CRIME OUT OF MIND
                                by Maxwell Grant

       As originally published in "The Shadow Magazine," February 1946.

     Murderous men with a fearful weapon plunge a group of fun-seekers into
chaos and terror, while The Shadow, master mind-reader, treads dangerous ground
to thwart the plans of evil-doers.


     CHAPTER I

     THE spotlight from the little balcony was focussed on the darkish man who
stood in the center of the nightclub floor. He was a commanding figure, this
man, with his dark, full face and glinting eyes.
     In fact, everything glinted about Planchini.
     The great man's turban gleamed with a huge red stone that he termed the
Token of Buddha. Similarly, Planchini's regalia scintillated with an embroidery
of costume jewelry. Beside him was a silver-rimmed fish bowl, transparent but of
a tinted glass that fairly shimmered with iridescence.
     Most sparkling of all was the crystal ball that Planchini held in his
right hand. No mere glass this, but genuine rock crystal, so clear that it drew
eyes with a hypnotic force.
     Appropriate, such a ball, for this was the Crystal Room of the Chateau
Parkview, one of New York's swankiest hotels. To live up to its name, the
Crystal Room was hung with huge cut-glass chandeliers and Planchini had smartly
posted himself so that one of these would serve as background in the spotlight,
thus adding its glitter to that of his performance.
     For in the eyes and minds of many who watched him, Planchini was a real
mystic of the highest caliber. Even now, as Planchini dipped his right hand
into the bowl to bring out a folded slip of paper, there was breathless silence
among the spectators who thronged the surrounding tables.
     "I see the initials 'L. J.,'" declared Planchini, in stentorian tone, his
eyes fixed on the crystal ball. "The 'L' stands for the name Louisa and it is
the name of someone present."
     An audible gasp filled the interval that followed and Planchini, gesturing
his right hand imperiously, carried a second spotlight to a ringside table where
a portly lady furnished a minor dazzle, except that her jewelry, though less
than Planchini's, was real.
     "Louisa Jardine," continued Planchini, consulting the crystal. Then,
without a glance at the woman who nodded her identity, he added: "Amid that
name I see a sparkle. It represents something lost that wishes to return."
     "My diamond pendant!" gulped the Jardine lady. "The one I lost - a week
ago - unless it was stolen!"
     "It was neither lost nor stolen," informed Planchini. "It was given to
someone."
     "Given!" exclaimed the portly Louisa. "I, give away my diamond pendant!"
     "You did not give it away." Fixing on Louisa, Planchini's eyes fairly
flashed with fire. "You gave it to a friend for safe-keeping."
     "But I don't remember -"
     Louisa halted as a companion nudged her arm and whispered something. Then,
with a giggly laugh, the portly woman admitted:
     "That's right. It must have been the night I was over at the Landworth
Apartments visiting Mrs. -"
     "No names, please!" Planchini was sharp, deft with his interruption, as
though he had purposely held it. "Do not tell me who your friends are. I am the
one who tells you who they are."
     Louisa gave an apologetic nod.
     "You left the pendant there," reminded Planchini. "You may tell me if you
remember."
     "I don't remember."
     Pondering, Planchini consulted the crystal, while portly Louisa, nervous
in the spotlight, reached for a champagne glass to take a drink. Again,
Planchini was timing matters well.
     "Perhaps," he stated, "you were in neither a mood nor a condition to
remember."
     The audience laughed while Louisa sputtered her champagne. Then,
sheepishly, the woman admitted the impeachment.
     "It was a party," she said. "Maybe I'd been drinking too much. But Agatha
- my friend, I mean - she should have remembered and told me she had the
pendant there."
     "I see bubbles," divined Planchini, concentrated on the crystal.
"Champagne bubbles, floating up from the past. I gather the impression that
your friend's condition was no better than your own."
     Louisa concluded her embarrassment with a giggle.
     "Agatha would just love that," announced Louisa, "but you're right, Mr.
Planchini, one hundred percent right. I mean you're right about the party - I
only hope you're right about the diamond pendant!"
     "The crystal never lies," assured Planchini, dropping the folded slip back
into the bowl. "Now to my mind come the figures three - four - three - two -
seven -"
     By the time Planchini had completed that slow spoken procession of
figures, Louisa was shaking her head, signifying that they meant nothing to her.
     "I'm not thinking of the number on a dollar bill tonight, Mr. Planchini."
     "I receive the letter 'J,'" Planchini insisted. "With it the figure four -"
     Noting that Louisa had started talking to the persons at her table,
Planchini waved for the spotlight to circle the audience.
     "Someone is thinking of that number," boomed Planchini, "the serial number
on a dollar bill!"
     The spotlight finally fixed upon a wan-faced man who had half-risen from a
rear table. The man was holding up his arm and nodding so emphatically that his
chin almost disappeared into his oversized tuxedo collar. That satisfied
Planchini.
     "The number has been identified," announced Planchini, dropping a slip
that he had started to lift from the bowl. "And now" - deliberately, with a
grand display of showmanship, the mystic drew another folded piece of paper -
"we come to a very happy subject: 'Love.'"
     A slight wave of Planchini's hand and the orchestra, lost in the darkness
of its platform, began to play the soft harmony of the wedding march, while
Planchini chimed in with a modulated tone:
     "I can foresee the happy event. It will take place within the next
fortnight. The impression comes from that direction" - the spotlight followed
as Planchini pointed - "and there is no reason to blush, young lady. You are
not yet a bride, though you soon will be. May I congratulate the lucky man,
since he is now with you?"
     The spot had fixed upon a girl who smiled as she reddened slightly in its
glare, then hid her face behind a menu, while the young man with her
acknowledged that Planchini was right as to the date of their prospective
wedding, by waving both hands, then clasping them as a sign of
self-congratulation.
     With a gesture, Planchini ended the music and brushed away the extra
spotlight. He dipped his hand for another slip of paper while his face assumed
an air so serious that the chuckling audience hushed. Planchini had the knack
of being impressive when he wanted and it went far toward convincing the
spectators.
     That was, with certain exceptions.
     Two of those were a pair of men at a table near the door. Even in the
gloom, their faces showed a contrast. One was undersized and slouchy, yet
keen-eyed and wise of face. His companion was both suave and sleek, to the
point where he was oily on both counts.
     They were here in a professional capacity, or such they would have termed
it: Val Varno, the sleight-of-hand king and Glanville Frost, magic's great
creative mind. At least so they considered themselves and neither disputed the
other's argument.
     Pausing in the midst of a one-hand manipulation of some slips of paper,
Val Varno thumbed toward the floor where Planchini was still working.
     "From corn," summed Varno, "and strictly."
     "At fifteen hundred a week," remarked Frost, smoothly, "I would say the
corn is ripe."
     "But what does the guy do?" demanded Varno. "Somebody collects slips in a
fish bowl and takes them away fifteen minutes before Planchini shows. Anybody
could get to the questions and read them."
     "People don't worry about their questions," returned Frost. "They are
interested in the answers."
     "So what does Planchini give them? Numbers off of dollar bills and a
prediction of a wedding that every columnist has written up."
     "The business about the diamond pendant was good."
     "Straight hoke," gruffed Varno. "The dame will never find the thing."
     "She might," considered Frost, "and it would be a swell break for
Planchini if she does."
     That brought a scoffing comment from Varno.
     "Sounds like you're going mental," he said. "Soon you'll be believing
there's something in the stuff."
     "There is something in it," reminded Frost. "Otherwise you wouldn't be
practicing at handling slips yourself. There's fifteen hundred dollars in it,
every week."
     Varno gave a very wise grin.
     "Soft money for either of us," Frost added, "or both. With your skill,
Val, you could swipe slips right under their noses. As for my presentation, it
would begin where Planchini leaves off."
     "Sounds right," assured Varno. "When do we begin?"
     "After we really know Planchini's system," replied Frost. "Don't bluff
yourself, Val; the fellow has something ultra with those smart answers. We'd
better nail it first."
     Frost shifted as someone pressed by his chair. With an upward glance,
Frost recognized the passer and gave him a nod. Then to Varno, Frost undertoned:
     "Remember him?"
     "Lamont Cranston," returned Varno. "We ought to remember him, even though
we only met him once."
     "I met him before that," stated Frost. "I used to see him at the meeting
of the Universal Wizards Association before they expelled me because I ran for
Second Vice-President ahead of my turn."
     "A smart apple, Cranston" - Varno's eyes were following the man in
question toward the door - "and I'm wondering if he was here checking on
Planchini's act."
     Val Varno wouldn't have wondered, had he followed Lamont Cranston in
person, instead of merely with his eyes. Outside the door of the Crystal Room,
Cranston crossed the spacious lobby, strolled past the cigar stand and entered
a telephone booth that bore a sign:
     "Out of Order."
     There, Cranston blended with blackness. The reason was that within the
booth, he slid himself into a waiting cloak that was black in hue, with a
slouch hat to match. A few moments later the door of the booth slid open under
a parting kick to reveal something even more remarkable.
     The telephone booth was actually empty. Lamont Cranston had become The
Shadow and with that transformation he was gone!


     CHAPTER II

     VAL VARNO and Glanville Frost weren't the only skeptical pair of gentlemen
who were watching Planchini's act.
     Over in another corner of the Crystal room, near a door marked "Exit" were
two other guests clad in the customary tuxedos required at the Chateau Parkview.
     One was a man who wore a half smile that seemed a perpetual part of his
rather broad face. He was youthful in appearance, but the low lights of the
nightclub helped that illusion, because at close range, his features bore deep
lines that could be charged to age rather than dissipation.
     Those lines hardened his face, giving a ruthless background to the amiable
expression which his lips falsified. All that this character needed was a name
to describe him properly and he had it.
     His name was Smiley Grimm.
     The other man was thin of face with a tall forehead, accentuated by the
thin hair that topped it. His features were dryish, even to his eyes, which
were roving but not shifty. Those eyes, if they met others, remained steady
until they established a certain indifference.
     But when those eyes fixed upon something that interested them, they
narrowed and their very sharpness seemed to stab the object of their gaze. As
for a name, this man was also well-equipped.
     His name was Keene Marker.
     They looked like old friends, this pair, but they were of comparatively
recent acquaintance, though they had heard of each other through underground
channels. Both were confidence men who had varied their swindling careers by
turning professional gambler when occasion called.
     Certainly no man could boast a better poker face than Smiley Grimm, with
his half-indulgent surface masking his hard interior. His manner, too, was a
cover for that certain deftness required in running up a poker hand or ringing
in a cold deck.
     Conversely, Keene Marker was the sort who could not only probe the faces
of others, but was sharp enough of vision to detect any difference in cards
that might become slightly nicked in play. This in turn made it a logical
conclusion that Keene would live up to his other name of Marker should a pack
demand the tampering that would provide the necessary nicks.
     They'd never met before, Smiley and Keene, because each made it a habit
never to stay in one place too long.
     Fast-moving swindles were their specialties. Smiley preferred selling
stock in Canadian gold mines while Keene could fairly pour the goods when
Oklahoma oil wells were concerned. They were fast-movers personally, as soon as
the con game was worked, and they used their gambling skill to pay for expenses
during their long itineraries.
     Indeed, the two had become almost legendary figures, even to each other
and now they had met, Smiley and Keene, on a common ground that demanded their
collaboration.
     Each was wise, so wise that he would not reveal too much to the other. Who
had brought them here, neither cared to state, each simply intimating that he
had received a good tip from some private source.
     But it was no secret why they were here. They had work to do and of a
daring sort.
     At present that work was to check back on Planchini's act. The mystic was
just finishing his turn, so the summing up was due.
     "Only eight questions," spoke Smiley, with a slight laugh. "Easy work for
his dough."
     "Easy work for our dough," acknowledged Keene, "particularly as I'm
already picking number five as the one that counts."
     "You mean that question about the diamond pendant?"
     "That's right, except I'm wondering about the bill reading that followed."
     "Why?" demanded Smiley. "Planchini gave the bill number, didn't he?"
     "Yes and no," retorted Keene. "The guy that spoke up was a stooge. I've
spotted him before, saying a question was meant for him, when Planchini got
jammed."
     Planchini's act was finished and the dark-hued mystic was salaaming
himself off stage. Lights were beginning to glow from the big chandeliers and
Keene gave a quick side-glance at Smiley, who had a pencil and notebook lying
in front of him. Reaching beneath the table, Keene produced a newspaper and
opened it to the sporting page.
     "We'll act like we're picking horses," undertoned Keene. "We don't want
anybody to know about those notes you're checking."
     "Who wants to know?" Smiley demanded.
     "A couple of mugs over there." Keene was looking toward Val Varno and
Glanville Frost at the other side of the club. "They're taking notes too."
     Smiley became interested.
     "Yeah?" he inquired. "Why?"
     "Because they're a couple of magicians," informed Keene. "One of them is
doing the coin roll" - Keene was referring to Varno, who was causing a
half-dollar to somersault along the backs of his fingers - "and the other is
wearing a color-changing necktie" - Keene's sharp eyes were studying Frost, who
was leaning forward, writing something on the tablecloth - "and the thing has
slipped. It's half green and half yellow."
     "And why should the magic boys be taking notes?" persisted Smiley.
     "Because they want to mooch into the mental racket," explained Keene.
"Fifteen hundred a week is better than fifteen bucks a show, isn't it?"
     "Should be."
     "Well, that's the difference between a mentalist and a magician, even
though they both do the same tricks."
     With that, Keene let his gaze rove elsewhere and specifically to the wide
door that formed the entrance to the Crystal Room. Eyes from that direction
might be too observant, Keene decided, because the doorway was packed with
persons who were looking for tables. With Planchini's act over, some of the
customers were leaving, but there was more of the floor show to follow. Hence
some of the people at the door were moving out to the lobby rather than be
jostled and finding that they weren't glancing his direction, Keene decided to
look them over.
     "There's Sidney Maywick," confided Keene. "He lives here at the Chateau
Parkview."
     "You mean Baldy with the Van Dyke beard?" queried Smiley, without looking
up. "Who's with him tonight?"
     "Nobody. He's looking around as if he expected some friends."
     "Spot them if you see them. All of Maywick's friends have dough. I'll
match you whether we sell them gold mines or oil wells."
     "Why not sell Maywick?"
     With the question, Keene stared at Smiley who expected the gaze and looked
up to meet it.
     "Maywick handles stock himself," explained Smiley, "and it's all
gilt-edged. He wouldn't buy an oil well if it poured out molten gold. But we
might get some of his friends to trade in what they bought from him for
something that we have to sell. Get it?"
     Nodding, Keene turned for another look at Maywick, but the man with the
Van Dyke had been shunted to the lobby along with other disappointed customers.
Nor was there a chance of glimpsing him beyond the throng for at that moment the
lights in the Crystal Room went out and a spotlight centered on a dance team
that came blossoming on the floor to an accompanying crescendo from the
orchestra.
     Settling back in the semi-darkness, Keene gave a low significant whisper
to Smiley.
     "Planchini ought to be up in his room by now."
     "What's more important" - Smiley tilted his head toward the balcony that
was almost above them - "is that the projection guy is up there instead of in
his office."
     Smiley gestured his hand toward a door near the exit. The door in question
was closed and bore the word "Private" in large letters. It was a combination
office and property room where the projection equipment was kept and the
operator stayed between shows.
     Right now that room was unoccupied, which was why Smiley and Keene
happened to be at their particular table. It was also why the shrewd pair began
to listen and intently.
     It came, the ring of a telephone bell, sounding muffled through the door
from the room where nobody was.
     Together, Smiley and Keene counted the rings of the telephone. The
progression ended with five, indicating that whoever was calling had hung up
after listening to that number of rings across the wire.
     "I was right," undertoned Smiley. "The fifth question. The one about the
diamond pendant."
     "Belonging to Louisa Jardine," whispered Keene, "who was visiting somebody
named Agatha."
     "Mrs. Agatha Somebody," added Smiley, striking a match so he could see his
notes. "She lives at the Landworth Apartments."
     "And what does that tell us?" side-toned Keene, while Smiley was using the
match to light a cigarette. "We can't burst into the Landworth and yell for
Agatha."
     "Naturally not," agreed Smiley. "We want that pendant and anything with
it, but we don't know where or how to get it -"
     "Listen, Smiley!"
     The interruption that Keene croaked was tuned to another ringing of the
telephone in the closed office. Together, Keene and Smiley counted the new
succession, which ended with the sixth ring.
     "The phony question!" came Smiley's hissed whisper. "The one the stooge
acknowledged!"
     "And we thought it was the number on a dollar bill," purred Keene. "You've
got it written, haven't you?"
     "I have."
     "We'll pick up Dirk on the way."
     That was all. A few minutes later, when the lights flooded the Crystal
Room so the dance team could take its final bow, the obscure table by the
little-used exit was devoid of Messrs. Smiley Grimm and Keene Marker.


