The Avenger 18 - Death in Slow Motion Read Online Free PDF

Smitty, “or just leave and stay left. This is a crazy idea anyhow. There can’t possibly be any connection—”
    Steps sounded in the alley. It was as if someone had left the old man’s door, or the door next to it, and the two hadn’t heard the door opening. Both popped into the alley.
    A man was coming from the narrow runway on the other side of the rear-house.
    “They duck in and out like rabbits in a maze,” complained Mac. “There must be a couple of stairways and doors in the back of this joint, too, to feed the top-floor rooms.”
    Smitty only said, “Let’s get this guy and ask a few questions.”
    It was easy to catch up to this second person to leave the rear-house, for the man had a twisted leg and walked quite slowly.
    He turned in surprise and a little fear as he heard the two behind him. But the fear left when he saw the amiable look on gigantic Smitty’s moonface.
    “Hello,” said Smitty. “You live in that house?”
    “Yes,” said the man. “Top floor, left-hand side. My name is Mason,” he added.
    “We wanted to see the old fellow on the ground floor,” Mac said. “Do you know if he is in?”
    “No, I don’t,” said Mason. “He’s a quiet old chap. I never know whether he’s in or out. Are you friends of his?”
    “We were afraid he was sick,” evaded Smitty.
    “Come to think of it,” said the man, “Old Mitch has looked badly for several days.”
    “Old Mitch?”
    “That’s all the name I know,” said the man with the twisted leg, apologetically. “Everybody just calls him Old Mitch. For Mitchell, I suppose.”
    “Say,” blurted Smitty impulsively, “you seem a cut above a joint like that rear-house. How is it you live in there?”
    The man smiled. And the smile took years off his face. He had looked about fifty before. Now he seemed no more than in his thirties. He looked meek and beaten and humble—but not old.
    “I have lived in better places,” he said. “But I have to have extra money, right now, and a bookkeeper doesn’t make much. There is a Mrs. Mason. I think she can come home from Arizona pretty soon, with cured lungs. But in the meantime”—he waved his hand—“I live here so she can stay in a sanitarium there.”
    There were no heroics in his tone, just a statement of fact. Mac and Smitty thanked him for his courtesy, and he went on.
    “Now?” said Mac disgustedly.
    But it was Smitty’s turn to be stubborn.
    “Make it just fifteen minutes more. Then we’ll blow.”

    Thirteen of the fifteen minutes passed, and they saw the object of their visit.
    At the alley entrance toiled a bent, aged figure with a ragged bundle in its arms. From the end of the bundle trailed a few bits of string and also protruded the jagged ends of broken wood for fuel.
    “Here we go,” said Smitty starting toward the old man. But Mac caught his arm.
    Another figure appeared at the alley entrance. This one was that of a younger and well-dressed man.
    “What in the world would he want with that old bum?” snapped Smitty suspiciously.
    What the young, well-dressed fellow wanted was nothing good, apparently.
    He said something in a loud, angry tone to the old man, and the old fellow cowered back.
    Then the man the bookkeeper had called Old Mitch said something in a low, placating tone. But it didn’t placate.
    “Why, you old fool—” Mac heard the young fellow snarl. Then there was the sound of a blow and the old man sprawled piteously in the alley.
    With one impulse, Mac and Smitty raced for the young bully. But they didn’t get him. There was the sound of a motor, and a cheap but new roadster flashed away as they got to the street. The young fellow was driving it.
    They helped the old fellow up—and they got the same snarling, querulous ingratitude they’d received before.
    “Lemme alone. I’m all right. Lemme be, I tell you! I can take care of myself.”
    The old fellow was shaken from the blow but otherwise he looked all right. Mac took special care to see