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Show plAll Over But the wk mm Richarcl Powell- Shooting .f lilt AN ,MS,ER SANCTUM MYSTERY . jjflNN AlW STARRING ARAB AD ANDY BLAKE -u tuus IS 9 Finally I caught a sentence. He had said, "This time we will not be Interrupted." I moved carefully toward the platform. plat-form. There were steps leading up to it but this time I wasn't going to hand him any presents by making a rush. The platform wasn't side. I could stay on the floor and yank him down. When he saw I wasn't charging charg-ing he started down the steps. His round polished head hunched between be-tween his shoulders. The long fat arms swung out, fingers stroking the air ahead of him. He was three steps up when I reached the bottom his breath whistling above the dynamo. dy-namo. He Jerked and tore at a pocket. For a second I goggled up stupidly at him. He was yanking out his gun. His hand wavered up, faltered, rose again. The slide of the automatic had a greasy blue shine. I ripped open my undershirt and clamped my fingers around the waffle waf-fle pattern of the hand grenade. It felt good. It would raise hell in this concrete room. I wouldn't have picked a room like this for my first lesson In using a hand grenade, but the selection was limited. He had the gun up now. It steadied on me. I cocked my arm and thought: this Is for Dartmouth. And I burned it down the groove at him. Flame slashed at me. A blast of noise seemed to stave in my eardrums ear-drums like old barrels. I closed my eyes and let things go dark . . . When I opened them again, ages later, I heard myself mumbling. "I got the guy I got the guy I got the guy I" Someone tugged at my arm, argued ar-gued with me. For some reason I was walking. I complained, "Why don't you let a guy stay in bed after he's blown to bits? This is a hell of an army walking a guy around and around "Andy! Oh, Andy, please." The fog swirled around In my head and smoked quietly away. Arab was clinging to my arm. laughing laugh-ing and crying. We were walking through sand. The fragment of moon I had seen ages ago was still skimming through the night sky. I growled, "Where's the hospital? What am I doing here? That grenade gre-nade tore me to bits." "Oh, Andy," she choked, "it didn't go off! You aren't really wounded. Just a bitten arm and a lot of bruises and" "Just that, huh? And why didn't the grenade go off? One of your lousy defective Ordnance grenades. HI get off a military letter with nineteen indorsements and see about these defective grenades." She nuzzled my arm and quivered with an assortment of laughs and sniffles. "They don't ever go off unless un-less you pull the pin," she moaned. "You didn't pull the pin!" , "They ought to print directions on the things. How would I know you had to pull a pin? What happened to the fat man?" She shuddered slightly. "Well?" "Andy, you hit him with it." "Did I hit him hard'" "If you can always throw grenades gre-nades as hard and straight as that, we'll have some special ones made up for you, without pins." "Yeah, but I saw a flash and there was an awful bang." "A forty-five makes an awful racket in a closed room." "He missed me, huh?" "Yes, darling. And I've been walking you up and down for five minutes to wake you up." Arab took a deep breath and clung to me. Her lips felt cool and soothing. sooth-ing. "Andy," she whispered, "I won't ever try to stir things up again. From now on I'll be a mouse." I scrubbed a hand over my aching face, peered at the flaming house and distant depth charges. "If you're going to be a mouse," I said solemnly, "God help the cats." (THE END) I carried her out into the corridor. corri-dor. of the stairs. Suddenly he whirled, dropped to his hands. A foot lashed at my throat. I was waiting for it. I Jerked back my head, caught the foot with my left hand and flipped it. The fat man crashed down. I locked a foot around his ankle to steady myself, ripped hooks into his left kidney with my free hand. His bent back was a sweet target. Like socking a drum. I pounded him three times. He grunted, jerked upright. up-right. Something tore agonizingly at my locked arm. I dug into his kidney once more and then he whirled around and let me fly off at the wall. It wasn't a clean toss. I hit spinning, spin-ning, felt skin burn off one shoulder. shoul-der. But I kept on my feet. My right forearm ached. A curved flap hung loose three inches above the wrist. It was lucky, though. His teeth had missed the artery . . . and rabies takes a long time to kill a man. "Just for that," I mumbled, "we'll see how you like blinking