The Radiant Shell | Page 9

not see his flying right fist! That was an invisible weapon that did incredible damage.
But if they could not see the fist to guard against it, they could see the results of the fist's impacts. Here a nose suddenly crumpled and an instant later gushed red. There a head was snapped back and up, while its owner slowly sagged to the floor. And all the while the still dripping wound and the packet of documents kept with devilish ingenuity between the body of some swordless guard and the impatient blades of the Arvanian nobles.
Almost, it seemed to Thorn, he would win free. Almost, it appeared to the Arvanians, the unseen one would reach the big window near the door--which the path of his wreckage indicated was his goal. But one of the wildly swinging fists of a guard caught Thorn at last.
It landed on the glass cup over his right eye, cutting a perfect circle in the skin around the eyesocket, and tearing the film over the glass!
* * * * *
Now there were three things about the lithe, invisible body that the Arvanians could see: the crumpled papers, a slowly drying patch of blood that moved shoulder high in the air, and a blood-rimmed, ice-gray eye that glared defiance at them from apparently untenanted atmosphere.
Then came what seemed must be the end. Soyo appeared in the pantry doorway with a machine gun.
"Everybody to the end of the kitchen by the window!" he cried. "To the devil with silence--we'll spray this room with lead, and let the sound of shots bring what consequences it may!"
The men scattered. The machine gun muzzle swept toward the place where the eye, the papers, and the blood spot were to be seen.
That spot was now at one end of the great kitchen range on which a few copper pots simmered over white-hot electric burners. At the other end of the range, in the end wall of the kitchen, was a second window. It was small, less than a yard square, and had evidently been punched through the wall as an afterthought to carry off some of the heat of the huge stove.
Soyo's face twisted exultantly. The machine gun belched flame. Chasing relentlessly after the dodging, shifting blood spot, a line of holes appeared in the wall following instantly on the tap--tap--tap of the gun.
Eye and papers and blood spot appeared to float through the air. One of the copper pots on the range flew off onto the floor. The glass of the small ventilating window smashed to bits. In the jagged frame its broken edges presented, the Arvanians saw for a flashing instant the seared, blistered soles of a pair of human feet.
"Outside!" bawled Kori. "He jumped onto the range and dove through the window! After him!"
* * * * *
After precious seconds had been wasted, the rear door was unchained and wrenched open. The Arvanians, swords and guns drawn, raced out to the rear yard.
His Excellency's town car, that had been standing in front of the open garage doors, leaped into life. With motor roaring wide open, it tore toward the Arvanians, some of whom leaped aside and some of whom were hurled to right and left by the heavy fenders....
Startled people on Sixteenth Street saw a great town car swaying down the asphalt seemingly guided by no hand other than that of fate; some said afterward they saw a single eye gleaming through the windshield, but no one believed that. Equally startled people saw the car screech to a stop in front of the home of the Secretary of War. After it, scarcely a full minute later, three motors with the Arvanian coat of arms on them came to a halt.
"My dear fellow," said the Secretary blandly to the livid Arvanian Ambassador, "no one has come in here with papers or anything else. I saw a man jump out of your town car and run south on Connecticut Avenue. That's all I know."
"But I tell you--" shrieked the Arvanian.
He stopped, impaled on the Secretary's icy cold glance.
"Your story is rather incredible," murmured the Secretary. "Valuable plans stolen from your Embassy by an invisible man? Come, come!"
Dark Arvanian eyes glared into light American ones.
"By the way," said the Secretary affably, "I am thinking of giving a semi-official banquet to celebrate future, friendly relations between our two countries. Do you approve?"
The Arvanian Ambassador tugged at his collar to straighten it. World dominion had been in his fingers--and had slipped through--but he would not have been a diplomat had he let his face continue to express the bitterness in his heart.
"I think such a banquet would be a splendid idea," he said suavely.

End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Radiant Shell, by Paul Ernst
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