“Inza?” he gasped. “Here at this hour! What does it mean?”
“She is alone,” was the surprising answer. “She came in a cab and asked to see you without a moment’s delay.”
“Something is wrong!” declared Frank, getting his hat and overcoat. Then he hastened down to the ladies’ parlor, where Inza was waiting for him.
Inza was pale and somewhat agitated when Frank reached her.
“Oh, Frank!” she said, “I am afraid something terrible has happened to—to Walter!”
“What makes you think anything has happened to him?”
“After he came here and found you had picked up the stick he returned to the house with it in his possession. Then he told me he was going to see that crazy doctor about the stick, and he promised to return by ten o’clock. It is now long past eleven, and he has not returned. I knew it would not do to let father know about it. Father had retired for the night, so I slipped out of the house without his knowledge, and here I am. I came to you because I thought you would know what to do.”
Her words had conjured strange, gruesome visions before Merriwell’s vision. Frank had heard from the man’s lips the story that revealed the peril of any one who might possess the little black stick. Was it not possible that, for all of his trick in dodging the Chinaman at the door, he had been tracked down by members of the secret order and slain? Was it not possible the stranger might be dead somewhere in the dark streets of New York with the strangler’s cord about his neck?
Inza saw Merry’s lips tighten and she gave a little cry of fear.
“You are afraid!” she said, clutching Frank’s arm. “Oh, why did he ever meddle with that terrible thing! What if he has been killed!”
A pain shot through Frank’s heart, for her words and her agitation plainly showed that she loved the stranger. Could it be possible that Starbright was right?
“No! no!” Merry cried in his heart. “I will not believe it yet—I will not!”
“You must help me save him, if we can!” panted Inza. “I know the address of the crazy doctor, and we will go there. Perhaps he is there! Perhaps we shall find him unharmed!”
More than ever did she betray that she loved this mysterious man, and Frank could not hold back the words which forced themselves from his lips: