But Curt was coming from the south. Concentrate on that direction for the moment. What lies ten to twelve miles from here to the south?
He examined the map carefully, trying to visualize in his mind what lay out in that direction. The Ruler's palace was more or less south, but nearer to fifteen miles. Could Hooper have run that far since dawn? Hanlon didn't think so, though the man had so evidently been running until almost exhausted.
The section Hanlon was visualizing was, he remembered now, mostly filled with the larger homes and estates of the more influential and wealthy.
Yandor's house? No, that was more to the west, and only about two miles from here. Of course, Hooper could have been circling and zigzagging during those hours—oh, but not that much, surely.
Carefully Hanlon pored over the map, trying to figure where his father could possibly be held.
Suddenly, a bit to the east, and about eleven miles from the street where Hanlon lived, he noticed a pencilled dot he had previously made on the map.
Irad's house!
Of course, Hanlon gasped. And that enigmatic stone building—Hooper had thought "stone"—behind the house. Also, all indications up to the present pointed toward the Second-In-Line as the head man of the criminal element ... and that probably meant of the opposition, as well.
But Hooper's thoughts had been that the S S men's torture and inquisition had been mental. Did Irad have that power? Hanlon had asked himself that before, but now it became increasingly evident that he did, he must have. Besides, now that Hanlon was concentrating on the subject, there had been that curious sensation of a mental block or barrier Hanlon thought he had felt in Egon-Irad's mind. What was behind that curtain?
"Well," Hanlon shivered, "there's only one way to find out. I'll have to scout this place more closely, and see if he's it."