Part 7 (2/2)
Crowley barked a laugh.
Patricia by now, was bent over the unconscious Ross crying even as she tried to help him.
Crowley said to the silent, all but disinterested Larry, ”Have these three put in separate rooms in that section they used for the violent wing when the place was a nuthouse. Have a good guard and see they don't talk back and forth.”
”You're the boss,” Larry said languidly.
Crowley was thorough. For that they had to give him credit. They were kept divided, each in a different room-cell and with at least two burly, efficient guards on constant watch. They were fed on army-type trays and their utensils checked carefully. There was no communication allowed--even with the guard.
The second day, Crowley took measures to see their disappearance raised no alarm at either their place of employment or at their residences.
This raised few problems since all were single and all had already taken off both from the job and from their homes in order to carry out their experiment. Crowley forced them to write further notes and letters finding excuses for extending their supposed vacations. He also had Larry return to the hotel suite, pay their bill, pack their things and bring them to the Catskill estate which had become their prison.
He had them make up lists of materials and equipment they would need for further manufacture of the serum upon which they had stumbled, and sent off men to acquire the things.
And on three occasions during the following weeks he had them brought from their cells and spent an hour or so with them at lunch or dinner.
Crowley evidently needed an audience beyond that of his henchmen. The release of his basic character, formerly repressed, was progressing geometrically and there seemed to be an urgency to crow, to brag, to boast.
[Ill.u.s.tration]
On the third of these occasions he was already seated at the table when they were ushered into the dining room. Crowley dismissed the guards with a wave of his hand as though they were liveried servants.
All had eaten but there were liqueurs and coffee, cigars and cigarettes on the broad table.
Ross sank into a chair and growled, ”Well, what hath the great man wrought by now?”
Crowley grinned at him, poured coffee and then a dollop of Napoleon brandy into it. He gestured with a hand. ”Help yourselves, folks. How you feeling? You been getting all the books you wanted? You look kind of peaked, Pat.”
”Miss O'Gara to you, you ape with delusions of grandeur,” she snapped.
”When are you going to let us out of those prison cells?”
Crowley wasn't provoked. The strong can afford to laugh at the malcontented weak. ”That's one of the things you never know,” he said easily. ”You sure you want out? Something the Doc said the other day had a lotta fact in it. The fewer people know about this secret of mine, the better off I'll be and the better off I am, the better off the whole country is going to be and I gotta think about that. I got responsibilities.”
”A combination of Engine Charley and Louis XIV, eh?” Ross muttered, running his beefy hand back over his crew cut. It was a relief to get out of his room and talk with the others, but he didn't want Crowley to see that.
”What's that?” the other was impatient of conversation that went above his head.
Dr. Braun explained gently. ”One said, _I am the State_, and the other, _anything that's good for my corporation is good for the United States_--or something quite similar.”
Crowley sipped at his coffee royal. ”Well, anyway, Pat, the day you're ready to leave that cell, you'd better start worrying cause that'll mean I don't need you any more.”
Ross growled, ”You didn't answer my question. Robbed any banks lately, great man?”
The other eyed him coldly. ”Take it easy, Buster. Maybe in the early stages of the Common Man Movement we hafta take some strong-arm measures, but that stage's about finished.”
Patricia O'Gara was interested in spite of herself. She said. ”You mean you already have all the money you need?”
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