     CHAPTER III

     THE tiny light licked along the gilded wall and paused upon a
simple-framed portrait of a plumed cavalier. A whispered laugh sounded from the
darkness behind the beam as the light enlarged its circle.
     It was coming closer to the portrait, that flashlight, bringing with it
the person who carried it, but when its progress stopped, the beam narrowed
again to a pencil ray that threw a spot resembling a silver dollar.
     Into that glow came gloved fingers to test the framed portrait with a few
deft touches. The picture swung open like a door, frame and all, disclosing a
wall safe behind it. The safe was a small one, but ample for its portable
contents: gems.
     The fingers busied themselves with the combination: three to the left,
four to the right, three to the left, two to the right, seven to the left.
     These were the numbers in rotation that someone had not been thinking
about in reference to an imaginary dollar bill whose serial had been reeled off
by Planchini, the seer of the Chateau Parkview.
     The safe door came open and the enlarging circle of the flashlight threw
back a dazzle that made the resplendence of the Crystal Room seem trivial.
     Again, a whispered tone - the laugh of The Shadow!
     The Jardine pendant, valuable though it was, formed but a minor item of
this collection. Here in the hidden wall safe of an apartment living room, was
a fortune in gems, all the property of Mrs. J. Allison Agnew, whose husband
owned a sizeable chain of small-town drugstores which gave him an excuse for
seldom being in New York.
     There was a touch of whimsy in The Shadow's laugh.
     Until a few years ago, J. Allison Agnew had preferred to live here in New
York because his wife was always cruising somewhere in the yacht that he had
bought her. When the yacht had been sold and later commandeered for coastal
patrol, Mrs. Agnew had evidently invested its equivalent in these gems, hoping
they would increase in value toward the purchase of a better post-war yacht.
     Meanwhile, Mrs. Agnew had taken over the apartment and her husband had
decamped. Distance had always been a factor in preserving what trifling harmony
existed in the Agnew family.
     Little wonder that Mrs. Agnew, whose first name happened to be Agatha,
should have suggested that Louisa Jardine leave her diamond pendant here. Even
less surprising was the fact that Agatha should have forgotten it, considering
how common jewelry was in the Agnew menage.
     From a zippered bag, The Shadow produced an inlaid jewel case, but instead
of opening it, he placed it in the safe, after he had poured the existing
contents of that safe into the bag itself. Drawn tight, the bag, when placed
beneath The Shadow's cloak, was a far more secure repository for the Agnew gems
than was the wall safe, now that the combination had become public property.
     Closing the safe, The Shadow turned the knob and swung the picture back
where it belonged, thus setting the scene for the next act in this drama.
Moving through the darkness, The Shadow reached a window; there, the dim light
from a courtyard blotted itself briefly as he swung out to a ledge.
     From there, The Shadow's course was a mere three stories down, since the
Agnew apartment was only on the fourth floor in a corner of the Landworth
Apartments that included all apartments designated by the letter 'J.'
     In his enterprise, The Shadow had been leisurely, taking due time to study
his surroundings. As a result, he hadn't completed his work with much time to
spare. Hardly had the window cleared itself of darkness that vanished in the
style of vapor, when sounds came from the door of the apartment itself.
     The man who was making those sounds was Keene Marker. He was showing
Smiley Grimm a very clever trick, although Smiley wasn't watching closely. Much
though he was interested in Keene's craftsmanship, Smiley still kept darting
glances along the hall outside of the door marked J-4.
     Past the automatic elevator that they had used to reach here, Smiley saw
the door of a fire tower. The door was slightly open, and as Smiley watched it,
he could see it move, though slightly. All that was to the better, because
behind that door lurked a watcher named Dirk Elverton, a handy man indeed to
keep as a reserve.
     Keene was using a tiny but efficient instrument in the form of a needle
drill that he had applied to the lock of J-4. It had bitten its way through the
metal and now Keene was removing it to supply a circular device with other
needles that he termed jabbers. Under the pressure of a small plunger, the
jabbers pressed home and the lock gave a barely audible click which meant that
it had yielded.
     Opening the door, Keene warded Smiley back before he could enter. Smiley's
hand went for a gun, but again Keene gripped his arm. All Keene wanted to do was
cover the work he had just accomplished, leaving no traces of the holes that he
had drilled. Keene did this by applying a special wax that plugged the tiny
pin-points.
     "Good any time we want to use it again," undertoned Keene. "I have a
string of set-ups like this, all over the country."
     Smiley's lips broadened their artificial spread a trifle, thus registering
approval. Then, eying the special needler that Keene was returning to a plastic
case, Smiley commented:
     "It wouldn't do for safes."
     "No," Keene admitted, "but I've punched strong boxes with it. In this
case, we don't have to worry about getting into the safe. All we have to do is
find it."
     Smiley was bringing a flashlight from his other pocket. In closing the
door, Keene gestured impatiently for his companion to put the torch away.
     "Guns make funny noises," opined Keene, "and flashlights give funny
flickers. Let's act like we belonged here, only first, we ought to be fixed in
case we meet somebody who knows we don't."
     As a means to that fixing, Keene produced two silk handkerchiefs, each
neatly knotted at diagonal corners. He slipped one over his head and drew it
down past the blindfold stage until it came to his nose. Instead of being
loose, the silk remained taut because it hooked over Keene's ears.
     Duplicating Keene's job, Smiley put on the other mask, but with more
difficulty, since Smiley's head was broader. Then Keene found a floor lamp and
turned it on so that the two masked men could survey the Agnew living room.
     It wasn't more than half a minute before a cluck came from beneath the
silken folds that draped Keene's chin.
     "Take a look, Smiley," said Keene. "That picture over there."
     Smiley looked and saw a flattering portrait of Agatha Agnew glaring
haughtily from the wall, as though disapproving the operations of these
cracksmen deluxe. It didn't happen to be the picture that Keene meant.
     "The other wall, Smiley."
     Turning, Smiley viewed the plumed cavalier and supplied an indulgent
laugh. Squared against the wall, lacking the forward lean that the other
pictures showed, and of just the right size to conceal a wall safe, this
picture fairly shouted what lay behind it.
     Keene clucked approvingly as Smiley put on a pair of gloves before
manipulating the straight-set frame. It wasn't long before the thing came open;
merely the fraction of a minute. Inside was the wall safe with its glistening
knob. Smiley reached for it.
     "Here goes with that one buck combination," announced Smiley. "Only which
way should I start - left or right?"
     "The first figure ought to mean left," decided Keene. "So if it didn't
mean left, that series Planchini called off would have started with a zero.
Bills have zeros you know."
     Smiley knew and acted accordingly. Three - four - three - two - seven -
     At the end of those turns, alternating left and right, the safe opened
under Smiley's steady fingers. A satisfied intake of Smiley's breath
accompanied his sight of the casket that The Shadow had left. Gripping the
object, Smiley extended it to Keene.
     Putting on thin gloves of his own, Keene received the casket and held it
to the light. He noted that it had no lock; merely a special clamp that held
the lid tight shut.
     "We'll take what's in it," Keene declared, "and then leave it like we
found it -"
     Keene was working on the clamp but finding it difficult. He couldn't seem
to get a grip on the box and pry it open at the same time. Smiley took hold of
the ends of the casket to help him; both masked crooks were bowed above it when
the clamp began to loosen.
     Success was in their very grasp, or seemed to be, when the pair were
greeted by a startling interruption. From across the room came a sharp buzzing
sound, signifying that someone was pressing the call button down in the
entrance to the Landworth Apartments, some visitor who wanted Apartment J-4!
     Freezing, Keene and Smiley stared at each other above their masks. Then as
if by common consent, the pair nodded. Keene shoved the jewel box under his arm,
while Smiley drew the gun for which he had reached before.
     Having decided to act as if they belonged here, these partners in crime
were ready to proceed along that chosen course!


     CHAPTER IV

     LIFE in Manhattan singularly resembles one of those cross-sectional
ant-hills encased between sheets of glass, which people used to buy to study
the ways and habits of the ant, back in the days before the complexities of the
human race reduced such matters to a state of insignificance.
     This analogy is needed in order to comprehend the peculiar possibilities
that the pressing of a call button in the Landworth Apartments could produce.
     Viewed from the outside, the Landworth formed what appeared to be a
pyramid; in reality, the building was a hollow square, the step-backs existing
only where the outer walls were concerned. Each of the pyramided sides had an
arched entrance, one on an avenue, two on side streets, the last on an alleyway
that bisected the block.
     Surrounding the interior courtyard, the walls were sheer but broken with
indentations that formed wells or shafts, giving light and air to some of the
inside apartments.
     Among the windows that fronted on a street, one showed a dim glow that
rendered it more conspicuous than if it had furnished a brilliant light. This
happened to be the window of a room connecting with the Agnew living room; The
Shadow had left the connecting door open for this very purpose.
     Now cars were creeping into this area, green cars with white tops, the
kind the New York police used. They were taking over where The Shadow had left
off, acting on a strange mysterious tip-off, the sort that a certain inspector
named Joe Cardona always respected and heeded, with satisfactory results.
     Naturally, the arriving police were surveying the big apartment building,
hence they did not observe the figures that were receding across the street.
These were The Shadow's agents, their vigil almost done, since they had been
stationed here only to nullify any criminal outposts, should such be in the
offing.
     There being none, the robbery at Agnew's had become a simple matter for
the law to handle. At least so The Shadow's schedule rated it, but there were
times when even The Shadow could be wrong.
     For one thing, The Shadow hadn't expected a chance caller on the Agnews at
this particular juncture; but even allowing for such, he would have counted on
some tell-tale reaction within the apartment itself, most specifically an
extinguishing of those dim living room lights which were like a signal beacon
beckoning the police.
     No such reaction occurred.
     The person who pressed the Agnew button received a responding buzz from
the inner door at that particular entry. Opening that door, the visitor entered
and continued to the elevator.
     A surprising visitor indeed.
     This visitor was a girl, a most attractive specimen. Slightly on the
blonde side, she had clear blue eyes that flashed a determination quite out of
keeping with her saucy, upturned nose. Her lips were something of a compromise;
though they looked determined too, it was through effort, as evidenced by the
tightness that showed itself as far down as the girl's well-rounded chin.
     The blonde must have expected a party at the Agnews, for she was wearing a
blue evening gown, visible only in splotches through the opening of the darker
cape that caressed her shoulders. As the elevator stopped at the fourth floor,
she tossed back those shoulders haughtily, before pushing open the door, as
though determined to make a grand and imposing entrance when she reached the
Agnew apartment.
     Maybe the lift of those shoulders helped the girl's rapid back step when
the door of the apartment opened to receive her. Certainly she was quick, the
way she avoided the threatening gun muzzle that a masked man used to beckon her
inside, while another snarled, "No noise now!" only to find himself unheeded.
     Even more rapid was the girl's action with the beaded bag that matched her
blue gown. Out of it she whipped a small-sized automatic so suddenly that she
was covering Smiley with the gun muzzle before he could bring his own weapon to
bear. Keene swung in from the other angle, sidling the jewel casket as a shield,
but unwisely blocking Smiley's aim.
     If she'd been as quick with the trigger as with her previous action, the
girl could have scored double at that instant, but fright mingled with caution
caused her to take a few back-steps more. Nerves taut, she heard a surging
sound behind her and turned to meet the menace, too late.
     The man called Dirk was hurtling from the fire tower door and he was
appropriately nicknamed. Big, brawny even to his upraised fist, he clutched a
long knife with a glittering blade that was meant for the feminine intruder.
Unable to bring her gun to bear, the girl could only shriek and twist away, but
her respite was brief.
     Dirk's free paw made a huge sweep and caught the girl's cape.
Instinctively the blonde flung the garment over the big man's head and squirmed
from the tangle, emerging in her strapless gown like something bursting from a
cocoon. Dirk came full about, half into the doorway of J-4 and thrust a swift
hand under one of the girl's bare arms, across her throat, and to her other
shoulder.
     With that smacking impact, Dirk clutched hard and whirled the girl around
in the fashion of a jive expert. His other hand went out and up at forty-five
degrees to poise its knife for a drive to the victim's heart. Though the little
gun was dropping from the girl's numbed hand, Dirk was merciless.
     What the girl saw in those kaleidoscopic moments must have seemed the
manufactured figments of a dream. Swirling blackness first, from the doorway
which Dirk had left; now, Dirk himself, a thick, brutal-faced assassin gone
completely berserk. Again, blackness, as the girl's head tilted away, the sort
that came from a faint induced by sheer horror at the sight of certain death.
     Except that the blackness was real. It did more than swirl as it issued
from the very doorway that Dirk had used. It was living blackness, cloaked in
the sable-hued garb that symbolized The Shadow!
     Dirk's face, leering just above the girl's shoulder, was no good target
for The Shadow's gun, but Dirk's knife hand was. Except that The Shadow didn't
use his gun in the accepted manner. He was half turned, shouldering the door
wide as he hauled a big automatic into play and from this position there was
opportunity for something swifter than a gunshot.
     The Shadow let go with a hard, sidearm throw, sending the loaded .45 ahead
of him as he completed his whirl to produce another automatic from beneath his
cloak. By then, The Shadow's fling had scored.
     Dirk's wrist, coming downward with his fist, was met by a jarring missile
that not only numbed his knife hand, but carried upward to snatch the blade
right out of the assassin's grasp. As knife and gun jounced and clattered
together, it was Dirk's turn to become vocal, which he did with an infuriated
bellow.
     If The Shadow preferred to toss unorthodox objects that happened to be at
hand, so did Dirk. In this instance, Dirk preferred blondes, so he chucked the
only one available. As the girl came flying headlong, The Shadow gave a
sardonic laugh and with it seemed to dwindle, only to come upward from his
stooping twist to pluck the girl almost as she struck the floor.
     All with one sweeping swingabout, The Shadow was again in action, this
time with a limp but uninjured girl draped over one arm, while his other hand
was thrusting its automatic straight Dirk's way. Scrambling to regain his
knife, big Dirk would have been an instantaneous target for The Shadow, if it
hadn't been for Smiley.
     Spurred on by Keene, Smiley jabbed quick shots from within his doorway.
Crooks to the core, both recognized The Shadow by his laugh and Keene was as
eager to demand the death sentence of this Nemesis as Smiley was to give it. It
was bad business, though, to hurry matters with The Shadow; bad business for
those who tried it.
     Smiley's first shot, wide by nearly a dozen inches, sent The Shadow
sidestepping toward the shelter of the wall. Smiley might as well have been
using a pop-gun when he delivered his next blasts, for he couldn't get the
angle without poking himself into destruction. The Shadow took a chance though,
that Smiley would do just that, for The Shadow responded with a single shot that
sizzled amid Smiley's gunfire.
     Whistling past the doorway, that slug hit the wall just beyond and
ricocheted to clip Dirk's shoulder as the big man came blundering up with his
knife.
     It was baiting the bull once more, that shot.
     Howling, Dirk launched past the doorway, intent upon reaching The Shadow.
Smiley swung out to follow, with Keene bringing up the rear. Letting the girl
slide from his arm, The Shadow poured straight into the advancing trio, meeting
them with an upward drive that piled Dirk back upon the men behind him.
     It would have been victory right there, whether by slugging tactics or by
gunfire, if The Shadow hadn't been interrupted by the very factor which he
himself had introduced. Staggered, sprawling crooks heard shouts as the
elevator door flung wide to disgorge a cluster of police with drawn guns.
     Odd though it seemed, this arrival of the law was to bring a set-back to
The Shadow's present cause.


     CHAPTER V

     OF the three crooks, Dirk alone rallied to give battle to The Shadow and
received what he deserved. His knife just starting on another downswing, Dirk
was met by a bullet that reeled him full about. Staggered, bellowing, Dirk
flung himself upon the police who were grabbing his masked comrades and the
officers took time out to riddle their big attacker with bullets.
     That meant timeout for Smiley and Keene, the men whose masks still
rendered them unrecognized. Smiley was trying to wrest his gun free from hands
that gripped it; and on the chance that Smiley would somehow manage, Keene in
his turn was trying to get the jewel casket from other claimants.
     The best that Keene could do was yank the casket open, which meant he
might snatch a glove-full of its precious contents. Before The Shadow could
lunge in to prevent it, the lid came wide.
     As the box opened, it puffed.
     It came like a huge sigh, that curious explosion that literally bounced
the box from gripping hands and sent men reeling back. Out of it came a
monstrous, greenish form, like a spreading devil-fish of gaseous quality. From
beneath the feet of twisting, diving men, The Shadow scooped something that he
saw there.
     Then, headlong, The Shadow was swooping away from the spreading flood of
green that was punctuated by choking gasps and coughs. Reaching the girl, The
Shadow flung the object that he carried, the girl's own cape, so that it
covered her head. Then, his own cloak folded across his face, The Shadow was
knifing through the cloud of green that reached him, bound for that fire tower
door that offered free, fresh air.
     One of The Shadow's neatly devised traps had sprung itself in strict
reverse.
     That casket, planted by The Shadow, had been loaded with concentrated tear
gas. Its purpose had been to stifle the greedy thieves who found it and who
would have normally opened it and promptly.
     There had been nothing wrong with The Shadow's timing. Keene and Smiley,
or any other unknown burglars, should have been clawing around the Agnew living
room when the police arrived. The unexpected girl had delayed their opening of
the gemless casket which had now become a Pandora's box, with a load of
mischief for all concerned.
     Whatever the girl's part, The Shadow wanted to remove her as an
unnecessary factor; now that the gas was loose, this was his opportunity, as
well as the only course for himself. Down the steps of the fire tower, The
Shadow reached the bottom; there, he used a flashlight to blink a quick signal
through the darkness of the rear alley.
     Time was still ample to double up and help the police complete a blind
round-up of two equally helpless masked crooks. But things weren't working that
way when The Shadow started his return trip up the fire tower.
     Neither Keene nor Smiley had fared badly. In their first blind grope, they
had found the door of the Agnew apartment; diving through, they had slammed it
after them.
     They owed their luck to the masks. Hauled over their eyes, with the bottom
folds clenched in their teeth, the silken contrivances were serving Keene and
Smiley against the greenish fumes. They were weeping, but not severely, as they
found their way through a window opening on a side street.
     Here the construction of the apartment building offered a series of
one-story steps, down which the fugitives dropped. Conspicuous against the
wall, they should have been flagged, but weren't. The few police who remained
outdoors had been attracted to a new quarter, the alleyway behind the Landworth.
     There, a very bewildered girl was finding herself conducted by guiding
hands through the darkness. They were silent, these men who served The Shadow,
but the girl's stumbles and the clatter of her high heels had become betraying
sounds.
     A voice called from one end of the alley:
     "Who's there!"
     The response was a brief trill of a police whistle from the other end of
the alley, answered in kind from the direction of the first speaker. Uniformed
figures began working into the alleyway, sending flashlight beams ahead of them.
     Instantly, the girl found herself whisked across to a shallow doorway in a
wall opposite the Landworth. Huddled in the folds of her mussed cape, she
escaped the flashlight beam that licked past her, but it disclosed the face of
one of her guides, a little man with a wise, wizened countenance.
     The officer who was using the flashlight failed to glimpse that face and
instantly, the wizened man turned from the glare. The girl heard him speak to a
crouched man who was working at an antique lock in the little door.
     "How are you doing, Tapper?"
     "All right, Hawkeye," the crouched man responded. "Steady, half a minute
more. Getting this turkey locked again after we go through, is going to be the
trouble -"
     The interruption was the click of the lock itself. Under Tapper's twist,
the door yielded, but its rusted hinges, long unused, shrieked a message both
directions along the alley.
     Flashlights fairly seemed to bound forward as hoarse voices called, "Who's
there!" which was a fair indication that they didn't recognize the cause of the
screeching sound. Tapper was half through the doorway, turning to help Hawkeye
to guide the girl that same direction, but now the flashlight beams were
interlocking from a scant twenty feet on either side.
     In fact, the alley was practically aglare with light, which wavered first
- and logically - toward the wall of the Landworth from which it would have cut
promptly to the doorway where the girl and The Shadow's agents were, if
something hadn't intervened.
     That something was a shower of a brief but spectacular sort.
     Something plopped the cement and bounded with a sparkle. Its scintillation
was matched by the next drops that followed, drops of something that certainly
was not rain.
     More of that peculiar hail arrived, and a moment later the officers were
not only snatching up the precious stuff, but turning their flashlights upward
to learn where it came from.
     Jewels!
     The whole Agnew collection was being fed down from the stepped wall above;
now that the police were ready for such gifts, more fragile items, brooches and
necklaces, were cascading down into the glare. The officers didn't stop to
question how or why; they just caught the stuff on the fly.
     Meanwhile, that door across the way was closing behind the persons who had
passed through it. Tapper remained to lock the door from within, while Hawkeye
hurried the girl through the basement to an exit on a side street.
     There, the still dazed girl found herself being helped into a cab by a
rather handsome young man who was politely adjusting the evening cape that had
wrapped itself around her shoulders. Feeling somehow that she had to explain
herself, the girl began:
     "I - I'm - well, my name is Bonnie Blye. I didn't mean - that is, I do
mean - that if you understand -"
     The young man bowed as though he did understand. Then:
     "My name is Harry Vincent," he introduced. "I'm glad I just happened to
arrive here in this cab. I hope we meet again, Miss Blye."
     Before the girl could say anything more, she was in the cab and it was
pulling away, the driver leaning over as though he expected his lone passenger
to give him an address, which Bonnie finally did.
     By then the shower had ended back in the alley. The cops who had received
the Agnew gems were raking the building with their flashlights and shouting up
to the ledges. They received similar responses from a window they couldn't see,
up on the fourth floor. But their flashlights converged with those that cast out
beams from that direction and they could hear the choking shouts of officers
above.
     It happened that nobody, either above or below, could explain where the
jewelry had come from. Only one person knew and he wasn't inclined to tell.
     That person was The Shadow.
     On his return to the fourth floor, The Shadow had slipped past the
recuperating police only to find the Agnew apartment devoid of the masked
crooks. In choosing his own way out, The Shadow had taken the alley side of the
building. Half way down the mammoth steps, he had spotted events in the alley.
     Hence the shower of gems, The Shadow's impromptu method of drawing the
attention of the police from where he didn't want it. Now instead of having
focussed all attention on himself, The Shadow was letting it ride right by.
     Flat on a ledge, lying along an inner angle where the ledge met the wall,
The Shadow's cloaked figure had become a part of the blackness. The probing
lights missed him, yet so closely, that they gave the impression of space at
the spot where The Shadow actually was.
     A whispered laugh stirred the darkness softly as the lights gave up and
departed elsewhere. The police apparently were thinking in terms of some future
trail. So was The Shadow.
     Yet even The Shadow might be due for a surprise when he learned where that
trail had led, for others already were experiencing that wonder.
     Back at their favorite table in the Crystal Room, where they had slipped
quite surreptitiously, Keene Marker and Smiley Grimm were preparing to stiffen
their morale with a few stiff drinks before Planchini's final show, when Smiley
gripped Keene's arm and lost sufficient sangfroid to gulp:
     "Look!"
     Keene thought that Smiley was concerned with the visiting magicians, Val
Varno and Glanville Frost, who were joining each other at the same table where
the crooks had viewed them before.
     But Smiley was indicating a table nearer the floor, a choice table
occupied by Sidney Maywick, the baldish man of wealth who sported the Van Dyke
beard. Maywick had risen and was bowing profusely to a girl whose face Keene
couldn't see, since she had just turned so that Maywick could introduce her to
the persons at his table.
     In fact all that Keene could see of the girl were her lovely shoulders and
a sweep of an equally graceful back. It wasn't until she reached a chair and
turned around again that Keene observed the blue gown that accompanied the
remainder of her figure.
     Then of course, Keene saw the girl's face too. Like Smiley, Keene stared
at the unmistakable features consisting of sparkling eyes, saucy nose and
straight lips that looked the same, even though less determined than they had
been under more pressing circumstances.
     These men who had, as masked crooks, eluded The Shadow, were staring at
Bonnie Blye, the girl who had slipped their clutches, thanks to The Shadow!


