Page:Arthur Stringer - The Door of Dread.djvu/299

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THE DOOR OF DREAD
285

one directly behind the reflecting library lamp that stared at her like a headlight, was Keudell himself. The next man to him was Breitman, alias Wallaby Sam. And next to Breitman sat Andelman, the same suave Andelman who had posed as the ordnance officer from the Department at Washington. The fourth man, who sat on Keudell's left, she could not for a moment place. Then she remembered the Secret Service photograph which Kestner had once handed out to her and Wilsnach for inspection. It was Heinold, the Austrian who had stolen the gun plans from the Watervliet works and handed them on to Dorgan.

That quartette's silent contemplation of her, she realized, was meant to be inquisitional. She felt, even against her will, like a prisoner brought to the dock. There was something disturbing, for a moment, in that judicial array. It brought to her mind the impression that she was a cell-inmate suddenly confronted by her accusers. Yet she was not altogether afraid of them. The whole thing, she tried to tell herself, had been stage-managed for the sole purpose of terrorizing her. Even the high-backed chairs and the formidable-looking table of green-baize did not quite succeed in giving them the dig-