Imam Singh was no longer in the seance room. He had glided into the reception room, and thence, to the outer door.
There, the white-clad man uttered a low signal. Four men appeared and came through the door. One was Barney Gleason. The others were his chosen gunmen.
"In here," whispered Imam Singh.
He stationed two men in the reception room. He led Barney Gleason and the remaining thug through the anteroom, into Rajah Brahman's private sanctum.
"O.K.," said Barney Gleason.
Imam Singh nodded. He went through the empty anteroom and traveled to the outer door of the apartment. There, he peered cautiously into the hall. He closed the door and let it latch behind him. It was only a few steps to the fire tower. There, Imam Singh descended, and reached the fhoor below. He peered from the tower into the hall. No one was in sight. Imam Singh hurried to a door directly beneath the entrance of Rajah Brahman's apartment.
He unlocked the door and entered. He turned on a single light in the hall, and made his way to the door of a storage room. He unlocked this door, and entered.
The storage room was fairly large. It contained various articles of furniture. A large square box was in one corner — beside it the properties of Professor Raoul Jacques, which had been partially unpacked. Imam Singh laughed as he looked at a chair which had come from the Hotel Dalban. He adjusted a stepladder in the center of the room, directly between two beams in the ceiling. The ladder was an unusual one. It was very firm, and had a large platform top. It reached almost to the ceiling. Iman Singh went to a closet. He divested himself of his white robes, and put on a garment of jet black.
This was close-fitting, and, with it, Imam Singh took out a black hood, which he did not don. Instead, he placed it upon a dressing table that stood beside the box in the corner.
Imam Singh turned on a light by the table. He produced make-up materials, and began a transformation of his own face.