     CHAPTER VI

     IT was morning for the Great Planchini.
     That meant it was six o'clock in the afternoon. Planchini's usual hour for
rising.
     Closing the door of his suite on the twelfth floor of the Chateau
Parkview, Planchini saw a flicker of a red light from an elevator and hurried
over to push the down button.
     Planchini was just too late. The car went by before he could halt it.
Another red light gleamed and a door slid open, admitting Planchini to an
elevator managed by a girl operator of hoydenish appearance.
     Finding that the car ahead was taking care of stops, this operator made a
straight trip to the ground floor, at the same time trying to make small talk
with her only passenger.
     "H'yah, Planchini," the girl greeted. "Getting up at the crack of sunset,
like as usual?"
     "Sorry," returned Planchini, drily. "I always rise at dawn."
     "It's six o'clock," observed the girl, "and that's six p.m., in case you
don't know. Unless maybe you don't operate on New York time."
     "You struck it exactly. My standard is Manila time. It is now seven
o'clock in Manila, and that happens to be a.m., in case you don't know."
     "You mean only seven o'clock this morning?"
     "I mean seven o'clock tomorrow morning," emphasized Planchini. "Since I am
able to regulate my mind accordingly, I am able within reasonable limitations to
predict future events.
     "And now, my thoughts being on the future" - Planchini fixed his eyes
steadily, then relaxed them, paying no attention to the hoyden's astonishment -
"I find that I have neglected the past. Because I unwisely set my watch by New
York time, I forgot to bring it with me. Therefore I must return to my room."
     Bowing out through the door that the staring operator opened, Planchini
stepped into the car that had arrived ahead, just in time to join the
passengers who were going up.
     Something quite beautiful glared from behind a cigar counter and gave an
angry toss of its brunette head. Coming from behind the counter, this girl
picked up a newspaper and brought it along to the elevator where the hoyden
stood in charge.
     "Man in eight-eleven wants his newspaper," the counter girl told the
elevator queen. "I can't find a bell-hop to take it up."
     "Sorry, I can't leave the elevator," retorted the hoyden. "Against orders.
Anything else bothering you?"
     "There might be."
     "If it's Planchini, all he was handing me was hoke. Anyway, I'm not his
type."
     "That's just it." The girl from the counter nudged her and toward the
elevator. "Why did the Great Brain go back up again?"
     "He said he forgot his watch," laughed the hoyden. "He had an alibi for it
though, some stuff about his thoughts being in the future instead of the past."
     "Did he really forget his watch?"
     "I guess so. I don't remember him looking at it. What do you figure it -
an alibi for something else?"
     The counter girl gave a grim nod and retreated to her own preserves.
Elbows propped on the counter, she watched the dial of the elevator that had
just gone up; seeing it stop at number twelve, the brunette's face remained
grim, until it started again.
     That elevator had stopped just about long enough to let off a passenger,
which was just right.


     EXCEPT that it hadn't let off a passenger. Up at the twelfth floor, the
girl operating that particular car had closed the door again at a gesture from
her one remaining passenger: Planchini.
     She was a cute thing, the girl who operated this car. She had a roundish
face beneath hair that wasn't really red, but just inclined that way, which was
probably why she liked it when Planchini said:
     "All right, Reds."
     The girl smiled and was about to halt the elevator, when Planchini
reminded:
     "Not between floors, Reds. Those dials are too accurate. It would be just
as bad as stopping too long on the twelfth."
     The operator halted the elevator at the sixteenth but didn't open the
door. She lifted her face so that she could snuggle her chin in the hand that
Planchini obligingly raised. The girl's eyes were glowing soulfully when
Planchini inquired:
     "How's the code coming, Reds?"
     The girl began to murmur words.
     "Tall - dark - handsome -"
     "Those aren't the code-words," laughed Planchini, "and if you mean me,
save the dark until I put on my make-up. I'm really handsome then, too."
     "You're really handsome right now."
     "A kiss for that, beautiful." Leaning forward, Planchini let the girl
supply one. "We'll skip the code lesson until later. Chin down now!" Planchini
drew the girl's face gently downward. "Give me a few bits of gossip while you
mosey up floor by floor."
     "There wasn't much of account last night," declared Reds, furrowing her
forehead, while she made approximate stops at floors. "Old lady Miles is still
waiting for word from her lost cousin whom you said she'd hear from within a
fortnight."
     "I didn't say what fortnight," laughed Planchini. Then sourly, he added:
"That debt collecting service is getting slow. I gave them a bill that I said
the guy owed me. They ought to have located him by now."
     "Somebody is going to ask you where Maria Leone, the movie actress, is
taking her vacation. She always uses another name, so people won't find her."
     "And she always goes to some big city. There's an outfit calling itself
Celebrity Service that covers characters like her. I'll check where she is by
my list. Anything else?"
     "Not that I remember." Reds shook her head as she stopped at the top floor
and prepared to start down. "No, nothing else."
     "Then let me off at the fourteenth, especially as your red light is
showing," suggested Planchini. "But what about Sidney Maywick? Didn't you
listen in on his chatter when you took him up last night?"
     "He wasn't talking about bonds."
     "About blondes, then?"
     At Planchini's query, Reds brought the car to a slashing stop at the
fourteenth floor and turned defiantly, to demand:
     "How did you know?"
     "Because he was all eyes for one that was perched at his table last night
and I knew he'd be all talk about her afterward. What's her name?"
     "Bonnie Blye."
     "What else?"
     "She's stopping here. On the eighteenth floor. I let her off there last
night."
     "And you're letting me off at the fourteenth right now, because there are
customers waiting. See you later, Reds."
     When he said "later" Planchini really meant much later, because after
walking down to the twelfth floor and reclaiming his watch, he carefully
avoided Reds' elevator just as ardently as he had tried to catch it earlier. It
was from the hoyden's lift that Planchini stepped a short while later to receive
the approving smile of the brunette who presided over the cigar dispensary, a
smile that increased as Planchini approached the counter.
     "Anything special in cigars?" inquired Planchini, in the bland tone of a
customer. "Or don't you recommend any brands?"
     "These Havana Specials," returned the girl, reaching beneath the counter
in a rehearsed style. "They are exceptionally mild and the panatela size is a
delightful after-dinner smoke" - the girl gave an apologetic smile - "or so the
gentlemen say, sir."
     "Save that sales talk for the right gentleman then," suggested Planchini
with a wise smile. "Make sure he's going into the Crystal Room before my act
starts and hold back the Specials unless he's changing a five dollar bill or
something higher. Get it, Smokey?"
     Smiling in acknowledgment of the nickname, Smokey nodded. She considered
the term a compliment to her black hair.
     "Only one customer to that box," added Planchini, "and give him the one
buck bills that you've stashed in the side till of the cash drawer."
     "Except I don't have those bills," reminded Smokey. "You said you'd give
them to me this afternoon. Remember?"
     Fishing in a pocket, Planchini brought out some tens and twenties. The
girl stepped to the cash register.
     "I have some singles here -"
     "Nix!" interrupted Planchini, leaning across the counter. "I can't list
the numbers here. I'll get some in the drugstore when I eat breakfast."
     The brunette's eyes became angry.
     "I thought you weren't eating in that cheap joint any more," she asserted.
"If you could hear what people say about you making fifteen hundred a week and
still saving dimes -"
     "What people?"
     "The people who work here -"
     "They aren't the people I entertain," interposed Planchini. "So don't let
them worry you. I'll take one cigar" - he helped himself from the Havana
Special box - "and I'll be seeing you later. Meanwhile, don't forget your code
work. I'll be needing a partner soon."
     Smokey smiled at that, knowing that Planchini couldn't mean much later in
her case, since he'd have to return to plant the dollar bills he spoke about.
Following Planchini with her own eyes, the girl didn't notice that she was the
object of others.
     Two pairs of them.
     Across the lobby, Glanville Frost was giving some details to Val Varno.
     "She was saying something about dollar bills," informed Frost. "I know,
because I practiced lip reading, on the chance that it might help in a mind
reading turn."
     "Say, that's a good dodge!" complimented Varno. "One I'll bet that even
Planchini missed."
     Frost didn't like the term "even Planchini" since it denoted superiority
in Varno's mind. But Frost erased his wince with an oily smile.
     "Scout around here," Frost told Varno. "Make some contacts of your own.
Bar tricks ought to help you get in with people who might have some fair ideas
on Planchini's racket."
     The suggestion pleased Varno and he headed for the bar while Frost
sauntered in the direction of the drugstore. What Varno didn't see was the
superior smile that Frost wore in departure.
     In the opinion of Glanville Frost, he personally was getting closer to the
inside of the Planchini business than Val Varno ever would or ever could.


     CHAPTER VII

     THERE was another and more important reason why the girl at the cigar
counter didn't like it when Planchini breakfasted at eventide in the hotel
drugstore.
     That reason answered to the name of Babe and it worked behind the
drugstore soda fountain, provided that lounging around in the willowy style
befitting a tall peroxide blonde could be called working.
     Certain customers, however, stirred Babe to rapid service and Planchini
rated A-1 in that category. Babe had the orange juice and scrambled eggs coming
up with coffee the moment that Planchini entered. With an appreciative nod, the
Big Brain sat down and unfolded an afternoon newspaper that he had brought
along with the cigar.
     "Please give me scrambled eggs and hurry," recited Planchini,
side-glancing at a five dollar bill that he held in his other hand. "Give me
coffee and hurry now."
     "Coffee up!" Babe planted the cup on the imitation marble. "Three, eight,
four, three, four, seven. What about the other figures on that fiver, Brain
Boy?"
     "Tell them quickly."
     "Two and a zero. Those code words click and proper. Want to try the name
list?"
     Planchini shook his head and gave the bill a quick shove across the
counter.
     "Better pay you now," he said. "Maybe I'd forget. Give me my change right
away, because I might forget that too." Swinging on the revolving stool,
Planchini stared across the newspaper and spoke suddenly: "Oh, hello, Frost.
How's everything by you?"
     Babe, being a smart babe, recognized that Frost must be a rival mentalist
and therefore somebody who demanded Planchini's full attention and bluff. So
she changed the five spot and put the result on the counter beside Planchini.
     "Things are fine," said Frost. He nodded at the newspaper. "What are you
doing? Reading your press notices?"
     "On the front page?" Planchini raised his thin eyebrows in surprise. "My,
my, you're giving me credit, Frost. Perhaps too much credit."
     "Why too much?"
     "Because I don't want my name to be there," confided Planchini. "I cater
to a swank clientele, not to people who gorge on news of murder and robbery or
who delight in scandal. Put that in your next exclusive manuscript on how to be
a mentalist for five dollars."
     The last shot told with Frost. He made a specialty of printing overpriced
brochures on how to do anything and everything in magic. One of those
publications covered the tricks of the mind-reading trade; in referring to the
price, Planchini accented it as though five dollars was the fee that a
mentalist could expect after imbibing the Frost system.
     His own mention of five dollars reminding him of something, Planchini
shoved the newspaper to Frost to distract his attention. To cover his own
chagrin, Frost glanced at the journal and found something that promptly
interested him.
     "You should have predicted this!" exclaimed Frost. "It more or less ties
in with that clientele of yours. A robbery at the Landworth Apartments,
frustrated by the police, thanks to a mysterious tip-off."
     "A telepathic tip-off," observed Planchini, drily. "I sent it personally
by mental radio."
     Frost was turning pages to read the rest of the story. Planchini picked up
his small change from the counter and dropped it in his right coat pocket, where
his hand remained. Meanwhile, his left picked up the dollar bills and began to
thumb them, much as Val Varno would have handled a pack of cards.
     In spreading the newspaper, Frost caught a glimpse of Planchini's action.
Doubling the paper, Frost slipped a long thumb-nail against the newsprint and
neatly slashed a sizeable opening. Newspaper spread again, Frost began reading
paragraphs aloud and slowly.
     What Frost was doing, was spotting Planchini's pocket through the opening,
watching a motion of Planchini's buried right hand. In pretending to read
slowly, Frost was actually scanning sentences rapidly, then reciting them from
quick memory, so Planchini would not suspect that he was under observation.
     "The Agnew jewels," announced Frost. "All recovered including a diamond
pendant belonging to Mrs. Louisa Jardine."
     Momentarily Planchini's hand halted and at the same moment, Frost's voice
paused. Then, oily-toned, Frost was reading again:
     "Two masked crooks escaped, but the third, identified as Dirk Quingal, was
shot resisting arrest and died in the hospital without a statement. The robbers
used tear gas to escape but dropped the jewels in their hurry. The wall safe
was found wide open but undamaged. Police are quizzing servants to know if any
knew the combination."
     Planchini's hand still was making occasional pauses. Recognizing why,
Frost began to wonder if the newspaper item had jarred Planchini at all. The
reason for Planchini's hand pauses was that he was using a tiny pencil to write
notations in his pocket. Those notations were the serial numbers of the dollar
bills that Planchini was thumbing with his left hand. Planchini had to shift
his pocket pad after each row of figures.
     "Funny business, this," commented Frost. "The police say it isn't the
first robbery that looked like an inside job but wasn't. There have been a lot
lately, but they can't trace how any originated.
     "Another thing" - Frost was really concentrating on the news account now -
"this Mrs. Agnew was a victim of a forgery about six months ago. It was the case
where Hubert Lidden, the bank cashier, was sent to Sing Sing. He took Mrs. Agnew
for about twenty thousand dollars."
     Looking up, Frost found he was talking to the air. Planchini had finished
his belated breakfast and had gone back into the lobby. Tossing the newspaper
aside, Frost started that direction and was just in time to see Planchini
leaving the cigar counter.
     The dark-haired girl behind that counter was putting some money in a side
till of the cash register and Planchini was continuing on toward the entrance
to the Crystal Room, which was just opening for the dinner trade. So Frost went
to the tap room instead and there found Varno doing some card tricks for two men
at a table, both of whom looked mildly interested. Frost sat down and Varno
introduced him between riffles of the pack, without naming the two customers
because he didn't know their names.
     Frost had missed out on something by not following Planchini. Instead of
going to the Crystal Room, Planchini stopped to chat with a fluffy-haired hat
check girl.
     "I'm so mixed with numbers," the girl said with a winsome head-shake. "I
just can't remember how that code goes. Besides, those lists I make for you
keep me awfully busy."
     "You're a great girl, Bubbles," approved Planchini. "You mustn't try to
remember too much. Those lists, for instance."
     "I don't, except when there's something very unusual. For instance, I
don't remember numbers after I copy them."
     "You won't have to copy numbers any more. Not unless you know exactly what
they are, street addresses for instance."
     Bubbles nodded, then asked:
     "And telephone numbers?"
     "Of course," returned Planchini. "You didn't get me many last night, did
you?"
     "Only a few. I didn't know what some numbers were, but I copied them
anyway."
     "That's just the kind you don't need to copy. By the way, you couldn't
tell me whose numbers those were that you gave me last night, could you?"
     Again, Bubbles shook her head.
     "Then just forget all about them," suggested Planchini smoothly. "Street
numbers and telephones - that's all the numbers you ever think about, the only
kind you would even look for."
     Bubbles smiled her agreement.
     Returning to the elevators, Planchini looked toward the cigar counter just
long enough to exchange a smile in that direction, which enabled him to miss the
hoyden's elevator, as if by chance. Entering the car that Reds maneuvered,
Planchini found himself alone with the girl before they reached the twelfth
floor.
     "Who did we have in the lost and found department last night?" asked
Planchini absently. "Or was there anybody?"
     "You ask me to remember?" returned Reds. "I'm not The Brain. You are."
     "Sorry, Reds."
     "There was some woman who lost something, but who she was, I've forgotten.
A lot of people were trying to remember things they'd lost, just to test you.
But don't bother about last night. I'll pick up plenty of scraps for this
evening. I'll leave the envelope under your door when I go off duty."
     Reaching his suite, Planchini found some envelopes already awaiting him,
including a fat one from the clipping bureau that he patronized. But Planchini
was too tired to go over this data so soon. He tossed the envelopes on one of
his several filing cabinets and stretched himself on a couch.
     The settling twilight that was dawn to Planchini put him in a placid mood.
If he looked pale and gaunt in that dull light, it was only because he lacked
the dark, full make-up that was part of the Planchini that the public knew.
     For the laugh that Planchini gave was a healthy one indeed, a
self-satisfied laugh at his own genius in choosing helpers who could find out
much but remember very little.


     CHAPTER VIII

     AT about half-past eight, New York time, Lamont Cranston paused at the
cigar counter in the Chateau Parkview and drew a ten dollar bill from his
pocket as he looked over the display of cigars. One glance at Cranston spelled
"Crystal Room" to the girl behind the counter. Anyone wearing evening clothes
so immaculate could only be bound for that haven deluxe.
     The girl came up with the box of Havana Specials and the sales talk that
went with them. Always a fancier of panatelas, Cranston purchased a quota of
the thin cigars. The girl promptly put the box beneath the counter, which
roused Cranston's interest more.
     What happened next did not escape Cranston's seemingly casual eye. He saw
the girl bring four one dollar bills from a side till of the cash register.
That was all Cranston needed to know.
     Reaching the doorway of the Crystal Room, Cranston inquired for Mr.
Maywick's table. He was ushered to a ringside seat where Maywick promptly
introduced him to a crowd of prosperous visitors. Among them was a girl that
Cranston expected to find, a certain Miss Blye.
     Bonnie was wearing the same gown of the night before and she was really a
rhapsody in blue. Enough so to violate the unwritten law of the Crystal Room,
where the lady habitues never appeared in the same gown twice in succession.
     Perhaps because Bonnie didn't yet rate as a regular, she was getting by;
but for that matter, Bonnie could have gotten by in any company. Right now she
was the most attractive sight in the Crystal Room not excluding the beautiful
big cut-glass chandeliers.
     To refer to Bonnie, all Cranston had to do was raise his eyebrows in
Maywick's direction.
     "Her father was a friend of mine," confided Maywick, leaning Cranston's
way. "I hardly remember him, but of course I pretended I did. Who wouldn't?"
     A nod came from Cranston.
     "I sell a lot of solid securities to reliable customers," added Maywick.
"I always warn them not to trade such gilt-edged purchases for doubtful stocks.
But many of them do" - he shrugged unhappily - "like this chap Blye did. Henry
J. Blye, his daughter says his full name was."
     Dinner was being served, which pleased Maywick's guests, because they
wanted to reach their desserts before Planchini's act went on. It was a
standing rule of the house that no serving should take place while Planchini
was officially on the floor.
     But Planchini acted in an unofficial capacity also, as became evident
during dinner. The great mentalist appeared, smiling blandly through the dark,
full-faced makeup that completely changed his gaunt and pallid visage, and
nodded to regular customers as he proffered the large glass bowl in which he
collected sealed messages.
     Again, Glanville Frost and Val Varno were witnesses to this procedure from
the undesirable table where they sat. Craning to look around a pillar, Frost
gave an opinion to Varno.
     "What a phoney!" commented Frost. "He won't give any of those messages
back. It's fifteen minutes until show time and all he has to do is open them
backstage and pick the stuff he knows he can answer."
     "Yeah," agreed Varno, glancing at the coin he was rolling along his
knuckles. "But that's still what gets us - the answers."
     "I'd like to see what goes on back there," remarked Frost. "Or better, I'd
like to have a peek into Planchini's room and see what sort of files he keeps."
     "You wrote a book on how to crack handcuffs and pick locks," reminded
Varno. "Why don't you load with the right gimmicks and check on what you want
to know?"
     "A good idea," nodded Frost, "except right now I'm getting interested in
what I'm seeing here. That patch of blue, for instance."
     The patch of blue proved to be Bonnie, and she must have captivated
Varno's attention too, for Val's coin slipped and struck the table, the only
time he'd missed on the coin roll in weeks. Planchini had stopped at Maywick's
table and Bonnie was reaching a long, lovely arm across so that she could drop
her sealed envelope into the bowl.
     Even at this distance, Bonnie's soulful expression was evident and it was
obvious that she believed in the reality of Planchini's powers.
     "Dames," observed Varno. "That's what Planchini's act is built on. They
all fall for that mental hoke."
     "Or for the gentleman who dispenses it," modified Frost, thinking in terms
of a soda fountain, a cigar counter, and their respective attendants. "I wonder
if he'll really go through with a two person act."
     "You mean where the guy codes the dope to some girl?" demanded Varno. "Not
a chance! Planchini wouldn't be a good audience man; they have to be mousey like
so many mice. The girl steals the act."
     "Which would be all right with the right girl," decided Frost, watching
Bonnie drape back to her chair. "It might steal some of Planchini's business
too."
     "Not from the dames that fall for him -"
     "They fall for the hoke, too. You said that yourself, Val. What's more,
around the better grade saloons such as this, the men pay the checks. Maybe" -
Frost's eyes were more than speculative - "it's time that they fell for
something too."
     Others than Frost and Varno were decidedly interested in the trusting
manner that Bonnie had displayed toward Planchini. Over at their favorite table
were the two men who had shown some interest in Varno's barroom card tricks.
That pair happened to be Keene Marker and Smiley Grimm.
     "That dame gets an answer," stated Keene. "I wonder if it's going to be
the one that counts."
     "It might be," acknowledged Smiley, "unless Planchini is too smart to show
his hand."
     "He'd be smart if he did," gritted Keene. "He must know we want some
service for being put on the spot."
     "We got service," returned Smiley. "Didn't you ever hear of Dirk Quingal?"
     Keene forced a nod.
     "According to a note I received today," confided Smiley, "we're to pick up
another big stupe named Hawser Thorgin, whenever we need him. Here" - he shoved
the note Keene's way - "read it and don't weep."
     Keene read it in the fair light that always persisted prior to Planchini's
act.
     The words weren't all that interested Keene.
     "Same writing as the one I got," Keene undertoned. "Hang on to it, Smiley.
We may want to match these some day."
     "With Planchini's writing -"
     "That's it. If we can't pick up some of those sheets he scribbles when
he's answering questions, we may be able to swipe a few samples from his room."
     Keene's notion pleased Smiley, particularly when he noted that his letter
lacked any mention of his own name, as well as a signature. Therefore the
people who had received the letters would not be implicated if the documents
reached the police.
     But it was equally evident that neither Keene nor Smiley intended to spoil
what could prove a lucrative game, so long as no clues pointed their direction.
     Meanwhile, Planchini, the subject of so much discussion, had retired
beyond the screens that stood for off-stage at the Crystal Room. There, in a
little dressing room, Planchini was lighting a half-smoked cigar as he began
cutting open the envelopes that he had gathered in the bowl that lay beside him.
     Laying aside those that suited, Planchini fished for the one he specially
wanted and had little trouble finding it. This was Bonnie's envelope and
Planchini had made an indentation in the corner of it with his thumb nail.
Though he lacked the long nails that Frost wore, Planchini's were sufficient to
accomplish enough in their small way.
     Planchini's eyes glistened at sight of a smaller slip that Bonnie had
enclosed with her question. His gaze then became speculative, very much so.
Checking a card index that he had brought from his suite, Planchini found all
the data he wanted - and more.
     Drawing on his cigar, Planchini kept testing the aroma of the panatela as
he stared into the thickening smoke. The room was becoming smoke-heavy, but
Planchini seemed to like it that way, until suddenly he tossed the cigar aside
and flung open the window.
     When the call came for Planchini's floor show to begin, the mystic stepped
from his dressing room, smoking a cigarette instead of a cigar. Closing his
eyes, Planchini rubbed their lids gently, to make sure he had affixed a pair of
flat brilliants there.
     Fully turbanned and carrying his crystal ball, the Great Planchini
appeared amid a crescendo from the orchestra to begin what was to be one of his
most startling performances.


     CHAPTER IX

     PLANCHINI'S act always opened with what he termed a warm-up, to whet the
interest of the audience. Going around from table to table, Planchini gained
occasional impressions, which filled time while a polite attendant was bringing
on the table that held the fish bowl full of questions.
     The warm-up had been somewhat lukewarm recently. Tonight, Planchini
intended to make it red hot.
     Gazing into the crystal, Planchini caught sight of reflected faces that he
knew, since the whole room was lighted at present; in fact, the spotlight man
was just starting from his office up to his booth. At one table, Planchini
paused to state that someone there was thinking of the Ozark Mountains; at
another, he gained the impression of a recent plane flight to Alaska.
     These were stock stuff, worked on customers whose history Planchini knew
by heart. Another of his favorite gags was that of getting an impression from
someone whose birth month was September. Some woman would invariably claim that
distinction and Planchini would dish out a brisk astrological reading as though
that happened to be what was on the woman's mind.
     Always, Planchini paused and swayed, taking deep breaths in accordance
with yoga tradition. That was what had given him the idea for tonight's big
punch.
     They'd been saying lately that Planchini was either missing numbers or
dodging them, so he was ready to ruin that impeachment. Planchini's long
breathing exercises were with a given purpose. He was sniffing for a strong
fragrance with which he had just educated himself, that of a very pungent
Havana Special cigar.
     Such an aroma reached Planchini now.
     Among the cigars that were being flourished at the nearest tables,
Planchini saw only one of the thin panatela variety. Stepping to its owner,
identifying the pungency again, Planchini was more than pleased. The man who
was smoking the planted cigar happened to be at Maywick's table, the same table
where Bonnie Blye was seated.
     The cigar smoker of course was Lamont Cranston, but Planchini didn't know
his name, which made it all the better.
     "You, sir," announced Planchini. "Have you ever met me before?"
     Cranston shook his head.
     "Never."
     "Would you state on oath," inquired Planchini, "that there is positively
no collusion between us?"
     "I would."
     "Suppose then," suggested Planchini, "that you use your own money for the
test I am about to perform. Take some bills and pass them to other persons at
this table. Not big bills" - with a broad smile, Planchini added what passed as
a touch of humor - "because I wouldn't want you to risk losing them.
     "One dollar bills will do, but keep them with the green side toward me. I
want only your friends to see the serial numbers on those bills, each friend
who takes one. Then, as each person concentrates, I shall mentally read those
numbers that they have in mind."
     Naturally the dollar bills that Cranston produced were those from the
cigar counter, since he'd had to change a higher bill there. As Cranston
carefully distributed them, Planchini added just one amendment; namely, that
the bills should be placed with persons well apart, so as to obtain a wider
range of thought.
     "One to the gentleman over there," said Planchini, "another to the lady
over here - the lady in blue -"
     The lady in blue was Bonnie, which made it perfect for Planchini. He was
going to move this red-hot warm-up into a big bang that would start the evening
right.
     "I get the impression of the letter 'D,'" began Planchini, staring into
the crystal ball, "followed by the figures three - nine - nine -"
     "My bill," acknowledged Cranston, looking up from the one that he had
retained. "You're giving it perfectly."
     Planchini turned the crystal slightly, which was necessary because under
it he had the paper that he had scribbled in his pocket earlier. The crystal
was enlarging the figures like a magnifying glass. Planchini called the rest
belonging to that bill and Cranston acknowledged that all numbers were correct.
     At that, Planchini was glad to finish with Cranston. Over the crystal, he
noted the man's face, calm, impassive, almost mask-like. Cranston's eyes, when
they looked up, proclaimed insight which troubled the mystic.
     "Another number comes to mind," continued Planchini. "The letter 'A' -
then the figure seven - eight - three -"
     "That's my number!"
     The exclamation came from Bonnie.
     "The number on your bill," emphasized Planchini, as though the dollar
didn't belong to Cranston. "Concentrate steadily and I shall give you the rest:
Four - three -"
     As he droned the figures that the crystal magnified, Planchini stole
another glance at Bonnie and saw that she was quite agog. Getting what seemed a
really mental answer was strictly a convincer where the girl was concerned. As
she went through with the business of the dollar bill, Planchini could see the
eagerness that registered on the girl's flushed face.
     It meant that Bonnie was hoping for an answer to her written question and
believed that she would get it. That was Planchini's cue.
     The moment that he finished naming the number that Bonnie corroborated,
Planchini shifted position, raised his free hand and snapped his fingers. Out
went the crystal chandeliers, on came the spotlight as if by magic. Trained on
Maywick's table, the glare caught both Planchini and the earnest girl.
     And now Planchini was really Planchini.
     Bonnie gasped as the mystic's eyes sparkled fire. Actually, Planchini's
eyes were closed; the brilliants on his eyelids were reflecting the focussed
light and therewith casting those vivid sparks. But Bonnie felt that it was
very real and all for her.
     "You have a question!" announced Planchini. "An important question, that
you do not have to write, because it is so predominant in your mind. The
question that you have waited long to ask -"
     There, Planchini inserted one of his dramatic pauses that seemed to fill
the hushed blackness away from the spotlight, until Bonnie's whisper broke it:
     "Yes - yes -"
     "I gain the impression quickly," continued Planchini, "because it is about
money. You began by thinking of a dollar, now you are thinking of many dollars -"
     A pause, while Bonnie swayed forward as she nodded.
     "Dollars, but not in cash," declared Planchini. "You are thinking of a
check to the amount of twenty-seven hundred and fifty dollars!"
     Bonnie couldn't have spoken if she'd wanted. Her eyes were wide,
fascinated by the glitter of Planchini's blazing orbs. If Planchini had seen
the girl's face then, he would have realized that she was on the verge of a
hypnotic state. But Planchini's own eyes were closed, as a help toward selling
the medicine that he was delivering too strong.
     "I see the name Gregg Zerber." Planchini was opening his eyes as he
lowered them to the crystal. "It is the name with which the check is signed.
You want to know who actually wrote that signature."
     Bonnie's eyes were fixed, but her lips spoke.
     "Yes."
     "A check that you have never seen," specified Planchini, "but with a false
signature which you know to be a forgery. You say you wish to know the forger's
name."
     All intensity, Bonnie was looking up, completely frozen. It was Maywick
who recognized her semi-hypnotic state, for he was closest to her. If Cranston
noted it, he gave no sign; he was seated calmly, with arms folded.
     "Wait, Planchini!" began Maywick, reaching to grasp Bonnie. "The girl
isn't well -"
     It was too late. Eyes closed, Planchini heard another forcible, "Yes" from
Bonnie and the tone must have knifed through Maywick's appeal, for Planchini
imperiously gave answer.
     "You will recognize the man from his initials," declared Planchini.
"Acknowledge the facts when I give them. Those initials are -"
     Clutching Bonnie with one hand, Maywick was rising to brandish an
interrupting gesture toward Planchini, which the latter saw as his eyes came
open. But at that very instant, Planchini was voicing the revelation that he
promised:
     "Those initials are 'H. L.!'"
     Bonnie Blye acknowledged the initials dramatically enough. This time it
was the girl's eyes that went shut, as with a sobbing sigh, Bonnie collapsed
from Maywick's hasty grasp, jarred the man on the far side before he could give
aid, and sprawled inert upon the floor beside the table!


     CHAPTER X

     A SHOWMAN to the core, Planchini blandly gestured the spotlight to where
it would show what had happened to the young lady whose mind he had read too
well. Into the glare came Maywick, Cranston, and others intent upon reviving
Bonnie.
     Then, Planchini's hand carried the spotlight with him as he stalked to the
fish bowl and picked out an envelope at chance. In his most powerful voice,
Planchini announced:
     "For my second question, I shall describe an elephant, a white elephant. I
mean a real white elephant imported from Siam. Who is thinking of such a white
elephant?"
     A voice responded and Planchini flagged the spotlight to the side of the
floor away from Maywick's table to pick out an elderly man who was
acknowledging the question. Over in their corner, Val Varno and Glanville Frost
immediately commented upon the subject.
     "Everybody knows that guy," declared Varno. "He's Pete Bouton, the big
circus man. I read all about him in the Billboard, making that deal to bring in
a lot of Royal Siamese elephants."
     "The people here don't read the Billboard regularly," reminded Frost,
"except for Planchini and the orchestra. You can see the way they're taking it."
     The orchestra members were buzzing among themselves while the audience at
large listened in amazement to Planchini's accurate description of King Yumba,
lead elephant of the Siamese herd, while the circus man acknowledged all the
specifications.
     "What's more important," stated Frost, "is what happened to that girl.
They must be helping her out of here in the dark."
     "The dame overplayed it," was Varno's opinion. "I knew she was just
another of Planchini's plants when she staged that faint."
     "It wasn't a faint," argued Frost. "She was hypnotized."
     "That's even fakier," returned Varno. "I did a phony hyp act once -"
     "And Planchini staged a real one tonight," interrupted Frost, "even though
he didn't mean it. You'd better read my manuscript on genuine hypnosis, Val. If
I could see that girl right now, I believe I'd find her in a cataleptic state."
     "Want to see her?"
     Answering his own question, Varno flung his hand upward and a whiff of
flame ascended, bringing gasps from surrounding tables, along with the brief
light.
     "Give me that flash stuff," ordered Frost. "You'll have us chucked out of
here next. You'd think you were some amateur magician, doing tricks while an
act is on. They'll be asking you to show your U.W.A. card next."
     Varno laughed at that, since the United Wizards Association, represented
by the initials, answered to the nickname of "Usually We're Amateurs."
Nevertheless, Varno handed over the bottle of flash capsules that he always
carried.
     "I'm going out to the lobby," stated Frost, "so I can learn what happened
to the girl. Check on the rest of Planchini's act and we'll hold a post mortem
when I get back."
     Already out in the lobby, Bonnie was definitely exhibiting signs of a
hypnotic state with her steady, vacant stare. Two ladies of the party
volunteered to take her to a room where she could rest, while Maywick hurried
to the drugstore, stating he'd phone his physician from there, since it would
be a handy place in case the doctor ordered some immediate prescription.
     As for Lamont Cranston, he was already making a phone call from the lobby
booth that no one else used because it was marked "Out of Order." A wavery
voice answered and Cranston immediately changed his tone to inquire in a blunt,
even manner:
     "Is Gregg Zerber there?"
     "Sorry," came the quavery voice. "Mr. Zerber just went out."
     "This is Kent Allard calling."
     "Oh!" The quaver showed surprise. "I can tell you where Mr. Zerber went,
Mr. Allard. He left for the Merrimac Club. He'll be at the Heliocar conference
and I'm sure he'll be glad to see you."
     The laugh that followed that phone call could have been styled a cross
between Cranston's and Allard's. If Zerber had wanted Allard at the Heliocar
conference, he would have asked him there. However, Zerber, whenever at home,
was always at home to Allard.
     These things were to be explained in due course. Just to simplify matters,
the man who looked like Cranston but called himself Allard, underwent a quick
change in the unused phone booth. In brief, he slid into the cloak and hat that
formed the habit of The Shadow. Releasing a special panel in the depths of the
phone booth, the cloaked figure filtered through.
     Nobody witnessed that departure though one man seated in the lobby knew
that it must have occurred. That man was Harry Vincent, the friendly chap who
had turned over his cab to a lady in distress the night before. Ace among The
Shadow's agents, Harry was stationed in this hotel lobby to observe what
happened during his chief's absence. So Harry settled back to watch.
     Oddly, The Shadow was at that moment riding in the same cab that had
figured in last night's events. Or in a sense, it wasn't odd, since this
happened to be The Shadow's own cab. Piloted by Moe "Shrevvy" Shrevnitz, the
speediest hackie in Manhattan, this cab was always at The Shadow's beck. Last
night it was Shrevvy who had disclosed that Bonnie Blye had gone to the Chateau
Parkview, since Shrevvy had taken her there.
     Now Harry Vincent was witnessing something so phenomenal that he wished
his chief had remained to observe it. His attention attracted by a motion on a
stairway to the mezzanine, Harry saw a blue-clad figure coming down those steps.
     Bonnie Blye!
     At first sight, Harry thought that the ravishing blonde had recuperated
from her recent shock, but as she crossed the lobby, Harry noted her fixed
stare and recognized its autohypnotic quality. Clutched to the bosom of her
blue gown, Bonnie was holding the ornamental handbag that she had carried the
night before, pressing it against the very center of the gown's clover-cut
front.
     Evidently Bonnie valued something that the bag contained, but no one other
than Harry noted it. As for the girl's slow, dreamy stalk, it was customary for
young ladies in evening attire to acquire such fantastic manners after imbibing
too many of the fancy cocktails dispensed in the famous Crystal Room. Hence
nobody but Harry gave Bonnie more than an admiring glance as she went by.
     As for Harry, he knew that Bonnie hadn't taken a single drink while in the
Crystal Room, because Harry had been there at another table. Harry simply
supposed that Bonnie was going back to join Maywick's party and would probably
snap out of it, particularly when she saw Planchini again.
     But Bonnie didn't stop at the Crystal Room. The speed of her pace
increased, she went right out the front door of the Chateau Parkview. That was
when Harry came to his feet and followed, but too late.
     Two cabs were standing outside the Chateau Parkview and Bonnie shouldered
her way right into the first. This caused quite a stir along the sidewalk,
since Bonnie looked like a fugitive from the Crystal Room, for it was hardly
likely that otherwise she'd have hurried outside without stopping to put on her
evening wrap.
     As the cab pulled away, the doorman and passing pedestrians stared toward
the hotel expecting some tuxedoed chap to come rushing out and call the girl
back, but the only candidate at that moment was Glanville Frost, who had
stepped outside the hotel to learn if fresh air could help him unravel more of
the intricacies of Planchini's act.
     In the style of a practiced magician, Frost performed an immediate
disappearance into the second cab while eyes were fixed the other way. That cab
was off along Bonnie's trail by the time Harry Vincent sauntered out to the
sidewalk, affecting complete indifference where the Bonnie question was
concerned.
     Seeing that Harry wanted a cab, the doorman started to whistle one for
him, while Harry went through the agony of repressed impatience at the lack of
such a vehicle. The cab wouldn't be worth the twenty cent price of a minimum
ride by the time it arrived, since it would then be too late to follow the
others.
     Making a wild guess as to where Bonnie could have gone, Harry remembered a
name that Planchini had spoken, the sort of name that people usually dismissed
from mind after a questioner acknowledged it as correct.
     Harry's lips spoke it:
     "Gregg Zerber!"
     Maybe Harry was becoming really telepathic, for somehow his recollection
of that name seemed to date, not with Planchini's revelation, but from the
moment that Harry had seen Bonnie coming down the mezzanine steps as though
drawn by her own hypnotic stare.
     Quickly Harry swung back into the hotel to find a phone book and look up
the number of Gregg Zerber before the doorman finally hailed a cab.
     That name, Gregg Zerber, was in other minds as well. Back in the Crystal
Room, Keene Marker and Smiley Grimm were going over their usual list as the
lights came on.
     "I'm betting on Question One," Keene was saying. "It was the knockout of
the evening."
     "A safe bet," agreed Smiley. "Less odds than usual, too. Planchini only
clicked off five tonight."
     "Smart, cutting his act short," declared Keene. "All the punch was at the
start, but he held the people as long as they expected something just as
strong. He clipped that last five minutes before they could go wise on him."
     Smiley nodded, indicating that he'd timed Planchini's act, too. His hand
was strumming the table as he glanced impatiently toward the door of the
projection man's office.
     "Maybe Planchini won't be using us," spoke Smiley. "The dance act is over
and the guy from the booth will be down here any time now. Planchini has been
up in his room at least five minutes. He ought to know that time is short."
     "Too short," specified Keene. "Here comes Mr. Projector now -"
     "And there goes the signal!"
     Smiley's ear had caught a single ring from the telephone in the office.
Keene was alert too, half rising as though he didn't expect more. Smiley came
to his feet too and a moment later, both men were sidling through the handy
exit.
     One ring only, meaning the name that these two guessers had picked: Gregg
Zerber.
     Much was on the move tonight.


