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“I am terrified,” the banker admitted “You warned ht you show me your face What am I to think but the worst?”

“Do not worry You are valuable alive I still need you I need you more than ever There is much to be done”

“What can be done? Bell is onto you And he’s closing in on Imperial Film”

Semmler snatched the telephone from the banker’s hand and listened A brilliant shtened his eyes and spread his lips, but bright as it was, Wagner thought, it looked cold as distant lightning

“Bell,” said the leader of the Donar Plan, “would sound less confident if he knee could hear him”

40

“Mr Bell, could I see that picture again?”

Isaac Bell handed the Wunderlich sketch to a Los Angeles Van Dorn disguised in the patched clothing and dark glasses of a blind newspaper seller The detective took off the glasses and studied the sketch

“You know, he didn’t look quite like this But it could have been him”

“When?”

The blind newsie opened his notebook and read deadpan: “Individual possibly rese Mr Bell’s sketch of Fritz Wunderlich entered Gerht Detective Balant decided it wasn’t him”

“Ten past eight this evening?”

“Yes, sir”

“When did he come out?”

“Didn’t”