glass out of your eyes." And suddenly he broke and ran. Ran sobbing along the wall and up the steps onto the platform. At the top he swung around. I could hear CHAPTER XIX I knelt beside Joey for a moment, then straightened. He had been dead when he hit the floor. Renee was still waiting by the desk. The fist doubled against her side seemed darker. Her body swung lightly up into my arms. I carried her out into the corridor. We were lucky. The smoke wasn't suffocating, and the flames had started on the top floor and hadn't gnawed their way down yet. I started downstairs. "Bob," she said suddenly. "Sorry. This is just Andy." Her eyes opened. "Bob used to carry me like this." "Did he?" . "He used to say I ought to try out for the ninety-pound team." "You could still make it." "I mustn't talk about myself," she whispered. "You still have work to do. Did you understanS that he went Into the powerhouse? He took the black-light set with him. He can attach It and signal through one of those slots near the roof. Don't let him tell the men on the U-boat about the convoys." ' "We'll take care of him." "The door will be open, Andy. He expected Joey and me to follow him." "I'll make sure he doesn't get lonely." I picked my way through a Jumble Jum-ble of furniture on the first floor, kicked the back door open. The guard, the man who had kidnaped Paula Thompson, was still huddled beside the steps. But he was off the books as completely ss Joey. His head lolled at a queer angle. Apparently the fat man didn't like to leave unsolved problems lying around; the guard might have talked, later. I carried Renee well back from the house and placed her gently on the sand. Her eyes were feverish, and she gasped, "I used to be afraid. Afraid of dying. Afraid for my people in Brittany. Afraid that the Germans could not be beaten. Now I am not afraid. It is worth dying to beat the Germans. Tonight I stood at the window and when the guns fired the third time I found that I was no longer afraid." I said gruffly, "You always did have what it takes." "I I'm sorry you saw how I acted act-ed with . . with" she nodded toward the powerhouse "with him. It wasn't really me." "I know it wasn't." "Will Bob understand?" Feet scuffled in the sand and Arab ran up to us. She dropped to her knees, spilling an armful of loot. "How is she?" she gasped. "I grabbed a tablecloth. You'll have to rip It into bandages, Andy. My fingers " Renee pressed the stained fist into her side. "Let me alone," she said sharply. "The U-boat. You must warn the ships about it. You must go after that man In the powerhouse." power-house." Arab bent and kissed her. "I brought Joey's flashlight," she said. "And I brought that International code book you were using. I can work the flashlight with my thumb and warn the destroyer. Andy will do the rest." Renee smiled. Her head drooped onto the snnd. Her lips moved. I leaned close. She was crooning an elfin melody. For a moment I could see Renee and her big Dartmouth kid hanging over their balcony, watching watch-ing moonlight on the Seine and humming hum-ming a quaint little college tune. I don't think there could have been any homesickness In the way Bob had sung it, because there wasn't any now. She whispered it softly: Dartmouth will shine tonight. Dartmouth Dart-mouth will shine . . . Dartmouth will shine tonight, Dartmouth will shine . . Dartmouth will shine tonight, Dartmouth will shine . . . When the sun goes down and the moon comes up . . . Dartmouth . . . will . . . shine ... It was almost gay, almost a challenge. chal-lenge. The elfin whisper faded. She lay there quietly, smiling up at the Dartmouth moon. From the look on her face. Bob must have been waiting. I got up stiffly. "Take the shotgun," Arab said. "I can't handle a shotgun. Let 'em know about the sub." She pushed something into my hand. "Take this. then. Please take tt, Andy." It was the hand grenade from the fat man's arsenal. I stuffed It Inside In-side my undershirt, remembering my trouble earlier in trying to untangle un-tangle a gun from my pocket. I walked across white sand to the powerhouse. I thought about Renee. and the building blurred and I had to gulp knots out of my throat. The door was slightly ajar. I kicked it open and went in. The fat man straightened slowly. He had been crouching on a narrow platform, adjusting the blacklight set to bear out through a seaward loophole. Light from a single electric elec-tric bulb flashed on his glasses. The room was filled with the shudder and whine of the dynamo, and at first I could not hear what he was saying. I |