The Avenger raised the window, having bridged the alarm wire so there would be no signal when, an instant later, he cut it. He climbed into the house. Mac started to follow. And then a couple of armies came tumbling down around them and the night was split with shots and yells.
Somehow the alarm had been given, and they were caught!
But catching these three was a little like catching three grizzlies, as the men were soon to discover.
The shots didn’t bother the three. The slugs jolted and bruised when they were stopped by the bullet-proof celluglass garments, but that was all. The shouts were worse. They’d draw everyone from miles around, in the quiet country, in short order!
Smitty’s vast paws reached out. He got a throat in each hand and squeezed. Two professional gunmen went down. One would recover, a long time later.
He swung twice. Two more sank to the lawn. He tripped over one of them in the darkness and fell just as a shot ripped murderously where his head had been. There was no bulletproof shield there!
Mac, meanwhile, was using those bony fists of his to unbelievable effect. Like ivory mallets, they crashed cartilage and flesh; and the recipients of the blows usually stayed where they had fallen.
Josh was the least powerful of the doughty three, but he was a match for most two men, at that. He writhed and ducked and shot out blows like a black tiger. Then he was slugged and dazed by a gun barrel, and Smitty heaved powerfully under a knot of men that for the moment held him helpless.
“Mac!” Smitty’s voice sounded, under the heap. “The g-g-ga—”
That was all, but Mac heard it and understood. As a matter of fact, Mac hadn’t needed the urgent call. He had been trying right along to get a couple seconds of time to dig in his vest pocket for what Smitty had been reminding him of.
The gas!
He got out three glass pellets. Then he was kept busy ducking blows for half a minute. Finally he threw the pellets.
“Watch noses!” he yelled, warning Josh and Smitty.
You couldn’t see the vapor that rose when the pellets broke. You couldn’t even smell it. But you certainly felt it.
Half a dozen of the gang went down, out for at least an hour to come. As many more started staggering dizzily in circles. But somebody in the crew was brighter than crooks usually are.
“Back!” this one yelled, coughing, “They got tear gas or some—”
There were about ten who had the power to get back and away from the spreading vapor. It left Mac and Josh and Smitty unattended for the moment. Breathing through the lapels of their coats, they clambered in through the window The Avenger had entered moments before.
“The door!” bawled the bright guy outside. “Keep ’em in the house!”
Mac looked out the window and saw three men stand with guns out, guarding it. He saw men run to the front, and to the back doors.
And then, as he was thinking sourly what a nice little trap they’d fought their way into, he heard The Avenger’s quiet, icy-calm voice.
“This way.”
They went after the voice. Two figures loomed. But one was in the arms of the other. And it was not Benson who was being carried!
“You got him!” breathed Smitty. “You got Ritter!”
“Yes.”
“Fine.” Mac said. “Now all we have to do is get him out of here.”
Far off, a police siren was wailing. That squad car was coming back, after being lost by Nellie’s sedan.
“And fast, too!” said Mac.
They were following Dick as they spoke. They didn’t know where to, but they had followed him blindly before.
They went upstairs, to a back window. Down below was a roof — the garage. They dropped to that, handing Ritter down as if he had been a bundle of carpeting. The rear of the garage was almost in the water of the Hudson River.
They lowered themselves to the narrow strip between building and water. A man came around the end of the garage, but Josh fixed that. He leaped, struck; and the jaws that had been open for a shout clicked shut to a smack that would leave the victim unconscious for a good many minutes.
They circled through woods and shrubbery.
“How’d you do it, chief?” said Smitty.
“Ritter was leaning out a window, looking for the reason for the commotion.” The Avenger’s voice was as icily calm as his pale eyes. “The nerve pressure at the back of his neck put him out— This is where Nellie should be with the car.”
But Nellie wasn’t there with the car. The highway was deserted as far as they could see. And behind them began to swell the sound of furious pursuit, as men chased after the daring kidnapers of the nation’s No. 1 political figure.
When Benson and Mac and Smitty had left the car, Nellie had started to act precisely as commanded. But she had only started.
She was about to go into gear, after the three had rounded the bend, and was opening her red lips for a scream.
The scream came, all right, but it was real. Two men had suddenly bobbed up into sight beside her. And when she looked to her right, she saw three more on
Her scream was cut off by a hand clapping over her mouth.
