent three of his men. Besides, Putney knew who sent them without asking, anyway. Nobody else wanted the junk."

"Well then, see the trouble you've got us into at the start!" wailed Nestor. "What can we do?"

"What can they do?" laughed the physicist. "They can't prove a thing. As a matter of fact they have made it impossible to send any of Joe Keller's friends. The whole gang is so scared now they wouldn't talk about it above whispers. I've got to hand it to that boy, Putney. Police protection wouldn't stop those crooks, but the 'muscle' they've got now stops every one of them.

"'Muscle'? What's that?" Nestor inquired blankly.

"Reputation for unpleasant happenings." Atkill smiled engagingly. "In the meantime I've made some progress. My apparatus is started. And I think I know what Warren was trying to do."

"What?"

"Transmutation."

"Yes, of course. Is that the best your famous brain can do? Anyone over at the University could have told you."

"Yes, that's the best I can do right now. You ask one of your University friends what Warren's theory of transmutation was. If he can't tell you, I will." Atkill started for the door, and called over his shoulder as he left, "But it doesn't work that way, so we can't make gold. I'm going to work."

Nestor looked suddenly interested, as Atkill mentioned transmutation, but his face fell as he was assured it wouldn't work. He growled some unintelligible remark, then picked up his desk telephone, and called a number at the University. Presently he was speaking to Professor William Boyd.

"Hello, Professor Boyd?"

"Yes, is this Mr. Nestor?"

"Right. Say, do you know what Warren was working on when he ruined that apparatus?"

"It wasn't Warren who ruined the apparatus, Mr. Nestor, but his assistant, Blamen. But they were working on the transmutation of the atom. He hoped to change the nuclear structure."

"Uhuh, so I heard. Do you happen to know what this hyp—hypothenuse was?"

"I can't say, he didn't tell anyone. I'm sorry, but why don't you ask him?"

Nestor growled, and hung up, and Boyd left the telephone with a gesture of distaste.

Atkill had found out where Wilson usually ate when he was in town for purchasing supplies, and had set a man to watch for him on his next trip into the city. Nearly a week went by, and Atkill was growing nervous. His apparatus had been finished, as best he could make it, and the Sanderson tube connected. However, it had a nickel wire instead of the iron wire Warren had used, and he was not at all sure what his results would be. Two tentative, low-voltage discharges in the tube had merely resulted in a peculiar feeling of strain in the laboratory, a feeling of some terrific jerk.

The mechanics had assisted him in making his apparatus, and had directed the work really, for they had seen the original mechanism Warren used in his successful, if not over-successful experiment. But they did not know that Warren had sent a current through the little iron wire, and Atkill did not guess this, for though the filaments had been sealed in all the tubes, they were practically never used, there was so seldom any reason for them. Sanderson had put them there in case they should be wanted, for it would be impossible to insert them after the tube was brought to earth.

That, and the fact that Atkill was afraid, with reason, to try any high voltage on his tube, made his experiments unsuccessful. Further, his magnets were not properly arranged. Warren had changed them after the photograph Atkill worked from had been taken.

But when at last his scout reported that Wilson was entering the little restaurant, Atkill left his laboratory at once and hurried over to meet the little man.

He found him seated in one of the small private booths, a waiter hovering near. It was one of the old-fashioned restaurants where waiters served the customers, as Atkill knew. This particular waiter was in his pay, however.

Wilson glanced up as Atkill entered. "Dr. Atkill!" he exclaimed as he recognized the famous physicist.

Wilson agreed with Nestor's description. He had a disappointed look. Atkill was anxious to change that.

"Hello Wilson, may I join you?"

"Certainly, Doctor. I didn't think you'd know me, though I naturally knew you."

"Oh, I've seen you around." Atkill's smile was friendly, it seemed to intimate that Wilson was an equal, and a man he was glad to be friendly with. "And then too, I've used that clever little microspectroscope of yours."

Wilson glowed with satisfaction. His one invention, a slight improvement on an existing device, was a thing very dear to him. Atkill had won him over completely.

