“Quick, tear off your glove and let me have that diamond ring I noticed on your finger, the large solitaire, not the dinner ring.”
Unquestioningly she obeyed. There was a strange Oriental odor in the car—suggestive of an incense. The car was gliding up Central Park West, toward one of the road entrances into the Park proper. Shirley's hand clutched the ring, tensely. The driver, tactfully looking straight to the front, gave no heed to the occupants of the Death Car. He was, by this time speeding too rapidly for either of his passengers to have leaped out without injury. Shirley understood the smoothness of the voice's system, by now. His hand slid to the top of the glass door pane, on the right. Down the glass, across the bottom, down from the other corner, and then over the top line, he cut with the diamond, using a peculiar pressure. He rose to his feet, gave the lower part of the pane a sharp tap. The glass, practically cut loose from its case, now dropped and would have slid out to the roadway with a crash had he not dexterously caught it, to draw it into the car. Quickly he repeated the operation with the door pane at the left. A nauseating, weakening something in the car sent Helene's head spinning; she choked for breath and lay back weakly, despite her will. Shirley turned to the small glass square in the rear. This came out more easily. He lay the glass with the others, on the floor of the car. The good clear air whirled through the openings, reviving the girl.
“Keep your eyes open, and that revolver ready. Now is the time. Pretend to sleep.”
Shirley had drawn his own automatic by this time, and he realized that the machine was slowing down. The chauffeur, as they passed a walk light, looked back, observing that the two were apparently unconscious. He slowed down still more, and tooted his horn three times. A large touring car passed them, to stop some distance ahead. Then it sped on, as Shirley's taxi followed lazily.
A figure suddenly came out of the darkness of the road. The driver stopped the taxi, and walked around the front, as though to adjust the lamp. The door opened slowly. A face covered with a black handkerchief obtruded. A hand slid up the detective's knee, along his side toward the abdomen, and a protruding thumb began a singular pressure directly below the criminologist's heart. Shirley's analysis for Dr. MacDonald had been correct! But jiu-jitsu is essentially a game for two.
Shirley's left hand suddenly shot forth to the neck of his assailant. His muscular fingers closed in a deft and vice-like pinch directly below the silk handkerchief. It was the pneumogastric nerve, which he reached: a nerve which, when deadened by Oriental skill, paralyzes the vocal chords. Not a sound emanated from the mysterious man, even when Shirley's right hand shot forward, under the chin of the other, for a deft blow across the thorax. The other tumbled backward.
“What's wrong, Chief? Too much gas?” cried the chauffeur rushing to the side of the fallen man. As the driver dropped to his knees, Shirley flung himself like a tiger upon the rascal's back. The struggle was brief—the same silent silencer accomplished its purpose. Before the man knew what had happened to him, he was dragged inside the car, and another deft pinch sent him to oblivion!
“Hit him over the forehead with the butt of the revolver if he opens his mouth,” grunted Shirley. “This is the chauffeur, now I'll get the other one.”
Just then a cry came from the darkness: it was a passing patrolman.
“What you doing in that auto?”