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room where he sat. And they were the stars of heaven and not from the smacks on the skull.
    He was on a dirt floor, and there was no heat of any sort. But the night was warm. And the place was out in the open, for he heard no sound of cars or people. Instead, he heard the occasional twitter of night birds, and a whisper of the night breeze through weeds and tall grass.
    Smitty’s hands had been bound behind him, and they would have to stay there, till the coil around his chest, binding his arms to his sides, was loosened.
    So he proceeded to do something about it.
    The men who had tied him had waited to tighten the loop until the unconscious giant had exhaled, in order to get the coil as tight as possible around him. That was ordinarily good tactics. But it was not so good when done to a man like Smitty. Not so good, that is, for the captors.
    Smitty took a deep breath. His chest expansion normally was something hard to believe. When he exerted himself—
    Around his vast chest, the stout rope creaked and protested. So Smitty took the deepest breath he was capable of, and his arms and shoulders strained as the body of a moth strains as it bursts from a cocoon.
    The rope gave out a shrill zing, like a snapped piano wire. And that fixed the coil.
    A good contortionist, with his hands bound at the wrists behind him, can work his body backward through the loop of his arms, so that his hands are in front. Smitty was a good contortionist for all his bulk.
    With his hands at his waist, he proceeded to get in touch with Bleek Street.
    Smitty was an electrical engineer almost without an equal. Among other things, he had designed a two-way radio set so small that it could be contained in a metal case scarcely larger than a cigar case. Each of The Avenger’s indomitable little band carried one of these concealed at his belt.
    Smitty began tapping at his, now; and far off, in Bleek Street, the tappings came amplified from the big master set in the great top-floor room. They spelled a message in code.
    Satisfied, the giant proceeded to shuck the rest of his bonds.
    He had a little gadget in the way of a belt buckle that had tickled him like a kid when he had thought it up. And it came in handy now. It was an ordinary-looking buckle, though a little larger than most. But it had a tongue like an angry woman’s. Sharp.
    The underside of the tongue was a knife edge. And when Smitty had fumbled it open with his middle fingernail, it locked out straight from the belt at his waist. Then it was just a matter of sawing the cords along the tiny, razor-sharp knife till they fell apart.
    He untied his legs and got up, staggered a minute till dizziness passed, then walked around. He got it, now. He was in an unused hangar, and a glance out the window revealed a weed-grown level field that had once, in barnstorming days, been used as a landing field. Maybe it was used now, furtively, for all he knew.
    He went to the wide doors, opened one enough to slide out, and closed it again. And not till then, as if the giant had a private Providence watching out for him, did the gang return.
    He saw headlights of a car wobbling rapidly toward him as it came over the field, and he lay flat in the high grass and weeds. He saw men get out of the sedan and go to the hangar.
    There was an enraged outcry when they found only cut and broken bonds in there. They came out like angry bees pouring from a hive.
    Because it was so dark, Smitty couldn’t see that six men got out of the sedan and went into the hangar, and only four came out. All he knew was that a bunch entered and a bunch left.
    He heard the men beating around the high grass, then saw them get into the car again, swearing, and saw the car drive off. Thinking he was alone in the field, he stood up and stretched his big arms.

CHAPTER VI

O. K.—Maybe!
    It was Mac, at Bleek Street, who had heard Smitty’s tapped message.
    Fergus MacMurdie had been with Benson a little longer than any other of The