But The Phantom was far from satisfied. At Azurecrest, Helen must have heard and seen things that if divulged would constitute a great danger to Mr. Shei and his organization. Her keen perceptions and inquisitive nature were always delving into whatever was strange and mysterious. Would Mr. Shei dare let her live after her usefulness to him was past? Again, as he repeatedly asked himself the question, a cold perspiration broke out on The Phantom’s brow.
Once more he made a quick decision, completely reversing the one he had made in Miss Dale’s presence. He glanced quickly at his watch. If he remembered correctly, there would be a train for Azurecrest inside twenty minutes. Single-handed, relying only on his quick wits and agile strength, he would beard the lion in his den.
But first he was anxious to learn whether Culligore had made any progress toward clearing up the other phases of the mystery, particularly in regard to Mr. Fairspeckle. He entered a convenient telephone booth and called up the police department. Luck was with him, for after a brief delay he heard Culligore’s voice over the wire.
“Oh, Fairspeckle! Why, he’s vamoosed. Slipped away right from under the eyes of a doctor and a nurse. Can you beat it?”
The Phantom’s veins tingled as he hung up. Fairspeckle’s disappearance was final proof that he had correctly guessed the identity of Mr. Shei.
[CHAPTER XV—DR. TAGALA]
Helen’s little wrist watch showed a quarter past four.
Getting up from the chair, she roamed aimlessly about the room. Presently she stopped at the table and gazed down. The initials she had heedlessly scrawled in the dust were still there. The faint tracings that had betrayed her knowledge of Mr. Shei’s identity seemed fraught with fate now. With a few idle strokes of the hand she had signed her own death warrant.
She could not have mistaken the sinister gleam she had seen in Slade’s eyes as he looked down at the letters in the dust. His eyes had spelled her doom just as surely as the tracings on the table spelled the name by which Mr. Shei was known to the world at large. And the slam with which he had closed the door told even more eloquently than words that her life was forfeit.
Suddenly she felt a little hysterical. The fatal secret she had learned, the spectacular intrigues of Mr. Shei, even the scrawl in the dust seemed so trivial now that she felt an impulse to laugh. It was grotesque, she thought, that such a little thing as a couple of initials traced on the surface of a table should mean the blotting out of her life.