     CHAPTER XI

     BY the time The Shadow's cab had reached the Merrimac Club, the face of
Lamont Cranston had undergone a complete transformation. In the dark, The
Shadow, master of disguise, had switched his features to those of a person
called Kent Allard.
     It had taken little of The Shadow's genius to accomplish this remarkable
result. In actuality, he had simply wiped Cranston's visage away, taking care
to remove a waxlike base that was responsible for the perfection of the
Cranston mold.
     Still The Shadow in attire, the cloaked passenger made a quick survey of
the street as the cab swung in front of the Merrimac Club. Ready for almost
anything along this trail, The Shadow was prepared to handle lurkers in his own
inimitable style, before Zerber arrived. Only there were no lurkers, which was
why The Shadow let his cloak and hat slide to the cab seat.
     Out of that cab stepped Kent Allard.
     This was one of those exceptional cases when The Shadow disclosed his real
identity, but under circumstances when nobody would begin to guess it. Greatest
of The Shadow's secrets was the fact that the very character which had become a
part of him, that of Lamont Cranston, was in itself a disguise.
     The Shadow had learned to live the role of Cranston, to the point where
becoming Allard seemed strange indeed. His agents and a few trusted others,
believed that he was Cranston; though they knew that on occasion he might turn
out to be almost anyone.
     Even in his archives, The Shadow referred to himself as Lamont Cranston,
if only for convenience. (Ed: Having full access to The Shadow's archives for a
period of fifteen years, I can vouch for the fact that there was not even the
slightest reference to Kent Allard prior to the time when a chance emergency
caused The Shadow to resume his real identity. See "The Shadow Unmasks," Vol.
XXII, No. 5, Aug. 1, 1937. Maxwell Grant.) Of course this gave him the
advantage of holding the Allard identity in complete reserve should future
policy demand it. Perhaps that was The Shadow's real reason for reverting to
his own self so seldom.
     There was a reason where Gregg Zerber was concerned. Zerber had known
Allard from some years back, but had never met Cranston. It was Allard who had
flown the mail for Zerber when the latter had been threatened with the loss of
his contract with a Central American government that expected planes to ride
the highest mountains in the worst weather.
     Always thereafter, Zerber had been going to do great things for Allard,
but had been too busy accomplishing great things for Zerber. The door of
Zerber's apartment was always wide open, but never that of his office. Right
now, Zerber wasn't going to be happy when Allard crashed the gate of the
Heliocar conference.
     Smiling slightly at that thought, Allard didn't forget his limp when he
entered the foyer of the Merrimac Club. The limp belonged to Allard
permanently, because it was part of his story about being lost amid a tribe of
Xinca Indians in the Yucatan Peninsula at the very time when an amazing
personage known as The Shadow had first begun to harass America's unwanted
gangland.
     Announcing himself at the door of the conference room, Allard listened for
comments from within. He still had reason to smile when he thought how welcome
Lamont Cranston would have been, as a potential investor with access to
millions, in contrast to a forgotten skybird like Kent Allard. But instead of
excuses, Allard was favored with apologies of a sort.
     One of the committee men arrived to explain matters with sincere regret.
     "Sorry, Mr. Allard," the man said, "but Mr. Zerber won't be with us this
evening. He called from his apartment to tell us so."
     "But I found his apartment," returned Allard. "His servant told me he had
already left for this conference."
     "You must have misunderstood old Jeffers," declared the committee man,
referring to Zerber's servant. "He probably meant to say that Mr. Zerber was
about to leave."
     It was the proper time for Allard to play dumb.
     "But if Zerber didn't leave -"
     "Something detained him," came the explanation. "An unexpected
appointment, so he said. Frankly, we thought it must be you, Mr. Allard.
Always, Mr. Zerber has spoken of you so highly that we know he would give you
first consideration in any important matter."
     Having had enough of that complimentary double-talk, Allard bowed his
departure. Limp notwithstanding, he made a quick return to Shrevvy's cab and
was giving an order as he settled in the back seat, sliding into his black garb
the moment he arrived.
     "Zerber's apartment. No loitering."
     That last phrase was the sort that made Shrevvy see green in the way of
traffic signals. Red lights could be something that Shrevvy sometimes couldn't
see and this was one of those times. Twenty minutes was a proper estimate of
the time lost by detouring to Zerber's apartment by way of the Merrimac Club.
Shrevvy intended to chop that margin down to something like fifteen.
     While Shrevvy was doing anything but dawdle, Bonnie's cab rolled up to the
apartment house where Zerber lived and disgorged its charming passenger. Over
the sill of the front window, the cab driver met the wide stare of fixed blue
eyes and watched curved shoulders respond to the action of graceful arms and
hands that paid the fare from a chic blue beaded bag.
     Shoulders erect, face solemn, Bonnie walked into the small apartment
house, finding the door unlatched because the buzzer device was out of order.
As if in a trance, the blonde approached an automatic elevator, pressed the
button and waited while the car made a slow, laborious trip down from the fifth
floor.
     As was common with hypnotized subjects, Bonnie was focussed on one thing
only, the elevator. She wouldn't have heard the outer door slam even if it had.
When the elevator arrived, the girl entered it, closed the door mechanically and
pressed a button that bore the number two.
     This proved that Bonnie was in a hypnotic trance. Any normal person of
reasonable agility would have used the stairs to reach the second floor, rather
than wait for the wheezy elevator to come all the way down from the fifth. In
starting later from the Chateau Parkview, Bonnie had already lost seven or
eight of those minutes that Shrevvy was trying to make up. She dropped from two
to three more, by bothering with the elevator.
     On the second floor, Bonnie's stare absorbed the name of Gregg Zerber,
which appeared on a door. Opening the door, Bonnie entered. A feeble groan
greeted her, as though from a resisting door hinge, but Bonnie was immune to
such sounds tonight.
     Walking through an ample but dimly-lighted living room, Bonnie came to the
open door of a study and entered. A creak preceded her, but it could have come
from the other end of a loose floor board, for this apartment house, though
exclusive, was old.
     The study was lighted but its glow was curiously concentrated. The light
came from a desk lamp that was tilted so its glare would meet the eyes of
anyone who entered. Bonnie met that glare without a blink and advanced slowly,
with pausing footsteps toward the desk.
     Behind the desk sat a dumpy man who wore a smoking jacket. His big face
was mostly chin, settled deep against his chest, the forward tilt of his head
enabling his half closed eyes to avoid the light, yet scrutinize his visitor.
On the desk lay a slight strew of papers that looked like canceled checks; the
spread was not untidy, but appeared to be a batch that had been rather hastily
sorted.
     Without a word, Bonnie reached into her handbag, brought out her tight
fist and leveled it straight at the big-jawed man who could only be Gregg
Zerber.
     In an icy monotone, the girl announced:
     "I am Bonnie Blye. I want the check that you mentioned in the letter. You
know the letter I mean, the one that you wrote to my uncle, Hubert Lidden.
Unless you give me that check instantly, I -"
     Bonnie pressed her lithe body forward to the desk edge, to accompany the
forward thrust of her tight fist. Her tone rose as the words came fiercely:
     "I will kill you!"
     Viewed from the door, the scene looked real. Bonnie's taut fist, hidden by
her body, must certainly have gripped a gun to account for the piston action of
her elbow. Added to that was Zerber's pose, that of a man so frozen by the
threat of sudden death that he could neither budge nor speak.
     That was why a man came surging through the door, giving a quick call to
make the girl turn about. He was drawing his own gun, a sizeable automatic,
this man who was subbing for The Shadow: namely, Harry Vincent. If Bonnie
turned, she'd have to meet a threat superior to that of her own gun and
besides, Zerber was a factor; he couldn't be counted on to show mercy under
this stress. If he had a gun in a desk drawer, he'd be apt to grab it and cut
loose.
     Only Bonnie didn't turn and therefore Zerber didn't move. What Harry did
therefore was complete his drive and hook Bonnie's right arm with a cross-reach
of his left. With a backward whip, Harry spun the girl around like a top, Bonnie
making three revolutions before she landed back against the wall.
     By then, Harry was gripping the side of the desk to halt his own recoil.
Zerber making no move, Harry stared at Bonnie, much amazed by what he saw.
     Fixed eyes and empty fist!
     The girl had been threatening Zerber without a gun in hand; hence there
was no mystery as to why he had ignored the menace. For the moment, Harry
Vincent felt as foolish as he was befuddled, until he heard the floor creak. It
came from near the door, that sound, and Harry wheeled anew. He was in time to
spot a man who was starting a sneak from the corner of the room, but Harry's
whirl carried him too far to cover the fellow with his gun. Though Harry
couldn't see the man's face in the light, he gained the impression of a tuxedo
shirt-front.
     Discovered, this intruder was lunging Harry's way, hands ahead, hoping to
snatch Harry's gun. Harry took one quick side-step past the desk, then came
forward, parrying his gun so as to swing his fist and let the gun-weight add
power to the punch.
     It was neat, the way Harry caught the man off-guard, or it would have been
neat if the fellow hadn't flung one hand upward. From that hand came a sweeping
flash of living flame that half-blinded Harry as he hit the desk and sent it
askew, taking a long sprawl to the floor.
     Rolling over, Harry came up with the gun, prepared to shoot blind, when he
heard the door slam and caught the muffled fade of speeding feet beyond.
Lowering the gun, Harry came to his feet, rubbed his eyes and gazed inquiringly
to the desk, realizing that, after all, Zerber could explain and with it accept
apologies.
     But Gregg Zerber wasn't capable of either.
     As Harry stared, his blinking eyes unbelieving, Zerber slid slowly from
the desk that had been wrenched out of place and landed with a deadweight thud
that made the very floorboards creak the message:
     "Murder!"


     CHAPTER XII

     GREGG ZERBER, dead, slain by an imaginary gun with a bullet that didn't
exist!
     Such was the impossible trail of thought that ran through Harry Vincent's
mind as he stared at the slumped figure on the floor.
     If ever there could be murder by magic, this seemed it.
     Of course Harry's eyes still saw big floating blocks of black as a reflex
from the sudden, blinding flash that somebody had tossed his way. He remembered
having seen a few such flashes around the Chateau Parkview and he identified
them with Val Varno. However, that wasn't the main issue of the moment.
     Harry looked toward the wall where Bonnie stood. The girl's fist was still
clenched, but lowered, while from her other wrist dangled the blue bag. It had
come open, that bag, and in it Harry almost expected to see a gun. But when he
steadied his eyes, he noted that the bag was empty, except for a change purse,
a compact, and a few minor items.
     Bonnie's eyes still held the vacant stare which her own intensity, plus
the glitter of Planchini's brilliant-studded eyelids, had hypnotically induced.
This convinced Harry that Bonnie couldn't have fired the shot that killed Zerber.
     Which produced the possibility that Zerber might have been slain by
something other than a gunshot!
     On that assumption, Harry turned to survey the body closely. Hardly had he
stooped above Zerber's form, before the door clattered and Harry had just time
to swing himself above the desk, gun in hand, when he saw a pair of men enter.
Spotting Harry, they immediately deployed, producing revolvers of their own.
     It was stupid to be taken so off-guard, but Harry wasn't in a condition to
avoid it. His vision was still blurred, to the degree where these invaders
looked like floating figures, chopped by blackness. He'd seen both men, Harry
had, around the Chateau Parkview, for the pair consisted of Keene Marker and
Smiley Grimm. But Harry couldn't begin to recognize them under present
circumstances.
     Whether Keene or Smiley recognized Harry was another question; it might be
that they thought he was Zerber, whose body was now out of sight behind the
desk. Whether the slick crooks knew why they'd been sent here did not matter,
for they had a general idea, now that they were on the actual premises.
     That idea involved the checks that were strewn on Zerber's desk. Maybe
they looked like canceled checks but there might be some negotiable items among
them. Keene and Smiley could see well enough, because the lamp's glare was on
the desk proper; besides, a stray breeze, wafting through an open window behind
the desk, was stirring the messed papers, giving them a conspicuous flutter.
     Around behind the desk and crouching low, Harry felt the wind against his
neck and bristled. Perhaps that was the nearest Harry could come to giving a
shiver, after years in The Shadow's service. Being in a spot like this wasn't a
new experience to Harry Vincent, but those persistent blurs of black before his
eyes were disconcerting, at the least.
     One thing: the two invaders didn't seem to want to start shooting any more
than did Harry. However, that fact, in its way, rendered the situation all the
more insidious. They were scheming something, these men that Harry could
scarcely see, judging from the way they kept flanking further, drawing more and
more apart.
     It couldn't be that they were going to do the rush act. All Harry would
have to do would be wheel in one direction, settle the first man who tried to
jump the gun, and be clear around the desk, ready to turn and devastate the
other.
     Easy enough, if Harry's eyes had been right. On the chance that they soon
would be, he started a shift to the right, imperceptibly at first, all the
while wangling his gun from one side to the other, in a lazy but disconcerting
style that his chief, The Shadow, had taught him.
     Floating in with the breeze came the chimes of a neighborhood clock,
striking the hour.
     Harry didn't need to count the strokes. He knew what time it was: nine
o'clock. Those big dongs that stirred the tense silence had a better use. They
provided just enough relief for Harry to move faster, as though he had become a
trifle nervous. He would make it seem that the clock strokes had excited him.
     One detail was overlooked by Harry.
     That detail was Zerber's body. Completely forgetting it, Harry stumbled
across the sprawled form and had to grab for the desk to save himself from a
fall. From their viewpoint, Keene and Smiley probably thought that Harry's
misstep was faked.
     Nevertheless, it served them, because there was something else that Harry
had forgotten: Bonnie.
     The crooks sprang their ruse with splendid teamwork.
     From his left, Harry heard a sharp challenge, and turned in Keene's
direction, only to get a blackish glimpse of the fellow dropping to the shelter
of the desk. Harsher, more forceful was the next voice from the right. As Harry
spun that way, knowing that his second adversary couldn't find shelter on this
side of the desk, he learned how the man had profited by the brief time
allotment.
     Smiley had grabbed Bonnie and was whirling the transfixed girl in Harry's
direction, using the slim blonde as a spinning human shield!
     Neither sight nor foresight could have saved Harry then, since Keene was
ready to deliver a flank attack along with Smiley's protected drive. But Harry
had wits in plenty and was trained to use them.
     Hurling himself straight for Bonnie, Harry met the whirling girl, took a
half turn with her in a change-your-partner style and came slugging blindly at
Smiley, who made a mad dive for Keene's shelter. Not only that, Harry diverted
Bonnie's spin and the girl, ricocheting from the desk, knocked over the lamp
with her wildly spinning arms. As Bonnie did a half topple across his path,
Harry didn't grab her as a shield, for he doubted that his enemies would care
what happened to her.
     Too much of Bonnie was too white and conspicuous even in the half-light
that now filtered from the hall, so Harry simply brushed her toward a front
corner of the room as he sliced to a sharp frontward angle of his own, from
which he could charge at the huddled men who weren't ready to receive him.
     This slighter light was helpful to Harry's eyes, until something bulked
suddenly to block it. Instinctively, Harry gave a reverse twist, to reach the
front of the desk as a shelter from the men upon the left, and at the same time
greet a new invader who was hulking through the doorway.
     The invader greeted Harry first.
     Not with a gun, nor a knife, but with the strangest weapon that it had
ever been Harry's ill-luck to encounter. A thing like a billiard ball came
whizzing through the air, not straight, but with a long wide curve. As it
scaled around his shoulder, Harry thought that it had missed him, and jabbed
his gun forward, intending to skim his enemy considerably closer with a bullet.
     Then, before he could tug the trigger, Harry was hooked forcibly from his
feet, choking and goggle-eyed as he tried to rip away something that had lashed
around his neck with tightening coils that would have flattered a python.
     That ball was on the end of a long, thin rope and the man who flung it had
retained the other end, which was made in a small loop. He'd swung the thing
like a hammer-throw, neck high, purposely giving enough length so the ball
would go beyond Harry and let him receive the rope instead.
     Three times the thing had coiled before the ball thwacked Harry's Adam's
apple. This little business was a specialty with Hawser Thorgin, the new husky
who had been assigned as handy man to the team of Grimm and Marker.
     Big teeth glittered from a pockmarked face in the dim light as Hawser
started to haul in his sagging captive like some gasping fish. Hooked between
the coils of the rope, the ball was causing those coils to tighten, cutting off
what little breath Harry had left.
     Murderous treatment, this, which Harry could not have survived, had it
continued much longer. But Hawser's gloating was destined to be brief. Even
before the haul was finished, Hawser was challenged by a fierce, defiant laugh
that came through the window, bringing a shrouded shape amid its own echoes.
The shape of a real avenger: The Shadow!


