The Dream Doctor

d in at our apartment, Kennedy was up even earlier than usual i

ether I'm right in my g

arked, scarcely

l; through another ran a glass tube, connecting with a large U-shaped drying-tube filled w

lute sulphuric acid through the funnel tube. "That forms hydrogen gas," he explained, "which passes thr

en upturned end. The hydrogen, now escaping

n him tear off in the den, scraped off some powder fro

e formed. In the ignition-tube a sort of metallic deposit appeared. Quickly he made o

very minute he is there he is breathing arseniureted hydrogen. Some one has contrived to introduce free hydrogen into the intake of his ventilator. That acts on the arsenic compounds in the wall-paper and hangings and sets free

ted in amazement. "Some one in that Red Brotherhood is

rld of the foreign settlements on the East Side. About the middle of the afternoon he reappeared. As far as I could learn all that he had found out was

g hastened to warn Brixton of his peril from the contaminated atmosphere

work connecting the two wires of the general household telephone with what looked very much like a seamless iron tube, perhaps si

rns, and everything. I shall run this third line from the coil into Brixton's den, and then, if you like, you can accompany me on a little excursion d

a tonic effect on him. I had, however, almost given up the illusion that it was possible for us to be even in the den without being watched by an unseen

this oak box he remarked: "This is an intercommunicating telephone arrangement of the detectaphone. You see, it is more sensitive than anything of the sort ever made before. The

as though a door had been opened and shut hastily. Some one had evidently entered the storeroom.

is Janeff the engineer who has charge of the steam heating, the electric bells, and everyth

I didn't just go down there last night and grab the fellow. Well, you see now. It is my invariable rule to get the man

the detectaphone. "This is J

ust have answered that

d discovered the poiso

ne

re it is the nine-o'clock train she is due on? Very well. I shall meet you at the ferry across the Hudson. I'll start from here as soon as I hear the train come in. We'll get the girl this time. That will bring Brixton to terms sure. You're right.

ughter, to hold her, perhaps, as a hostage until he did the bidding of the gang. Wachtm

h. It was already only a couple of minut

d start for the station immediately we might sa

u and yours," put in Craig coolly. "No, let us get this thing straight. I did

u don't suppose anything in the

d Craig. "Save her and ca

empt to telephone from here, that fellow

he Woodrock central down in the village. He was using the transmitter and receiver that

ere, under any circumstances. Now put that to them straight, central. You know Mr. Brixton has just a little

do. Why, I suppose our friend Janeff down in the s

indicate that he had overheard and was spreading the alarm. He w

ary means to prepare against the experts who have brought this situation about.

?" repeated Brixton,

tting and fuming, Mr. Brixton. If Janeff can wait, we'll have to do so, too. Suppose we should start and this Kronski should change his plans at the last

should cut the

overheard. He knows nothing. You see, I took advantage of the fact that additional telephones or so-called phantom lines can be superposed on existing physical lines. It is possible to obtain

or choke-coils bridged across the two metallic circuits at both ends, with taps taken from the middle points of each. But the more desirable method is the one you saw me install this afternoo

coil, then divides and passes through the two line wires. At the other end the halves balance, so to speak. Thus, currents passing over a phantom circuit don't set up currents in the terminal apparatus of the side circuits. Cons

interested," remarked Brixton grimly, cur

ank you. The nine-o'clock train is five minutes late? Yes-what? Count Wachtmann's car is there? Oh, yes, the train is just pulling in. I see. Miss

g up the corridor and the stairs from the den an

s and fled. There was not a moment to lose. Craig hastily made

ntral! Get the lodge at the Brixton estate. Tell them if they see the engineer Janeff going out

a whirlwind. Already we could see lights moving about and hear the baying o

cars standing before the ferry house. It looked as though one had run squarely in front o

d groaning, while another man was quieting a girl w

ess, leaped out of our car almost before

exclaimed, c

d sternly, eying the man.

e house together. But before Conrad could get into the car this fellow, who had the engine running, started it. Conrad jumped int

ffeur," muttered Wachtmann, l

s?" asked Craig with

mann'

ki, and a blacker devil an emp

r of the Red Brotherhood, one of the cleverest scientific criminals who ever lived. I think you'll hav

he case was finished, although I fancied from a flicker of his eye as he made some passing reference to the outc

t was imperative that he should get back to the city immediately. Nothing would do but that th

xhilaration of the on-rush of cool air was quite in keeping with his mood, though for m

rily as I dropped into an easy chair in our own q

dy la

of scientific mischief, "no

aven!" I

I am making on the sensitiveness of selenium to light, and I want to finish the

y meant it. He was laying

he had gone. Instead he was preparing for w

eel that I ought to give up this outside activity and devote

ething other than the very thing that nature had evidently intended the

g, neither would I. I tried to write. Somehow I was not in the mood. I wrote AT my stor

" would do him good, and I had almost carried my point when a big, severely plain black foreign limousine pulled up with a rush at the laboratory door. A large man in a huge fur coat jumped

est at the apparatus Craig had collected in his warfare of science with crime, "I have dropped in here as a matter of patriotism. I want you to preserve to America those masterpieces of art and literature which I have collected all over the world during many years.

without words that this was better relaxation to him than either the Metropolitan or the "m

east. Yes, we can catch him there. I have a dinner engagement at seven myself. I can give yo

he famous Spencer house, itself one of the show places of that wonderful thoroughfare. Spencer had built the museum at great cost simply to house those tr

cing for us chairs that must have been hundreds of years old. "At first it was only those objects in the museum, that were green that were touched, like the collection of famous and histo

upted Spencer, who had been l

ry, sir. Shal

y as she told it to me. Explain while I am gone how impossible it would be for a vis