Carlson said, "The Eye has not only organized the various mobs of gunmen in this city, but he has accomplished something else. He has established a perfect underground railway for transporting these criminals from one place to another in secret. I know, because the Eye personally asked me to handle that part of his business for him." There was another dramatic pause. Then Sergeant McGinty sprang to his feet. "Say, Mr. Carlson, if the Eye approached you personally let's have it right now. Is the Eye this same guy known as the Black Hood?" Carlson smiled. "It would seem so from the picture which appeared this morning in the Daily Opinion." "Yeah," Joe Strong put in. "That's the picture I took." No one was paying any attention to Joe. All eyes were focused upon Jack Carlson. "Understand," Carlson continued, "I did not meet the Eye face to face. He called me on the telephone, spoke to me in a whispering voice. He asked me if I would be interested in a money-making proposition. I played him along, tried to draw him out. He wanted me to employ cars and trucks for the secret transportation of criminals and in exchange I was to get a cut of the money which would be looted by his criminals." "And," Weedham said, "you believe that some transportation company in this city is actually assisting the Eye in this business?" "Undoubtedly," Carlson said. "I, of course, rejected his offer. I was attempting to figure out a plan by which I might trace this call to the Eye's hideout, but that's quite difficult with these dial phones, you know. "But that is how the Eye is working his get-aways. He probably has carefully placed stations all over the city where criminals who are fleeing from some crime can get a fast car, or hide in some unsuspicious looking truck to be transported beyond the reach of the law. It would appear to me--" Every light in the big room suddenly went out. Smothering blackness dropped like a shroud over those at the refectory table and upon Barbara Sutton, Joe Strong, Kip Burland, and Jeff Weedham who were seated along one wall. "D-d-damn!" Jeff Weedham stuttered. "What's this--the well known blackout?" A white beam of light stabbed through the French windows at the end of the room, spotted the wall directly above Jack Carson's sleek head. In the center of the spot was a crude sign, projected in black lines upon the wall. It was like a child's drawing of a human eye, round, staring, and at the same time infinitely menacing. Kip Burland was on his feet while the others remained spellbound by the brand of light. Watching the projected sign of the eye upon the wall, he nevertheless moved swiftly and silently toward the French windows. The sign of the Eye flicked out, and in its place was a message in black letters: CARLSON HAS DEFIED ME. HE WILL DIE.