     CHAPTER XIII

     ONE deft whip of the rope and Hawser Thorgin sent Harry Vincent twirling
like a top spun from a string. With another whip of the ball-tipped leash, the
burly strangler tried to loop The Shadow by the same device. He was gauging by
the laugh, was Hawser, slapping the rope low, because he was confident The
Shadow had gone into a crouch.
     Hawser guessed right, but missed the reason. The reason didn't miss him.
That reason happened to be Zerber's desk, which The Shadow was flinging forward
with a mighty flip. The desk took Hawser much as the loop had taken Harry,
flinging the strangler backward. Hawser's rope hooked a chandelier and stayed
there.
     On his feet, Harry found himself beside Bonnie and almost as dazed as the
girl. He was able, though, to shout a warning that wasn't needed. The Shadow
had already picked out two huddled men who were scrambling to regain the
shelter of the overturned desk.
     Keene and Smiley thought they were fast with their guns, but they were
slow, painfully slow, in comparison to The Shadow. He could have nicked them
with two quick shots before they learned their guns had triggers, if Hawser
hadn't come to their aid again.
     Abandoning the glorified yo-yo that had tangled with the chandelier,
Hawser lurched upon The Shadow with a bellow quite as sincere as Dirk's, the
night before. Like Dirk, Hawser received quick treatment. The Shadow met the
husky with a grapple that turned him half-around, a blockade against Keene and
Smiley, even though he was their shield as well.
     Amid this, The Shadow gave a swift command that cut through Harry's daze.
He was telling Harry to get started and to take Bonnie along. In grappling with
Hawser, The Shadow was circling the big strangler toward the door, keeping Keene
and Smiley completely immobilized.
     Harry left suddenly, hauling Bonnie with him. It was an unwritten rule
with The Shadow's agents never to argue with their chief. How aptly this rule
applied, was proved the moment that Harry and Bonnie were really in the clear.
     Hoisting Hawser with an expert heave, The Shadow flung that struggling
chunk of bulk upon the two lurkers who were back beside the desk. As they
flattened, Keene and Smiley began shooting; their target by that time was the
ceiling.
     It took more than one fling to settle Hawser. He came to his feet, but as
he did, he took the gunshots to be The Shadow's. With that, Hawser became The
Shadow's ally, for he gripped Keene and Smiley by their respective necks and
tried to crack their heads together, evidently thinking that one was The
Shadow, the other Harry Vincent.
     Guns were the only answer to such treatment and the two crooks gave with
theirs. Taking the bullets, Hawser reared and gave a half stagger. Lunging
slantwise toward the desk, he blundered into The Shadow as the latter was
springing forward to get at Keene and Smiley.
     From then on, Hawser was quite a handful, exhibiting all the fury of a
dying man who wouldn't cave. Keene and Smiley didn't appreciate what power
Hawser had gained, nor did they care to answer to him, any more than to The
Shadow. They took off through the window, to a fire escape just outside it.
     All during the fading clatter from the fire escape and the dwindling
footbeats from the cement of the rear courtyard, The Shadow lashed about the
room with Hawser, artfully, forcing the strangler to waste his convulsive fury.
More bullets would only have roused Hawser to greater frenzy, so The Shadow
didn't use them.
     After a few minutes of borrowed time, Hawser succumbed, suddenly and
thoroughly. Letting the dead man's clutch slide away, The Shadow intoned a
mirthless knell then faded out through the doorway.
     Police whistles were shrilling through the neighborhood, but there was no
sign of The Shadow by the time the police reached the house where the shooting
had occurred.
     Events were shifting rapidly to the Chateau Parkview. There, something of
a stir swept the lobby when Harry Vincent entered, bringing Bonnie Blye. They
had made a swift trip here in Shrevvy's cab, which had been waiting outside
Zerber's, but Harry avoided mention of that detail.
     Sidney Maywick dominated the lobby and with him was a solemn man with a
physician's satchel. At sight of Bonnie, Maywick helped the girl to a chair,
then turned accusingly to Harry.
     "For half an hour I've been hunting this girl!" stormed Maywick. "I
brought Dr. Herkimer here" - he gestured to the man beside him - "and returned
to find her missing. Can't a man go to bring a specialist without having the
patient disappear?"
     Harry glanced at the clock above the hotel desk. It registered twenty
minutes after nine.
     "It took me about half an hour to find her," explained Harry. "I don't
even know who she is. I saw her walk out the door with her eyes dead-set for
Central Park, so I thought I ought to go after her."
     Maywick gradually became mollified and muttered his thanks to Harry. By
then, Dr. Herkimer had studied Bonnie's eyes and had come to an interesting
conclusion.
     "This girl's been hypnotized," declared the physician. "She seems to be
the victim of some strange fixation, temporary of course, but possibly serious."
     "Why serious?" inquired Maywick.
     "Because we do not know the extent of the hypnotic condition," explained
Herkimer. "I could awaken her quite easily, but it might not be wise. She would
not recognize me for one thing; furthermore, we would not know if she were under
a post-hypnotic suggestion."
     Maywick looked puzzled, so the doctor explained further.
     "Post-hypnosis," he stated, "is a condition wherein the subject has been
given some mission to fulfill. It is always unwise to awaken such a patient
without knowing what that later impression is to be. If the subject is unable
to fulfill the post-hypnotic mission, it becomes a terrible burden. Therefore
you should find the person who hypnotized this girl."
     People were gathering at a respectful distance, but one man had already
stepped closer: Planchini. Still wearing his mystic regalia, the mentalist had
just come downstairs from his suite.
     "I hypnotized the girl," admitted Planchini, blandly. "It was accidental,
because she simply became too intense while I was giving her a reading. But she
is under no post-hypnotic suggestion. Shall I awaken her?"
     The doctor nodded solemnly and Planchini stepped forward. Finding that the
lobby represented an audience, Planchini did the natural thing; he played to it.
This, if anything, would add to the Planchini fame.
     Among others who recognized that and rather resented it were Val Varno and
Glanville Frost.
     "Look at that phony!" grumbled Varno. "What he gets away with!"
     "It's a better act than you did in the bar," returned Frost, suavely. "Too
many card tricks are like too many rabbits from a hat."
     "How do you know?" demanded Varno. "You weren't there to see me work. You
only showed up five or ten minutes ago -"
     "Never mind the argument," interrupted Frost. "Let's watch Planchini. By
the way, here are those capsules of yours." He handed the bottle of flash pills
to Varno. "But don't start playing with them now."
     Varno was toying with the bottle as the two magicians moved closer and
Harry noticed it. Harry's look was brief, because he didn't want Varno to
observe it. Besides, Harry was interested in what was happening with Bonnie.
     Lifting the girl's chin with his hand, Planchini turned her face into the
light. His own face moved closer until he remembered that this wasn't Reds, the
elevator girl, and also that he and Bonnie weren't alone.
     Closing his eyes, Planchini let the brilliants furnish their usual glitter
as he snapped his fingers, repeatedly and emphatically. Bonnie's fixed
expression changed; she started to gasp as she saw those sparkling optics just
above her. Taking the gasp as a cue, Planchini actually opened his eyes and
gave Bonnie a smile which she returned.
     "I - I can't remember the question that I wanted to ask," began Bonnie.
"It - it was something -"
     "Something already answered," interposed Planchini. "No need to remember
what it was. Think of another and ask it the next time you see my act."
     Two men coming from the Crystal Room halted abruptly at sight of what was
happening in the lobby. They turned abruptly to the head waiter who was
standing near.
     "Guess we'd better get back to our table," said Keene Marker. "We've been
sitting there all evening, waiting to see Planchini's act again."
     "That's right," added Smiley Grimm. "If he's going on soon, we don't want
to lose that table."
     It was something of an alibi for Keene and Smiley, considering that the
same head waiter had seen them go to that table originally. Of course they
didn't mention the proximity of the exit by which they could arrive as well as
leave. That was something Keene and Marker didn't talk about, except to
themselves.
     One other person was entering the lobby, but he remained entirely
unnoticed. Kent Allard, a gaunt man with a limp, was a stranger at the Chateau
Parkview. He was wearing evening clothes, but they looked rumpled. Nobody would
ever have classed them with the immaculate attire of Lamont Cranston, a regular
patron of the Crystal Room.
     Entering a phone booth, Kent Allard dialed the same number as before; that
of Gregg Zerber. Phoning a dead man would have seemed a strange procedure,
except that Allard wasn't supposed to know that anything had happened to
Zerber. Even Lamont Cranston wasn't supposed to know.
     Of the three personalities combined in the single individual, only one
could afford to know:
     The Shadow.


     CHAPTER XIV

     POLICE COMMISSIONER RALPH WESTON stared at the bodies on the floor of
Zerber's study, then at the chandelier with its hanging trophy that wasn't a
lamp cord. With that, the commissioner declared:
     "It's as plain as day, inspector."
     The remark was addressed to Inspector Joe Cardona, a swarthy, stocky
stalwart, who usually was prepared to argue the point, even with the police
commissioner. This time, Cardona's nod showed that for once he agreed.
     The fact annoyed Weston. He looked toward another man who had just joined
them and was again treated to a steady gaze of the strong, silent variety. The
man who received Weston's glance was Kent Allard.
     "Cranston ought to be here," decided Weston. "He has ideas. Not
constructive ideas, but novel ones. I'd like to give him my analysis of this
case, just for his reaction."
     Stepping past the overturned desk, Weston gestured to Zerber's body.
     "It puzzled us at first," the commissioner said. "We thought that Zerber
had been shot, or even knifed. It wasn't until we lifted his head that we saw -"
     To complete the statement, Weston stooped and raised Zerber's chin. Under
the man's long jaw, tight around his neck, was a rope like the one that hung
from the chandelier. This rope too had a ball on one end, a loop on the other.
The ball had been pushed through the loop enough times to tighten three coils
around Zerber's neck, with appropriate results.
     "Hawser's work," declared Weston, "Somebody must have come upon him
immediately afterward. He tried to noose them too. I say 'them' because the
evidence points to more than one. They shot Hawser instead."
     The ordinarily silent Mr. Allard had a query:
     "Have you been able to determine the time of Zerber's death?"
     "A few minutes before nine o'clock," announced Weston in a final tone.
"Hawser was slain a few minutes after the hour. Perhaps when we find the
persons who killed him, we shall have to extend congratulations. After all,
Hawser had branded himself a killer."
     Allard was studying the rope that hung from the chandelier. It was fairly
short, about the same length as the one that twined around Zerber's neck.
     "About your phone call, Mr. Allard," put in Cardona. "You say Jeffers here
told you that Zerber had gone out?"
     Cardona gestured to a withery servant who was seated, quite wilted, in a
corner of the study.
     "That's right," Allard acknowledged, "and I think Jeffers told the truth."
     "I did," quavered Jeffers. "I did indeed. It was nearly half past eight
and I didn't know that Mr. Zerber had only gone to the drugstore and intended
to return before leaving for the club. If he hadn't come back, he wouldn't have
been here for the other phone call."
     Cardona's eyes fixed steadily on Jeffers.
     "Who was that call from?"
     "I don't know," replied Jeffers. "But Mr. Zerber thought it was important.
He didn't go to the club at all. He phoned the conference and stated that he had
an appointment here."
     It was Allard who put the next question.
     "When did Zerber receive the call?"
     "Only a few minutes after yours, Mr. Allard," testified Jeffers. "He came
in just after I talked to you. If I'd only known where to reach you -"
     "You couldn't have," interposed Allard, bluntly. "I was looking for a cab
to go to the Merrimac Club."
     Cardona was an intent listener to this and Allard knew what went on behind
the star inspector's dead-pan. Every story, Allard's included, would be checked
by Cardona. However, when Joe discovered that Allard had actually been to the
Merrimac Club, he wouldn't care where he had been before that.
     One thing Cardona would definitely learn: there hadn't been time for
Allard possibly to reach Zerber's before nine o'clock, the time established as
the moment of murder. In fact, allowing for the time of a normal cab trip,
Cranston couldn't have arrived at Zerber's before quarter past.
     By then the police had taken control, so Cardona would deduce that Allard
hadn't come here at all, but had simply phoned later, to show real surprise at
the news of Zerber's death.
     In fact, Cardona was already so inclined in Allard's favor that he made no
objection when Zerber's friend took a close look at the thick, closely woven
strangle cord responsible for the nine o'clock death. Allard noted particularly
that the rope was thrice around the victim's neck and he studied the way in
which the ball had been worked through the loop and the adjacent coils to form
an interlaced pattern.
     Meanwhile, Cardona was trying to gather further time factors from Jeffers,
but with no result. All Jeffers remembered was a sudden burst of light; when
he'd awakened he was lying in the front closet with the door locked. His
thoughts were a blank as to what had happened immediately before that, whether
in terms of seconds or minutes.
     Jeffers didn't remember whether Zerber's visitor had arrived, nor how long
Zerber had been waiting for him. Which resolved to the fact that Jeffers had
been overpowered some time between eight-thirty and nine o'clock. Since
Zerber's death was established at the latter time, Cardona sagaciously marked
off Jeffers' experience at approximately that hour, leaving only the question
of whether the murderer had put the quietus on the servant before or after
killing the master.
     Inspector Cardona was still checking this point when Kent Allard left,
bound to a singular destination.
     Somewhere in Manhattan, a bluish gleam appeared within the black-draped
walls of a windowless room. This was The Shadow's sanctum, the hidden
headquarters wherein he mapped his campaigns against crime.
     Into that light came a pair of hands that seemed like separate entities,
for the black sleeves above them faded into the darkness that rimmed the sphere
of light. These were the hands of The Shadow, a fact betokened by a strange,
glowing gem that scintillated from one finger, reflecting the light with
ever-changing hue.
     This rare stone was a fire-opal or girasol, a trophy of Allard's actual
trip to Yucatan. He had gained it as a symbol of authority over the Xinca tribe
that he had ruled while absent and over which he still held supremacy so long as
he owned this flaming amulet.
     A map of Manhattan came into the light, drawn there by the long, thin
hands. From this, The Shadow traced the running time between such places as the
Chateau Parkview and Zerber's apartment, which he calculated at approximately
ten minutes.
     Next came a floor plan of the Chateau Parkview showing the various exits
from the hotel, including those through shops that adjoined it. On this plan,
The Shadow had marked the secret exit through the tricked telephone booth, a
device which he had uncovered while tracking down a previous crime and now used
for his own convenience.
     A time chart followed, The Shadow inscribing its details in writing that
resembled printed script:

     8:30 Girl taken to lobby.
             Maywick went to call doctor.
             Allard phoned Zerber.
     8:35 Allard on way to Merrimac.
     8:40 Planchini ended act.
     8:45 Girl started to Zerber's.
             Frost followed in next cab.
             Vincent took up trail.
     8:50 Allard at Merrimac Club.
             Others on way to Zerber's.
     8:55 First three arrivals at Zerber's.
             Frost departs from Zerber's.
     9:00 Established time of death.
             Others arrive with Hawser.
             Maywick back at hotel with doctor.
     9:05 Shadow reaches Zerber's.
     9:10 Matters concluded at Zerber's.
             Frost back at hotel.
     9:20 Vincent and girl reach hotel.
     9:30 Planchini wakens girl.
             All parties back at hotel.

     It was approximate, this listing, with allowance for minutes between those
specified. This latter point was covered by the order of the various listings;
for instance, the three arrivals at 8:55 had reached Zerber's separately. It
was quite possible that Frost could have passed Bonnie, but Harry's arrival so
soon after wouldn't have allowed Frost any great leeway. Frost had certainly
shown speed in departure, according to a report that The Shadow moved into the
blue glow.
     That report had been relayed from Harry Vincent to The Shadow's sanctum,
through Burbank, a contact agent whose life was a perpetual swing shift.
     Not only were Harry's reports usually accurate; where this one was
concerned, The Shadow was able to check it by his own data. Nevertheless,
something was definitely wrong with it.
     According to a police surgeon's finding, Gregg Zerber had died at nine
o'clock, the very time when other events were at their climax!
     As Allard, The Shadow had checked the neighborhood clock that had chimed
the hour and its time was correct. Yet Harry's report stated that Zerber was
already dead, or practically so, strangled in an expert style. Even the
practiced hand of a strangler like Hawser Thorgin could not have accomplished
that job in under five minutes.
     This would indicate that the police estimate was at least five minutes
late and that the murderer must have started operations soon after a quarter of
nine in order to be gone before the first arrivals that The Shadow had listed.
The police didn't know that intruders had been on the ground before swift death
had reputedly struck down Zerber.
     Something was wrong and badly so. To charge the error to the police
surgeon was the easiest course, but The Shadow did not write it off in that
fashion. In the vast majority of instances wherein a surgeon's examination was
held so promptly, the time estimate proved accurate.
     Perhaps the trouble was the time chart itself, or certain factors which it
did not include. To tally on those was The Shadow's next objective.
     The bluish light clicked off and a parting laugh dwindled amid the
shrouded walls of the mysterious sanctum. The deep hush that followed told its
own story.
     The Shadow had gone to probe into the hidden facts of murder.


     CHAPTER XV

     EMERGING into the lobby of the Chateau Parkview as Lamont Cranston, The
Shadow immediately saw some persons from whom he might learn a few missing
details that belonged on the time chart.
     Val Varno was doing some slick card tricks in the corner for a small but
enthusiastic group that included Sidney Maywick and his physician, Doctor
Herkimer.
     Maywick saw Cranston approach, gave him a nod, and commented:
     "Watch this chap, Cranston. He is very deft."
     The most puzzling feature of Varno's tricks was why he was doing them at
all. Providing free entertainment around a hotel where Planchini was getting
fifteen hundred a week, less taxes and stooge fees, was hardly helpful toward
establishing Varno's commercial status.
     Looking for reason, Cranston detected one by its absence. Glanville Frost
wasn't around.
     It followed that Varno was helping Frost accomplish something special by
keeping other persons temporarily immobilized and this rule could apply to
Maywick and Herkimer. Proof of this came when the physician turned to leave,
just as Varno finished a trick with the four aces.
     "Just a moment, gentlemen," began Varno, glibly. "I am about to show you
the Monte trick, the real Varno version of Find the Lady -"
     "You must wait for this, Herkimer," said Maywick to the doctor. With a
smile, he added: "You can find the other lady later."
     "You mean Miss Blye?" inquired the physician. "I know exactly where to
find her. She is resting quietly in her room."
     "I know," nodded Maywick, "so you can watch the Monte trick and go see her
afterward."
     "That won't be necessary," the physician explained. "You can see how she
is and phone me."
     "Suppose we go up to see her now," began Maywick. "Then I can drive you
home -"
     "Find the Lady!" interrupted Varno, brandishing two spot cards and a red
queen. "You think you can't miss, but you do. The hand is not just quicker than
the eye; it is quicker than the mind! Find the Lady and then learn how!"
     "Good advice for you, Maywick," chuckled Herkimer, slapping his hand on
the bearded man's shoulder. "Learn how to find the lady and you won't have to
hunt a half an hour the next time she disappears."
     That brought a Van Dyke smile from Maywick.
     "That lady found herself, Herkimer."
     "Lucky for you she did," nodded the physician. "You didn't tell me the
patient was missing when you stopped at my place to bring me here."
     "I supposed she would be found by that time," rejoined Maywick, "and she
was."
     "Yes," admitted the physician, "she was back when we arrived here. If
you'd phoned me earlier, though, I might have helped you hunt for her. Well,
good-night, Maywick."
     "Let me drive you home, doctor -"
     "Nonsense. It's only a few blocks. You like magic, so stay and watch
Varno's tricks. Maybe you should tell Varno that you dabble in the mystic art
yourself."
     "I do a few tricks," admitted Maywick. "Just as a hobby, you know." He
drew back his coat and showed a small badge with a peculiarly cryptic emblem.
"I belong to the S.O.S."
     "Society of Sorcerers," identified Varno. Then, under his breath, he added
the nickname that applied to that amateur aggregation and their performances:
"Same Old Stuff."
     Maywick didn't catch the derogatory statement and Varno followed it with
the glib announcement:
     "You'll like my Monte routine, mister. All the magi say it's the best.
First, you mark the queen -"
     By then, Cranston had left, like Herkimer. The intricacies of the Monte
trick would hold Maywick a long time, since he was interested in such
deceptions. Meanwhile, Val Varno would be fully occupied in demonstrating it,
which allowed good opportunity to check on the activities of a more polished
deceiver, Glanville Frost.

     Quite recuperated from her ordeal of the evening, Bonnie Blye was seated
in the living room of her suite on the eighteenth floor of the Chateau
Parkview. The fact that Bonnie could afford a suite at such a fancy-priced
hotel, added substantially to the aura of mystery that this glamour blonde had
already woven about herself.
     Particularly it intrigued Bonnie's lone caller, a suave gentleman who
answered to the name of Glanville Frost. It hadn't been difficult for Frost to
introduce himself; he had simply phoned Bonnie's room and announced that he was
coming up in behalf of the management.
     Now Frost was carrying through with that pretext and handling it adroitly.
He'd mentioned that he was a magician, because that was part of his scheme.
Also, it promised well for Bonnie.
     "It's about Planchini," Frost was saying. "He's finishing his engagement
here at the Chateau Parkview as soon as he winds up the current week."
     Bonnie's eyes lighted with surprise, then became troubled.
     "On my account?" she inquired. "But I'm sure he didn't intend to hypnotize
me at all."
     "You really were hypnotized, weren't you?"
     "Completely," Bonnie admitted. "It was just like a blank. When I woke up,
I couldn't remember a thing. That is, nothing except -"
     "Except what?"
     Frost put the question coolly but firmly and Bonnie, perhaps mistrusting
her ability to resist direct questioning, let her eyes stray away.
     That was how the girl's gaze happened to fix on the door and stay there,
so strained that Frost began to wonder if another hypnotic trance was coming
over her. Wheeling in his chair, Frost demanded:
     "Who's there?"
     At that, Bonnie laughed lightly.
     "Just my imagination," she explained, gesturing toward the door. "I
thought for the moment that I saw the door close, but my eyes are jumpy, that's
all."
     On his feet, Frost took a few steps toward the door, then returned. The
door was closed, hence if anyone had opened it, that person must have retired
outside. Certainly no one would have the temerity to remain within the door,
expecting to stay unobserved in a restricted triangle of gloom that slanted
from the doorway to the adjacent wall.
     Frost's self-importance restrained him from going over and prowling the
spot in question. Moreover, the hand that Frost had slipped into the pocket of
his tuxedo jacket failed to find a little bottle there. Remembering that he had
returned those capsules to Varno, Frost was struck by another thought.
     It wouldn't do to stage the flash trick in Bonnie's presence. Perhaps her
memory would prove as long as Frost's was short. A man who specialized in
tricks, Frost was beginning to suspect that Bonnie was trying one on him.
Turning to the girl, Frost asked smoothly:
     "What was it you said you remembered?"
     "Nothing, really," replied the girl, pursing her eyebrows. "It was like
one of those odd dreams, the kind that puzzle you afterwards. There was someone
I intended to go and see, that was all."
     "And did you?"
     "Of course not," laughed Bonnie. "I just wandered around outside the hotel
until somebody steered me back in again. Only now I'm not worrying about seeing
that person."
     "Why not?"
     "Because I feel it would be useless," sighed Bonnie. "I'm afraid it was
foolish for me to come to New York at all." She shook her head sadly. "I'm sure
there's nothing I can do here now."
     Bonnie didn't specify anything further, so Frost took over from that point.
     "About Planchini," he resumed, casually. "It's not your fault he's
through. He's just been working his act too strong."
     "Too strong?"
     "Overdoing it," interposed Frost. "He's been predicting the future. That's
telling fortunes. There's a police ruling against fortune tellers working
nightclubs in New York."
     "There is?"
     "Absolutely. If Planchini was really smart, he'd taper off with a hypnotic
act and then switch to magic. But he'll have to try that out of town first. Now
my way would be to work it the other way around."
     Noting Bonnie's interested, yet puzzled expression, Frost came right to
the particulars.
     "I'd start with magic," he explained, "then swing into hypnotism, and
finally throw in some mentalism, a two person act, if you know what I mean."
     Bonnie shook her head to indicate she didn't.
     "You'll find out soon enough," declared Frost blandly. "We'll open with
the bullet catching act, which will be a real sensation. After a few weeks,
we'll introduce some hypnotism, because you're a natural subject -"
     "I'm to be working with you?" interrupted Bonnie. "But I don't know a
thing about show business!"
     "You don't need to know anything at the start," insisted Frost. "By the
time we get around to the mental act, six weeks from now, you'll be fully
rehearsed."
     Bonnie began to laugh, happily, but with a dash of hysteria.
     "And I thought I could stay in New York," expressed the girl. "I was
beginning to think I'd have to give up what I came for" - she caught herself
quickly - "that is, I was beginning to think I'd have to save my money. But now
you're telling me I can make money -"
     "And plenty," put in Frost. "You can stay right here in this suite. Only
I'll handle all the interviews and manage the show. Wait until you see the
publicity break that will put us across. I'll tell them -"
     By "them" Frost meant reporters and he swung as though to address an
imaginary gallery of such, only to halt as abruptly as Bonnie had before. This
time it was Frost who thought his eyes were getting jumpy. He could have sworn
he saw the door close, slicing off a portion of that triangular darkness.
     Two strides, then Frost halted. Nonchalantly, he turned and bowed to
Bonnie, then sauntered toward the door. Reaching it, he was turning the knob
casually, when a knock came from the other side. Whipping the door open, Frost
was confronted by a red-haired elevator girl.
     "I came for that extra phone book," Reds announced. "The one somebody
dragged up from the cigar counter, when all the excitement was on. They're
yelling for it downstairs."
     Letting Reds pass, Frost strode to the elevator expecting to find someone
there. The elevator was empty, so Frost looked toward a distant door marked
"Fire Tower" and thought he saw it closing. Hurrying to that door, Frost stared
down a flight of dimly-lighted steps, listening for sounds from below.
     There were no sounds; nothing but a streak of noiseless blackness that
Frost didn't see as it glided from the steps to reach a door on the floor
below. There, a door opened so quietly that its sound did not carry.
     A tall, cloaked figure appeared in the seventeenth corridor, to catch the
brief red flicker of a light that denoted a passing elevator. A whispered laugh
came from beneath the slouch hat worn by this shrouded personage.
     That mirth symbolized the secret, unseen visitor who had listened in on
Frost's chat with Bonnie:
     The Shadow!


