"Very little," replied the old man in his quavering tones, "but that little I don't like. I've seen wagons drive up there with big carboys of acid on 'em, and sometimes in the night, when it's all still, I hear a great noise of hammering and strange lights gleam through the chinks of the shutters—ah, there's something queer about it I can tell you. All's not right in that house."
"Hum," said Ben, for lack of anything better to say.
"And for the last week," went on the old man, "things has been queerer than ever. I don't like it, I tell you, when at midnight you see a great dark thing come flying off the roof with a gleaming eye on it and a buzzing voice like a big fly. I leave it to you if that ain't enough to scare any Christian, let alone an old man watching a factory in this lonesome part of town."
Ben agreed; but to tell the truth, his attention had been distracted by the old man's description of the night-terror he had seen. In the old sailor's mind there was little doubt that the object that had so scared the old watchman was the dirigible that Luther Barr had purchased and which the crafty old millionaire was trying out by night so as to avoid attracting any attention.
"Well," said Ben lightly, "I've got a little business in that there house, shipmate, and if so be as I finds out anything about what kind of folks they are, I'll let you know."
"Thank you," rejoined the old watchman earnestly, "I'm getting an old man to have such scares thrown into me—it's really too bad."
Ben lightly ran up the steps, having nodded farewell to the old watchman, and the next minute pressed the electric bell. Somewhere in the far interior of the gloomy mansion he could hear the tinkle of the answering summons. The sailor, as he waited for the door to open on he knew not what, reached back with his weather-beaten hand to his hip pocket. He nodded with satisfaction as his fingers encountered the butt of a revolver of heavy caliber.
"All right, old bark-and-bite," muttered Ben to himself, "I feel better now we've shaken hands."
At that moment there came a great clanking from inside the door, as if heavy bolts and chains were being removed, and the next instant the portal swung open and Ben found himself face to face with a thickset man, who seemed, by his complexion and general appearance, to be of Spanish origin. His heavy eyebrows and thin, cruel lips gave him a singularly sinister appearance.
"What do you wish?" he demanded of Ben, with a foreign accent that agreed with his general makeup.