“Hurry!” urged the Phantom, making a little flourish with the pistol. “Bimble is likely to walk in on us at any moment to see what is keeping you so long. Will you strip voluntarily, or must I tap you on the head and undress you? I don’t like to be rough.”
The reporter seemed impressed by the argument. With surly acquiescence he kicked off his shoes and started removing his suit. The Phantom, a thin smile hovering about his lips, followed the other’s example, keeping the pistol within easy reach while the exchange was in progress. In a little while he was once more garbed in the familiar gray which was his favorite color.
“This is better!” he commented. With an absentminded air he picked up the chain. For a moment or two his fingers toyed with the lock; then, stooping quickly, he looped the end of the chain around Granger’s leg. The reporter growled out a curse as the lock snapped shut.
“Put your hands behind you!” commanded the Phantom, again making a menacing gesture with the pistol. The reporter, his ashen face twitching, glowered savagely as he obeyed, and in a few moments the strings had been removed from his shoes and twisted tightly about his wrists. Finally the Phantom tore a strip from the table-cloth, fashioned it into a gag and thrust it between the reporter’s teeth.
“I’m really very much obliged to you, Granger,” he murmured dryly as he put the revolver and the knife into his pockets. “If you hadn’t come to me with that barefaced hoax, I should still be wearing a chain around my ankle. Too bad I can’t offer you a drink. You seem to need one.”
With elastic step he walked to the door. There he pushed a button, and the room went dark. There was a glow in his cheeks and a tingle in his veins as he stepped out in the hall, closing the door behind him. Looking up and down the silent corridor, he saw a stairway at the farther end, and hastened in that direction. At the head of the stairs he all but collided with Doctor Bimble.
“Well, Granger?”
The Phantom thanked his lucky star that the lights in the hall were dim. Under the circumstances, it was the most natural thing in the world for Bimble to suppose that he was addressing the reporter. He knew that Granger had been wearing the Phantom’s clothes, and the latter was supposed to be chained securely to a wall.
“No luck,” announced the Phantom, simulating Granger’s manner of speech. “I gave him exactly the line of talk you suggested, but he spotted the trick right off. He wouldn’t listen to me at all.”
Even in the dusk the Phantom saw a spiteful look creep into the doctor’s face.