     CHAPTER XVI

     AT the Chateau Parkview they followed the practice of parking surplus
elevators at various levels rather than the ground floor; this, because of
changeable express schedules and similar factors.
     When elevator operators took over duty, they entered those cars by opening
the doors with a hooked implement misnamed a key. Such "keys" were not too
difficult to get, at least The Shadow hadn't found it so.
     That was why, shortly after the episode in Bonnie's suite, the ground
floor dial above an elevator door showed that a car was coming down dead-head,
but no one noticed it, not even the usually alert cigar counter girl who
answered to the name of Smokey.
     The term "Smokey" would have applied better to the shape that issued from
the elevator. The door began to open, imperceptibly at first, then with a
sliding part-way motion that reversed itself all in one sweep, during which the
yawning blackness of the elevator briefly precipitated itself outward.
     One witness alone traced something of what followed. That witness was
Glanville Frost who had come downstairs meanwhile and was standing quietly with
the group that was watching Val Varno baffle Sidney Maywick with the climax of
the Monte trick.
     Maybe Frost's imagination was at its peak, but he could have sworn he saw
something blackish glide across the lobby and fade through an obscure doorway
beyond. Watching, Frost remained taut until he was startled by a sharp nudge at
his elbow.
     It was Varno who nudged. The group was breaking up and Varno was
sidemouthing a query:
     "How'd I do? Or rather, how'd you do?"
     "I'll tell you later," gritted Frost, under his breath. "Meanwhile, slip
me that bottle of flash pills. I'm carrying those from now on, just in case I
meet a certain somebody who needs to be shown up."
     All traces of anything resembling The Shadow were gone by the time Frost
received the bottle. Frost was preparing solely for a future meeting with
something that still might be a product of his imagination, but which he feared
could be real.
     The men who should have thought about The Shadow in present terms were
Keene Marker and Smiley Grimm. Their mistake was simply that they were
considering the past.
     At their favorite table in the Crystal Room, the two slick crooks were
methodically taking notes of Planchini's late show, which was proceeding at its
smoothest. Nothing sensational had developed yet, but Planchini was smoothly
convincing his audience of his psychic powers.
     "Throwing their questions right back at them," said Keene. "He's seeing
palm trees in the crystal, but he gets the impression of snow flakes fading
from the picture. Now he's talking about Christmas -"
     "And the lady is nodding all amazed," added Smiley, looking across to a
table where a woman was nodding to everything Planchini said. "Chances are she
wrote a question: 'Will I get my train reservation to Florida in December?' so
Planchini is playing it as though she hadn't written anything."
     Planchini's voice came authoritatively across the floor:
     "Concentrate, please! I see the name that is solely in your mind! The word
'Florida' is in the crystal -"
     Keene gave a grunt and checked his list, while Smiley did the same.
     "That's the last," decided Smiley. "I don't think any of them count, this
show."
     "Why should they?" queried Smiley. "That one assignment we took tonight
was plenty."
     Recollection of events at Zerber's demanded increased caution. The cronies
in crime put their heads closer together and the mere action blocked off what
little light reached the table. In so doing, Keene and Smiley cut off something
else, the trace of a deep gray silhouette that had begun to creep between them.
     It was the shadow of The Shadow, cast before. Lost in the gloom just
behind Keene and Smiley was a cloaked form standing so close that he could have
placed his hands upon the shoulders of the two men at the table.
     "A bad job tonight," undertoned Keene. "I didn't like it."
     "Neither did I," low-voiced Smiley. "We missed out again and The Shadow
was the reason."
     "It wasn't just that." Keene's tone was nervous. "The Agnew job was only
robbery. What happened at Zerber's was murder."
     "So what?" Smiley's words came through his teeth. "Dirk Quingal took one
rap; Hawser Thorgin the other."
     "Except we know they weren't to blame. Suppose the police find out the
same?"
     "It would be worse if they found out about Dirk, because we really staged
a robbery at Agnew's. In the case of Hawser, it wouldn't matter. We didn't do
anything at Zerber's."
     "Except bring Hawser there -"
     "And Hawser wasn't the murderer." Smiley's tone had emphasis. "We can
vouch for that, because he came along with us."
     "Which is something we don't want anybody to know," reminded Keene,
sourly. "The police would mark us down as accomplices."
     "Except that Zerber was already dead -"
     "On whose word? Nobody's but ours, unless the Shadow wants to give us a
clean bill."
     That very suggestion relieved the tension. Smiley laughed at what Keene
said and in his turn, Keene couldn't help but see the humor. The pair were
still chuckling when the lights came on, marking the end of Planchini's act.
     Fortunately, Keene and Smiley watched the great mystic bow off, otherwise
they might have noticed the blackness that receded from their very elbows, like
foam retiring from a spent surf.
     Even more ironical was the fact that though both Keene and Smiley were
interested in where The Shadow went, they didn't look that way. The Shadow had
withdrawn to the door of the projection man's office, toward which the two
crooks tilted their ears, but were too smart to stare.
     Their voices reached The Shadow, though, for they were very close and
thought themselves alone.
     "Better allow Planchini a good five minutes," stated Keene. "It would take
him that long to get up to his room."
     "He was slow on the phone signal after the last show," reminded Smiley.
"He just managed to slip that one ring through before the projection man got
here."
     "Lucky it wasn't a latter question," remarked Keene, "or the fellow would
have heard the ringing. If Planchini had been faster with it" - Keene's tone
became an annoyed growl - "we'd have gotten to Zerber's sooner."
     "Maybe he didn't want us there sooner," suggested Smiley. "He could have
slated us for a rap along with Hawser."
     "If I thought that Planchini was trying a double-cross -"
     "Take it easy, Keene. We're not sure yet, and the only way to find out is
to play along. We're in this too deep to do different."
     Minutes passed until the dance act ended and the projection man came down
from his booth. By then The Shadow had shifted to another angle and he saw the
telephone in the little office. Keene and Smiley had their backs turned so the
projection man wouldn't notice them and The Shadow took advantage of that
situation to glide out through the convenient exit that the crooks themselves
so frequently used.
     Soon afterward, Lamont Cranston reappeared in the lobby, there to find
Sidney Maywick talking to Harry Vincent, the young man who had brought Bonnie
Blye back to the Chateau Parkview. According to Harry, Bonnie had simply been
wandering in a bewildered state asking people where the hotel was, so he'd
shown her the way there.
     This brought an approving nod from Cranston when Maywick introduced him to
Vincent. Maywick took the nod as something that accompanied the introduction,
but Harry understood.
     It was better to keep Bonnie's visit to Zerber's a strict secret, rather
than clutter the situation with too many clues.
     The Shadow knew!


     CHAPTER XVII

     A FEW days had changed matters immensely at the Chateau Parkview.
     Most notable was the fact that two signs now appeared outside the Crystal
Room, one announcing the merits of Planchini, the Famous Mentalist; the other
advertising Glanville Frost, Master of Mystery, assisted by Bonnie Blye.
     These two claims were rather speculative in themselves. As a "mentalist,"
Planchini didn't state that he was a fortune teller, nor did the term "master
of mystery" specify that Frost was a magician.
     As a matter of record, Frost seemed to have the edge as a fortune teller,
except that he made his predictions privately instead of publicly. He'd told
Bonnie that Planchini wouldn't stay long at the Crystal Room and it looked as
though the prophecy would come true. Rumor was stirring, though, that Frost
knew how to shape the future.
     Somebody had phoned a complaint to the police regarding Planchini and that
complaint could very well have come from Frost. Otherwise it was a very
remarkable coincidence that he should have tried to book his act at the Crystal
Room just at the time when the management had been officially informed that
Planchini would have to go.
     Only Planchini hadn't gone.
     Smartly, Planchini was extending his time limit on the ground that fortune
telling wasn't part of his act. Sheer entertainment was all that Planchini
offered; no fortunes. The police were welcome to attend and learn for
themselves. But the hotel management, doubtful that Planchini's act could stand
up in such diluted form, had booked in Frost to share the bill, just in case
Planchini's popularity faded.
     There were other changes at the hotel.
     The girl behind the cigar counter had gone on a vacation and a
quiet-mannered brunette had taken her place. Planchini had nicknamed her
Smokey, like her predecessor, but her real name was Myra Reldon and she was
working for The Shadow.
     So was a new doorman named Jericho Druke, a powerful African who was very
gentle with doors of pre-war taxicabs, because his powerful grip, if normally
exerted, might have ripped those doors from their hinges.
     Being short-handed, the hotel had hired two other men who belonged in The
Shadow's service: Hawkeye and Tapper. Anywhere that Hawkeye couldn't pry,
because of locked doors and such, Tapper provided the method. The Chateau
Parkview was literally providing open house, thanks to this capable pair, but
only for The Shadow.
     The natural rivalry between Planchini and Frost was something with
potential news value, particularly as Frost calmly claimed that he had
purposely let his assistant be hypnotized by Planchini as a test. So Clyde
Burke, a star reporter with the New York Classic, was on hand to cover the
first show in which both wonder workers were to appear. It happened that Clyde
was another of The Shadow's agents.
     Harry Vincent was around as usual, but Lamont Cranston hadn't been seen at
all. Hence on this particular evening, Sidney Maywick was both pleased and
surprised when he saw his calm-mannered acquaintance stroll into the lobby.
     "Hello, Cranston!" greeted Maywick. "Here to see the big duel in the
Crystal Room?"
     "Duel?" queried Cranston. "You mean some fencers are going to perform?"
     "No, no," laughed Maywick. He gestured to the display boards outside the
Crystal Room. "I mean Frost versus Planchini. One deceives the eye, the other
baffles the mind. I think I can make room for you at my table. How about it?"
     Cranston considered; then nodded.
     "I think I can make it," he said. "I just dropped in to see a friend who
is stopping here. His name is Slade Farrow. Do you know him?"
     Maywick shook his head.
     "It's just a casual visit," added Cranston. "So I probably won't be long.
If anything delays me, I'll phone your room, Maywick."
     Casual described Cranston's meeting with Farrow, so far as the manner of
the two men was concerned, but the subject they discussed was anything but
trivial. Farrow was a stoop-shouldered man who greeted Cranston with an
apologetic bow, then took a quick look out into the corridor before closing the
door of the hotel room.
     When Cranston was seated, Farrow took another chair, then tilted his head
in a listening attitude. He was a curious type, this man who was well along in
middle-age. He looked tired, yet alert; his face was hard, but ready to relax;
his deep-set eyes cold, yet somehow sympathetic.
     People who noted these conflicting traits would not have been surprised to
learn that Farrow had spent some of his best years as the inmate of a dozen
penitentiaries; he had the mark. What would have surprised them was the fact
that Farrow had never been anything but a voluntary convict. By profession,
Slade Farrow was a criminologist who preferred laboratory work and his idea of
a laboratory was a prison cell.
     There, Farrow learned what really made convicts tick. Most of all, he
could detect the mechanical flaws of a certain type of human clockwork.
Convicts who constantly reiterated the same old story, the claim that they were
innocent, were the sort that intrigued Farrow most. Given a few weeks with such
a man, Farrow could find out the lie that the fellow sought so ardently to hide.
     Except when there was no lie.
     That was Farrow's great purpose, to prove the innocence of men whose
punishment was undeserved. When he struck upon one of those very rare cases, he
counted upon The Shadow to help him gain vindication for the man in question. To
Farrow, Lamont Cranston was the Shadow's spokesman on such occasions.
     A case was now on the board; that of Hubert Lidden.
     Silently, Farrow handed over his full report, including a photograph of
Lidden, a wan, haggard man whose features looked as though they had been beaten
from within. But Farrow didn't judge from mere appearances.
     "Lidden was doing too well with his brokerage job," asserted Farrow. "Too
well to go in for forgery. He handled checks for clients as a matter of
convenience, but the orders came from the firm. It would have been very easy
for him to put through duplicate checks, the way the prosecution claimed. I
would say too easy."
     Cranston's eyebrows raised slightly.
     "Too easy?"
     "Yes," affirmed Farrow, "because he would either have worked some system,
like a clever criminal; or he would have overworked it, like a greedy one.
Instead, he played it hit or miss."
     To prove his point, Farrow indicated a paragraph of his report.
     "The Agnew instance is an example," said Farrow. "Lidden knew that J.
Allison Agnew was due in town; that he always went over his wife's records as a
matter of course. If Lidden had waited only a week, he could have slipped that
check through safely. Instead, he played it right into Agnew's hands."
     Standing where he could look across Cranston's shoulder, Farrow pointed
out other incidents that followed the same theory. He finally came to the best
of all.
     "Those checks of Zerber's," declared Farrow. "There were two of them, each
for twenty-seven hundred and fifty dollars; one genuine, the other forged.
Zerber thought he'd made out both of them through some oversight. So he wrote
Lidden a note about it."
     To save time, Farrow took the report and thumbed through to another page
while he continued:
     "All Lidden had to do was look through his own records and discover the
mistake; that is, if he was crooked. It would have been smart for him to pay
Zerber back, because" - here Farrow paused to tap the new paragraph he wanted -
"because a forged check had just gone through on Homer Wingate, the importer,
for thirty thousand dollars.
     "Now Wingate was a friend of Zerber's and the very man to whom Zerber
would have mentioned the matter if Lidden didn't settle it. If Lidden had been
crooked, he would have covered up. Instead, he wrote Zerber a very testy
letter, accusing him of trying something shady."
     Going back to his chair, Farrow let Cranston finish the report. Then:
     "Zerber never appeared in court at all," recalled Cranston. "What was
Lidden's theory on that?"
     "He thinks Zerber believed him," replied Farrow. "But the case was so
strong against Lidden that if Zerber had produced the forged check, the
prosecution would have used it as a clincher and ruled out the letter."
     "So Zerber retained both -"
     "Yes," interposed Farrow, "and Lidden's niece has the memo that Zerber
originally sent to Lidden. He was hoping, Lidden was, that she would go and
talk to Zerber, but he wanted her to see Mrs. Agnew first. If Agatha Agnew
would try to reopen the case in Lidden's behalf, the other evidence would have
some value."
     Cranston nodded slowly; then he inquired:
     "What is the name of Lidden's niece?"
     "She lives in the Middle West," began Farrow, "and she's probably somebody
you never even heard of -"
     "Her name?"
     Cranston's smile was slight, but it carried the opinion that Farrow had
overlooked something when he arrived at this hotel, namely the big new sign
outside the door of the Crystal Room.
     That Cranston was right was proven when Farrow made reply:
     "Bonnie Blye."


     CHAPTER XVIII

     THE Great Planchini was putting on his face.
     Not that Planchini used a mask; he didn't quite. But his real face, that
of a gaunt ascetic, didn't go across with the management of the Chateau
Parkview which felt that everyone should look well-fed in a place that taxed
the customers a five-dollar minimum charge. So Planchini's face needed building
and considerable, every night.
     Planchini used a darkish substance resembling putty that filled the
hollows of his cheeks. He sleeked his hair with a special but temporary dye
that gave it a distinctive gloss. Of course there were the brilliants for the
eyelids; Planchini had quite a selection of them, and he affixed them with
spirit gum.
     What made the make-up perfect was the life-size, hand-colored picture that
hung in a frame beside Planchini's mirror. It showed Planchini exactly as he
ought to appear and enabled him to fix his face to the last detail. Thus there
were three Planchini's in the strong light concentrated to include them: the
original, its reflection, and the picture.
     Meanwhile Planchini was listening to a conversation between Glanville
Frost and Bonnie Blye.
     Those two parties were not here in person; they couldn't be, since the
door of this hotel room was triple-locked. Planchini was listening to their
voices, which came from a small radio which served as amplifier for a
reproduction of a wire recording.
     Beside the radio lay an open telephone book. Its interior was cut out and
the open cover revealed two spools of wire, a tiny motor and a pair of small
dry cell batteries. This was how Planchini had been picking up all
conversations between Frost and Bonnie.
     Small wonder that Planchini had played his cards well and kept himself a
rival headliner in the Crystal Room. He'd learned about the new mystery act
soon after it had been decided upon; now he was getting details of a final
conference that had taken place this very evening.
     "Don't worry about this bullet," Frost's voice was saying. "It looks like
lead, but it's only wax. Painted silver, of course, but I dig my finger into it
to make sure it's wax before I load it."
     "But even a wax bullet might be dangerous," was Bonnie's reply. "Have you
tested it?"
     "I'll test one now," returned Frost. "See that target? It's about fifteen
feet away. Watch!"
     There was the report of a gun, an odd echoing ping, then Bonnie's voice:
     "Why, it just flattened away to nothing!"
     "Of course," rejoined Frost's tone. "It hit that thick wood, that's why.
Wax can't hold up; the mere heat from the friction of the air is enough to melt
it."
     "And I'm to be behind the target," came Bonnie's voice. "That seems safe
enough, but be sure you hit the bull's eye, Mr. Frost!"
     Hearing a muffled knock from the door of his room, Planchini turned off
the radio. He closed the telephone book and turned from the dressing table. All
was very dark away from the glare that Planchini's eyes had been absorbing so
long. A few long blinks, and Planchini saw the blackness draw away as it always
did. Putting the phone book under his arm, he turned out the strong light and
picked his way through the dim room to the door.
     Outside was Reds, the elevator girl. Planchini gave her the phone book.
     "Keep it handy," Planchini told the girl. "Smokey the Second, down at the
cigar counter, will tell you where to plant it when I want it."
     There being no feud between Reds and Smokey the Second, otherwise the new
counter girl, Myra Reldon, Planchini was quite sure that all would work out
right.
     So was The Shadow.
     As soon as Planchini had stepped outside the room and closed the door to
throw its triple lock, the darkness laughed, softly and serenely. What
Planchini had mistaken for blackness without substance had been the solid shape
of The Shadow, watching the details of Planchini's make-up and listening in on
his special recording.
     Now, with a tiny flashlight, The Shadow started through Planchini's
well-indexed files. Soon he found the very thing he wanted: an envelope
containing clippings and other data. The clippings referred to Hubert Lidden,
convicted forger and the topmost contained a statement by Lidden's niece,
Bonnie Blye, insisting upon her uncle's innocence. From a Mid-West newspaper,
this was the only clip that mentioned Bonnie.
     The other data included the memo signed by Gregg Zerber. It wasn't
addressed to Lidden; that was, it bore no mention of his name, but it referred
to the doubtful check that Farrow had mentioned. Also attached were some notes
in Planchini's own particular scrawl, plus a written question from Bonnie,
asking for information regarding the check that the memo mentioned.
     To read all this, The Shadow had turned on the strong light above
Planchini's mirror. Now, fully revealed in the glare, The Shadow looked at his
own reflection alongside Planchini's picture.
     Again came The Shadow's whispery laugh, with a note of prophecy that would
have worried even Planchini.
     Meanwhile, Planchini had gone down in the elevator with Reds. Stalking
through the Crystal Room, he bowed in his usual style to the customers
congregated there. Going backstage, he encountered Glanville Frost and gave him
as friendly a smile as was possible with the putty make-up. Frost turned away to
chat with Val Varno, who was a backstage visitor.
     Planchini took advantage of this to knock at the half-open door of
Bonnie's dressing room. The girl drew a dressing gown from the chairback, threw
it over her shoulders and turned to say, "Come in." Seeing Planchini, Bonnie
rose somewhat nervously, but the mystic's genial smile reassured her.
     "The best of luck," said Planchini. "I'll go on first to put the audience
in a friendly mood. You'll be the big feature."
     "I only hope so," began Bonnie. "On account of Mr. Frost -"
     "You're the act," interposed Planchini, drawing closer. "Not Frost. He is
no showman. I doubt that he has really rehearsed you."
     "Why, yes -"
     "Very well, then." Planchini's tone was a soft purr, for he had reached
the chair beside which Bonnie stood. "Then let me tell you just this -"
     The rest was scarcely audible to Bonnie. She sensed Planchini's words
rather than heard them. For Bonnie was staring wide-eyed into the sparkle which
she thought was Planchini's gaze.
     As on another night, Bonnie was fascinated by the glint, never realizing
that it came from the brilliants attached to Planchini's eyelids. Those
sparklers, however, were more hypnotic than Planchini's own gaze. As inducers
of hypnosis, bright objects are the strongest and Bonnie was focussing her
sight upon a vivid pair of such. Breathless, she was answering the words that
came from Planchini's almost motionless lips.
     In another dressing room, Frost was showing Varno a bowl of envelopes, a
duplicate of the type that Planchini used.
     "Dummies," informed Frost. "Switch them for Planchini's, bowl and all."
     "Neat," supplied Varno. "Copping originals by ringing in dummies is an old
gag. This is putting it in reverse. It ought to louse up Planchini's act and
proper."
     "And that," assured Frost, "is the precise purpose of this original
subterfuge."
     They stepped from the dressing room just as Planchini appeared from
Bonnie's door. Curt nods were exchanged as before and the three went their
separate ways. It was then that blackness moved in from a dim corner and
entered the room where Frost and Varno had held their chat.
     Seeing the bowl, the blackness approached it and in the light became the
shrouded figure of The Shadow. A thin-gloved hand plucked a few envelopes from
the bowl and opened them, to find blank slips within. Taking a chair, The
Shadow began to write questions on those slips.
     What was going to happen with Planchini's act was something that would
puzzle Frost and Varno, quite as much as it would Planchini himself!


