The unknown seven

Standing in the dark doorway of a delicatessen shop, Kingdon Cole gazed, through the fog and drizzle of the October night, at a second-story window across the street. The brim of a slouch hat shaded his eyes and most of his face. His lean figure was draped in a mackintosh that reached almost to his feet. The upward slant of the cigar, clamped between his teeth, hinted at total absorption in what he saw.

The building that claimed his attention was an ordinary three-story structure of murky brick. Flanked by a warehouse on one side and a secondhand clothing store on the other, it presented a sullen and gloomy aspect to the watcher across the street. Yet there was something in the very drabness of the house and the chill atmosphere which hung over it that might have appealed to the imagination of a man like Kingdon Cole.

A man’s head and shoulders were dimly silhouetted against the lighted window shade at which he was looking so fixedly. For half an hour or longer the figure had not stirred. The rigid poise of the head and the stiff set of the shoulders suggested that the man at the window was engaged in a task that occupied his whole mind.

Cole struck a match and, holding it in his cupped hands, lighted his dead cigar. The flickering light shone for an instant on fingers that were long, slim, and finely tapering, the fingers of a man of great mental energy and a compelling personality.

“Wonder what the learned Professor Carmody finds so interesting,” he mumbled. “Some scientific treatise, very likely, or perhaps it is——”

He lowered his gaze, as he vaguely sensed that a pair of eyes was trying to pierce the gloom in which he stood. What with the wet night and the lateness of the hour that dreary section of Bleecker Street was all but deserted. Now and then a crosstown car jogged along at a lumbering pace; occasionally a taxicab passed on its way.

Cole looked up and down the block. The impression was more distinct now. Some one was watching him, just as he was watching the solitary figure in the window. His senses, sharpened by long training, told him he was under observation even before he could trace the impression to its source. Now he saw a limousine drawn up at the corner, less than twenty paces from where he stood. Its sides of burnt sienna gleamed in the blurred lights. It seemed to lend a touch of affluence to the squalor and dreariness of the scene. How long the car had been there he did not know, for the window across the street had claimed all his attention.

The car began to move, crawling, snaillike and silent toward the point where Cole stood. It stopped opposite the doorway that sheltered him. He fancied that he saw the flicker of a face behind the curtains. Then the door opened a few inches, and he caught a glimpse of a beckoning hand.

His eyes narrowed under their puckering brows. The monotony of his vigil was being broken in a strange way, and the slow twisting of his lips signified that the interruption was not altogether displeasing. Once more he glanced up at the window across the street, noticing that the shadowy figure had not stirred. Then he crossed the sidewalk, and instantly the door of the limousine was flung wide.

“Won’t you step in, Mr. Cole?” asked a voice.

Though his life had inured him to surprises, Cole started a little. It was odd that the occupant of the car should address him by name. The interior was dark, but in the shadows he saw the figure of a woman.

“You are very patient, Mr. Cole,” the voice continued. “You are wasting your time, however. It isn’t likely that Professor Carmody will go out to-night, so you might as well jump in.”