Half an hour later they left the restaurant the best of friends. Atkill had spread himself to be agreeable, and Wilson had talked a great deal more than he realized. Atkill had a perfect map of the complete defenses of the Putney laboratory, and knew exactly where to find the notes when he got in. However, he decided to send someone else. He couldn't afford to be captured.

"That fence—clever! Bet Warren thought of the capacitance bridge. But we can overcome that with a little patience. A bridge of our own, and a little static apparatus——" Atkill began planning just what sort of a thing would be needed to neutralize the effects of a man's capacity on the fence. He set to work on it soon after he reached the laboratory, and in a few hours had a suitcase that would contain his apparatus, within it the assembled machine was ready for use. He tried it on a metal plate set up against the wall, and the results gave perfect success. He could walk to the plate leisurely, and touch it without so much as disturbing the sensitive capacitance bridge.

He put his apparatus in the office safe, took down his hat, and shrugged on his coat, after carefully washing up. He was smiling contentedly as he walked toward the moving way on Fifth Avenue Third. He threw away his cigarette, and stepped upon the third level escalator, paid his fare, and started toward the information point.

He found Joe in a little cottage on the Palisades. Joe was nattily dressed now, and looking happy. His cottage was entirely automatic, and heavily armed. The police, moreover, were no longer looking for him. He had grown a new set of finger prints.

Joe didn't greet him so enthusiastically this time. The last visit had resulted in rather unhappy consequences for some of his friends. "Hello Atty. Watcha want?" he asked apathetically.

"I'll tell you, Joe. I want to make an offer," began the physicist frankly. "I want a certain job done, it's going to be a bit difficult, perhaps, but it will be worth it to me, and I'll make it worth it to you. I'll not give you any money for it." Joe looked puzzled, but not deeply so. He wasn't really interested, he had an excellent idea what the job was.

"Nah? What then?"

"The Death Ray machine—with sixty charges still in it."

Joe sat up like a spring coming into position. He stared at Atkill sharply, then slumped unhappily. "Now I know it can't be done. What is it? What y're getting at?"

"Oh, Joe, it can be done easily enough—now. You remember that place where those friends of yours went, and came back with tales of all sorts of things—terrible things—? Well, I found out a lot about that place from a man named Wilson, who works there, and Wilson told me all about it. You know, those rats of yours started spouting without so much as a slight burn! They're dirty liars, Joe. Wilson saw it, and he told me that all Warren did was to clamp them in a big wooden chair, and start a spark machine, what we call a Tesla Coil, about as dangerous as a fly-swatter, right behind their ears. It looks bad, and those rats got scared, and talked so fast they couldn't understand all they said. Joe, they squealed without a heavy touch!"

Joe began to be interested; he was very anxious to believe this, and to believe he could win that death ray. "Yuh—how ya' know this Wilson bird ain't lyin'?"

"Joe, he wouldn't. He thought I was his best friend. He was spouting forth the confidences of his dried-up, little heart.

"And he even told me all about the fence, and the other things they have there. Why I can give you a map of how to get in there now, and how to get out again. I'll give you a suitcase that's got a machine in it that will keep you from affecting their traps. You know how an old radio set squeals when you take the shielding off? Well, that's because your hand gets near it, and upsets the balance. That's what they are using, and all we have to do, is to put an electrical shield up, and they'll never know you're there.

"Get three men here, Joe, and I'll show them how to do it. I even know just where the papers I want are."

Joe was succumbing. That Death Ray sounded good, the thing sounded easy now.

"Yeah—but what about that fence? Mike said it kicked like a damn mule?"

"Certainly," replied Atkill. "Tell him to take a good hold on an electric light wire, and see how it feels. Just plain ordinary electricity. Every one of you ought to know that."

"O. K. I ain't tellin' 'em, though. You give 'em orders, an' if they squeal, that's your bad luck," decided Joe.

An hour later Atkill was giving orders, and demonstrations in his laboratory. He didn't mind. He knew that both Warren and Putney knew who it was that was ordering this attack on their papers. So he showed the men that his machine prevented their being detected, showed the film of grey-white paint on the suitcase that flamed greenish when ultra-violet light struck it, and gave them a map of the grounds.

Ten minutes later the three gunmen headed for the New Jersey Monorail.