The long procession of bundles was slowing when, at last, that alley became a scene of quick action. A figure sprang out here, another there and one there. Not a word was spoken above a whisper, but Jimmie knew it was the pinch.
As he sprang to his feet he saw something gleam white then saw a figure fall. Another gleam, another plunging figure. The Bubble Man was getting in his terrible work.
Jimmie seemed to see the word, “Poison.” “Poison gas,” he muttered. “That man must not escape.”
He sprang forward. There came a blinding burst of light. He staggered for an instant. Then, realizing that he had, without knowing it touched off the flash-bulb on his belt beside his candid camera, he made one flying leap for a pair of legs. He and the Bubble Man fell in a heap. At the same instant, with a pop-pop that could scarcely be heard, two bubbles in the mad chemist’s hands exploded.
The Bubble Man lay still. Striving to regain his feet Jimmie felt once more that strange sensation of dizziness. Without so much as a groan he sank to the pavement. For an instant he saw six black tubes, three marked poison. Was there poison in those bubbles? Was he going to die? Jimmie went to sleep.
Sometime later he felt himself to be climbing out of a pit filled with sliding sand. Where was he? In his own good world or another?
With a heroic effort he forced his eyes open to find Mary Dare looking down at him and to hear her exclaim joyously,
“He’s opened his eyes! He’s coming ’round. Thank God, it was not poison.”
“Did—did they get them?” Jimmie whispered.
“Every one,” said Mary.