He turned to the work in hand with increased energy.
“Come, you, Griggs and Red, and push that desk down a bit so that I can stand on it.” The two men bent to the task, heedless of Mary's frantic protest.
“No! no! no! no! no, Joe!”
Red, however, suddenly straightened from the desk and stood motionless, listening. He made a slight hissing noise that arrested the attention of the others and held them in moveless silence.
“I hear something,” he whispered. He went to the keyhole of the door leading into the passage. Then he whispered again, “And it's coming this way.”
At the words, Garson snapped his fingers. The room was plunged in darkness.
CHAPTER XVIII. THE NOISELESS DEATH.
There was absolute silence in the library after the turning of the switch that brought the pall of darkness. Long seconds passed, then a little noise—the knob of the passage door turning. As the door swung open, there came a gasping breath from Mary, for she saw framed in the faint light that came from the single burner in the corridor the slender form of her husband, Dick Gilder. In the next instant he had stepped within the room and pulled to the door behind him. And in that same instant Chicago Red had pounced on his victim, the huge hand clapped tight over the young man's mouth. Even as his powerful arm held the newcomer in an inescapable embrace, there came a sound of scuffling feet and that was all. Finally the big man's voice came triumphantly.
“I've got him.”