Argosy All-Story Weekly — page 137: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

MYSTERY OF VOODOO MANOR. The prisoner was picking with restless fingers at his clothes, despite the manacled condition of his hands. His dark skin gleamed startlingly pale against the heavy black beard. On closer view the eyes were singularly small, sunken and gray. <A strange light shone in them, yet it was not the light of unreason, of insanity. Per- plexedly I tried to fathom the uncanny bril- liance of the restless, strange orbs. “Now,” directed Nancy at once, “ fe- move the beard and the wig, Bland.” The bearded man jerked up his head. His eyes flashed darkly. He started to raise his hands. : “ None of that,” rasped Stebbins tersely. * We are all armed here.” With another shrug of his sficulder superlatively expressive of resignation and baffled hauteur, the man suffered the wig and the beard to be none too gently re- moved from his face by the plainclothes man. The removal of the disguise brought a startling change to the man before us. 1 had expected almost anything, perhaps even to recognize in his undisguised face the fea- tures of the masked man whom I had surprised in a shadowy rendezvous ob- viously awaiting his blond haired con- federate. Despite the mask I thought I could iden- | tify the shape of the mouth, the chin and the jaw. As a whilom artist, I had been trained in portraiture to recognize the slightest varying difference in characteristic features. Yet I was doomed to disappointment. 1 was reasonably certain that the man before us was not the questionable accomplice of Blanche Pembroke. Without the beard and the wig, he was smooth shaven, his hair closely cropped and sprinkled with eray. The forehead was very high and white, of a mellow, yellowish hue. The features were singularly refined and delicate, almost effeminate in their cameo clearness. The brown cheeks were high boned. The face was a clean cut oval, and the lips were thin, well chiseled and firmly shut. The chin was decisive and the jaw strong. “Are you ready to talk or shall I?” 607 asked Nancy crisply, after a sharp scrutiny of the man’s features. up, you know.” The man merely shrugged his shoulders. Interpreting them as a refusal Nancy went on: ‘““T- am certainly aware of the reason for your disguise. It was first assumed when you appeared as a peddler to the cook, in order to fix firmly in your mind necessary information about the arrange- ment of Voodoo Manor.” If this shot struck home the man gave no index of it. “ Furthermore,” went on Nancy, ‘‘ when I was bound to the polished leg of the table the other night, my assailant considerately left the mark of his thumb on the highly polished surface. I have carefully trans- ferred it as proof in case you are so ill-ad- vised as to attempt to deny my accusation. Get his thumbmark, Mr. Stebbins,” she re- quested abruptly. As he rose to obey, Nancy warned her captive. “ You’d better submit gracefully. It will do you no good to struggle against the inevitable.” Something in her tone seemed to carry conviction. The man offered no resistance. With evident relief Stebbins triumphantly handed the result to Nancy. She brought out another piece of paper and compared it with the print just ob- tained. She showed the two to the con- stable. “You see they are identical,” she re- marked quietly. “No doubt of it,” agreed Stebbins. Still the dark visaged prisoner sat mo- tionless except for the flicker of his swift moving eyelashes. “So,” went on Nancy, “ thanks to this convenient little clew, I am convinced that the man before us is unquestionably the man who so unceremoniously bound us to the table, stole upstairs and spirited away the death knife from behind the locked door of Room Number 13. Subsequently this malicious prowler, adamant to the decency and the respect usually accorded the dead, entered Miss Loring’s room and turned her dead body face downward.” Even the thought made me shiver. _ “For your game is — GOmicbOoks.co