THE POISONED ROOM
Elaine and Craig were much together during the next few days.
Somehow or other, it seemed that the chase of the Clutching Hand involved long conferences in the Dodge library and even, in fact, extended to excursions into that notoriously crime-infested neighborhood of Riverside Drive with its fashionable processions of automobiles and go-carts—as far north, indeed, as that desperate haunt known as Grant's Tomb.
More than that, these delvings into the underworld involved Kennedy in the necessity of wearing a frock coat and silk hat in the afternoon, and I found that he was selecting his neckwear with a care that had been utterly foreign to him during all the years previous that I had known him.
It all looked very suspicious to me.
But, to return to the more serious side of the affair.
Kennedy and Elaine had scarcely come out of the house and descended the steps, one afternoon, when a sinister face appeared in a basement areaway nearby.
The figure was crouched over, with his back humped up almost as if deformed, and his left hand had an unmistakable twist.
It was the Clutching Hand.
He wore a telephone inspector's hat and coat and carried a bag slung by a strap over his shoulder. For once he had left off his mask, but, in place of it, his face was covered by a scraggly black beard. In fact, he seemed to avoid turning his face full, three-quarters or even profile to anyone, unless he had to do so. As much as possible he averted it, but he did so in a clever way that made it seem quite natural. The disguise was effective.