     CHAPTER XIX

     SPOTLIGHTS and the Great Planchini.
     Bowing, the turbanned mystic drew an envelope from his bowl and held it to
his forehead as he gazed into the crystal ball. There, Planchini saw and
announced the name "Cairo" which was promptly identified by a stooge.
     Slinking in from the screen that cut off the backstage rooms, Val Varno
slipped into a chair and stifled a chuckle. Varno had been quite sure the first
question would be faked. Planchini hadn't been able to open his own batch of
envelopes tonight, not with Frost backstage.
     Therefore Planchini, master of unlimited nerve, was using the only system
at his disposal, the old "one ahead" gag long favored by fake parlor mediums.
Having faked a question and answered it, Planchini was now opening the envelope
to check the question and assure the audience that he was right.
     Of course it would be another question, not the one just answered.
Planchini would read that question to himself and answer it when he drew out
the next envelope. Which in turn would give him another question and so on,
with every envelope that he opened.
     Naturally Varno chuckled. In drawing blanks, Planchini would have no next
question to read. He would have to go on faking until everybody present would
know that there was something wrong.
     Only that wasn't what Planchini did.
     Looking at the paper he drew from the first envelope, Planchini nodded,
tossed it aside and drew another envelope.
     "Yes," said Planchini, "that first question involved the name of Cairo. I
now have another query, signed with the initials 'H. W.' which asks if this
person, 'H. W.,' should sell the jewels. I would say yes, if the price is
right."
     Nobody identified the questions, but Varno was a little puzzled by the way
Planchini had handled the blank slip without a show of surprise. Now Planchini
was going right on with the next.
     "Unsigned, this question," stated Planchini, "and wisely so. I shall not
divulge the name, because the person who asks it admits that he has a
considerable sum of money with him. He wants to know if he should proceed with
his transaction. Again, my answer is yes."
     Another question followed and now Varno was becoming very woozy.
     "Someone is really trying to test my telepathic faculties," declared
Planchini. "This questioner must have been in the lobby when a new guest just
checked into the hotel. He wants to know what room was assigned to a person
named 'Wingate.' I get the number" - Planchini paused dramatically - "one - six
- one - two."
     It went on, this amazing act that was too smooth to be merely a matter of
ad-libbing with blank slips, much to the bafflement of Varno. One question
involved an important package; whether or not it should be put in the hotel
safe. Another asked if an old friend could be trusted. A few more seemed to
revolve curiously about the others if anyone wanted to interpret them that way.
     Since people weren't calling out their identities, Planchini didn't waste
time sending the spotlight to look for them. He was working a different act
tonight, a fast one, because his time was limited, and he concluded by bowing
off to the usual applause.
     Also as usual, much applause came from the table where Sidney Maywick was
entertaining a group of friends. There was just one empty chair at that table,
the one reserved for Lamont Cranston. After looking for Cranston to arrive,
Maywick decided he must have been detained with Farrow.
     Now the great sensation of the evening was at hand. Spotlights were busy
showing the polished performer, Glanville Frost, as he bowed and introduced
Bonnie Blye, the hypnotic young lady who was immune to bullets.
     Bonnie indeed looked like a true hypnotic subject. She was attired in a
white fluffy gown that would have suited Trilby, the historic lady who was
susceptible to the mesmeric skill of Svengali.
     In keeping with the act, Bonnie walked steadily forward, eyes fixed
straight ahead. Frost stopped her, then proceeded to show a muzzle-loading
pistol to the audience along with a batch of bullets that clanked the plate on
which he dropped them.
     Over in their corner, Keene Marker and Smiley Grimm were watching these
preparations with interest.
     "I hope it works," said Keene. "It will be something worth knowing if it
does."
     "You mean you hope it won't work," corrected Smiley, "but it's one and the
same thing."
     "If bullets can't hurt people," explained Keene, "I want to find out why.
If I do, there's one person I won't mind meeting up with."
     "If you mean The Shadow," argued Smiley, "don't forget he packs a
different type of gun."
     Now Frost was taking the gun from someone who had examined it. He poured
powder down the muzzle, poked in some wadding, then displayed a bullet and
dropped it in next. Finally, he rammed home another batch of wadding.
     Varno came into the spotlight holding the wooden target at arm's length.
The target was a large affair, about a yard square. Varno took his position
midway between Frost and Bonnie, who were about thirty feet apart.
     All set to shoot, Frost beckoned Varno a trifle closer. The spotlight
moved accordingly, but kept on. Following it, Varno was getting nearer and
nearer to the gun, which annoyed Frost. Looking up to the projection balcony,
Frost gave wigwags, but the light still moved.
     Staring elsewhere, Frost learned why. Over by the screen that led
backstage, Planchini was gesturing to the projection man. Used to taking his
cues from Planchini, the fellow was following orders. It was Planchini's turn
to play hob and he was doing his best to ruin Frost's act.
     Except that nothing could faze the smooth Mr. Frost. As the target loomed
right in front of him, he nodded approvingly and beckoned Varno even closer. It
was good comedy, this, easing the strain that the audience felt. Varno was
bringing the target right to the muzzle of Frost's gun, so close that Frost
couldn't help but score a bull's-eye.
     The nervous laughter from the audience was a tribute to Frost. The muzzle
a mere foot from the target, Frost furnished everyone, Planchini included, with
a big, broadly humorous grin. Then, suddenly serious, Frost raised his free hand.
     "When I fire this shot," announced Frost, "the bullet will pass through
both the target and the girl without leaving a trace! Neither target nor girl
will be harmed in the slightest. Are you ready, Bonnie!"
     Bonnie's tone came clear and steady.
     "I am ready."
     Nervous people were leaving the Crystal Room. Among them were two members
of Maywick's party and he was solicitously seeing them out through the door.
Planchini, apparently disgruntled, had retired from the scene. Frost was
holding the gun, its muzzle almost up against the target, while he raised his
other hand to still the audience.
     The only sound that broke the silence was heard by two persons who were
just close enough to catch it. That sound was the ringing of the phone in the
little office over by the exit. The two men counted the rings.
     "Four," whispered Keene. "That means the question about Wingate."
     "His room number is sixteen twelve," undertoned Smiley. "We'll duck out
and get up there as soon as that gun goes off."
     At that moment, the gun went off.
     Terrific was the blast from the old muzzle loader. A tongue of flame gave
the target a brief, scorching jab. Varno jolted slightly as the target jounced,
but no eyes were watching him. All were fixed on Bonnie.
     With a shrill cry, the girl threw back her head and crumpled to the floor,
clasping her hands to the bosom of her dress with a wild, despairing clutch that
slipped away, for as she struck the floor, Bonnie's arms went wide.
     Half-staggered by the gun's recoil, Frost stood gaping at something that
gaped right back at him. If anybody needed proof that a real bullet had carried
all the way to Bonnie's heart, there was that proof and graphically.
     Punched straight through the bull's-eye was the evidence that really
staggered Glanville Frost, a flame-scorched hole that marked the bullet's
course!


     CHAPTER XX

     IT didn't take a thought-wave for Frost to guess the name of the mighty
mind behind this murder. Frost's maddened brain thrummed it all in one word:
     Planchini.
     Flinging the one-shot pistol aside, Frost brushed past Varno and dashed
for the screen behind which he was sure Planchini must be. As he went, Frost
whipped an article from his pocket in the shape of one of those handy flash
capsules that he had borrowed permanently from Varno.
     Then, rounding the screen, Frost pulled up with a half-jolt. Instead of
Planchini, he was confronted by a figure cloaked in black. He'd met the very
person that he wanted, that ominous foe known as The Shadow!
     One of The Shadow's hands was ungloved. It was extended in a
half-beckoning gesture, that seemed to call for Frost to calm himself. In
retaliation, Frost supplied the same treatment that he had doled out to Harry
Vincent.
     Frost's hand came up, flinging the capsule, which ignited fully in The
Shadow's face. That glare would have proven blinding, had The Shadow waited to
receive it. But The Shadow's lowered arm was on the up as quickly as Frost's
hand.
     The rising arm brought a sweep of cloak with it, completely covering The
Shadow's face against the spurt of fire. Then The Shadow's ungloved hand made a
swing in Frost's direction and a thumb and finger snapped.
     Right then, Frost learned of a potency that made the flame-gushing
capsules seem trivial. The Shadow's thumb and forefinger each had a tiny dab of
complementary substances that did terrific work. The snap exploded them with a
blast as sharp and startling as Frost's gun. The concussion literally jarred
Frost; he sprawled back on the floor and sat there stupefied while people
overtook him and dragged him to his feet.
     The Shadow was gone by then, bound somewhere and swiftly.
     Others had already left. Keene and Smiley hadn't even waited for the
confusion to begin. They were in the elevator piloted by a red-haired girl, who
had delayed the trip just long enough to get something from the cigar counter.
     As the two passengers stepped off at the sixteenth floor, the girl handed
the object to them. It was a telephone book.
     "I can't leave the elevator," the girl stated, deciding it wasn't wise to
disobey rules with passengers present. "The man in sixteen twelve needs a phone
book. Leave this with him, will you?"
     Smiley hesitated, but Keene promptly took the book. Then, as they swung
the corner, Keene explained.
     "The girl saw us come up here, didn't she?" Keene queried. "All right, she
might remember us later. Now we have an alibi. She asked us to leave something
in sixteen twelve, That's how we happened to meet Wingate. Get it?"
     Getting it, Smiley agreed. He knocked on the door of room 1612 and had the
words ready when the door opened:
     "Mr. Wingate?"
     Only it wasn't Mr. Wingate. The man on the threshold was Sidney Maywick
and his recognition was mutual. With a nod to the arrivals, Maywick invited:
     "Step right in. I'm expecting Mr. Wingate very shortly."
     They entered and Keene planted the phone book on the table where it
belonged. Maywick closed the door and studied the visitors quite blandly.
     "Sit down, gentlemen. I'm sure my friend Wingate will be glad to see you."
Pausing, Maywick waited for comment that didn't come, then asked: "Is there any
special purpose in this visit?"
     Shrugs were the only answer, but at the same time, Keene and Smiley did
some glancing about. They remembered questions involving jewels and money, a
mysterious package and a trusted friend. They were trying to link some of those
factors with Wingate.
     A key, turned in the lock, was the thing that broke the silence. As all
eyes turned, Maywick's alone could have recognized Wingate; but Maywick's gaze
froze like the others.
     The man who stepped into the room was Planchini, attired in his full
regalia!
     "Pleasant to find you here," announced the mystic, blandly. "While we wait
for Wingate, suppose I show you a clever trick I do. Better than those that
Varno does, Mr. Maywick."
     Planchini drew a coil of rope from under his Hindu jacket and drew the
ends to show that it was about a yard in length. Then, running his hands along
the rope, he began to stretch it.
     Keene and Smiley gaped as they saw the rope extend itself to double the
original length.
     "Fooled you?" queried Planchini, smoothly. "It shouldn't. You can buy a
yard of it in any magic shop. It's all in the weave; it's made to stretch."
     He was showing the rope to Keene and Smiley, but keeping his eyes fixed on
Maywick.
     "It costs a lot, but it's worth it," assured Planchini. "Because this rope
naturally contracts to its original length, so you can do the trick again."
     More than ever intrigued, Keene and Smiley suddenly found themselves
really startled, when Planchini added in his wise style:
     "One good trick often explains another. This stretching rope which is
really a contracting rope, tells why Gregg Zerber died at ten o'clock."
     A sharp hiss came from Maywick's lips, but he suddenly repressed it.
     "Zerber wasn't strangled," explained Planchini. "He was garroted. In case
you aren't familiar with the difference, garroting may be likened to slow
strangulation. The victim's breath is cut off to the point where he is
helpless, but still alive."
     A sharp interruption came from Maywick.
     "We're not here to see tricks, Planchini -"
     "You're here to listen about murder," interrupted Planchini. "A rope of
this type did it. Slowly, steadily," - Planchini was twirling the rope by the
ends as he spoke - "it contracted and what had begun as a garroting ended in
what the police mistook for an actual strangulation.
     "It's the only explanation, Maywick, considering the time element.
Somebody must have left this hotel at half past eight to reach Zerber's before
quarter of nine, the latest time that the garrote could have been put on
Zerber. Ten minutes from here to Zerber's" - Planchini paused to let the
calculation sink home - "and that elects you, Maywick!"
     It did elect Maywick, since both Keene and Smiley could testify that
Planchini had been working in the Crystal Room until nearly quarter of nine the
night of Zerber's death!
     "Why be a fool?" snapped Maywick. "You phoned a ring signal to these two
men yourself -"
     "I phoned it?" queried Planchini, as Maywick halted. "You mean you phoned
the projector's office from Zerber's. You were trying to plant everything on
me. You just proved it, by admitting you knew about the signal system. Your
system, Maywick, not mine."
     A long, hard laugh came from Maywick. His Van Dyke beard wagged with it.
     "See all, know nothing," scoffed Maywick. "That ought to be your slogan,
Planchini. All right, I'm The Brain. I was using these two men for their own
benefit. I wanted them to get their share of the Agnew jewels."
     "Fair enough," agreed Planchini. "You knew right where those jewels were.
Laura Jardine happened to have the combination and when it slipped out during
my act, you recognized what it was."
     Maywick nodded, beard and all, very proudly too.
     "Jewel robbing is a tougher job than forgery, though," remarked Planchini.
"That was what you worked on Mrs. Agnew before."
     That statement brought a glare from Maywick.
     "All you wanted from Zerber was a canceled check and a letter," continued
Planchini. "Zerber had no gems."
     "All right," snapped Maywick. "So I was covering up. Hubert Lidden took
the rap for my forgeries and he'll stay right where he is. If that niece of his
hadn't believed your press notices, she wouldn't have come here to consult you.
But that doesn't really matter.
     "I pulled a forgery on Wingate, too." Maywick looked from Keene to Smiley,
nodding for their approval. "I'm after his gems right now and the cash that
somebody is bringing to buy them. I'm cutting my friends in on it."
     "Now that they are here," returned Planchini, "you say you're cutting them
in. But it wasn't your idea. I planted those questions and I phoned the tip-off
tonight. I wanted your friends, as you call them, to meet their double-crossing
chief!"
     It all seemed out of character for Planchini, this business of being so
strongly on the side of integrity. But it was explained the moment that
Maywick's hand went for his gun.
     From Planchini's half-fixed lips came the unmistakable laugh of The Shadow!
     Equally startling was the looping whip that The Shadow gave the rope. It
licked over Maywick's wrist, formed a knot there, and hauled the bearded man
clear around, as The Shadow wheeled and snapped one end. Maywick's gun went
flying from his hand and he took a smacking, face-first dive right after it.
     Out of their respective stupors, Keene and Smiley remembered suddenly that
they were Maywick's accomplices, even though he had deceived them. They reached
for revolvers, but they were too late. It didn't even require The Shadow's draw
to stop them. In from the hallway stepped two men: Harry Vincent and Clyde
Burke, each with a handy gun to plant in a crook's back.
     On the way out, The Shadow, still masquerading as Planchini, met Slade
Farrow and gestured to the telephone book that lay on the table. Farrow opened
it and found the final item needed, Planchini's wire recorder, running
smoothly, steadily.
     That device had picked up every word of Maywick's boastful confession. It
was the evidence that would free Hubert Lidden.
     All that remained was to tell Bonnie Blye.
     It didn't take The Shadow long to rid himself of the putty overlay and
other items that would have enabled any good make-up artist to duplicate the
face that Planchini showed the public. The Hindu regalia was baggy and fitted
over Cranston's own attire, so he disposed of it as rapidly, this extra costume
that Planchini had used before he lost weight.
     Arriving in the lobby as Cranston, The Shadow was in time to see two wild
men come breaking from the Crystal Room, with a third behind them. The
fugitives were Frost and Varno, their pursuer was the real Planchini, shouting
for them to stop.
     Big Jericho stopped them. The new doorman took Frost and Varno each by the
back of the neck and carried them into the Crystal Room, with Planchini wheezing
alongside. They thought they were going to answer a murder charge, those
prisoners, but they were wrong.
     Cranston was already snapping his fingers before Bonnie's eyes, and the
girl, resting stiffly in the arms of men who held her upright, suddenly
responded by coming to life with a puzzled gaze.
     "A dangerous trick, Planchini," reproved Cranston. "You hypnotized this
girl just before the show and gave her a post-hypnotic suggestion. She was to
fall and play dead, the moment she heard the gun go off."
     Planchini nodded, somewhat guiltily.
     "I wanted to spoil Frost's act," he admitted. "After all, he was out to
ruin mine."
     Frost and Varno, unable to believe their luck, were staring at the wooden
target as though that still disproved it.
     "Another trick Planchini knew," Cranston told Frost and Varno, "but one
that neither of you ever heard of. At very close range, a wax bullet will
pierce a board easier than a lead bullet will. That was why Planchini coaxed
the target right up to the gun muzzle. He knew Bonnie wouldn't be hurt; she was
far enough away for the wax to melt itself before it reached her. But it did a
real bullet's job at the start of its trip."
     Much was dawning on Bonnie Blye, but she hadn't begun to realize the
surprise that still awaited. Lamont Cranston provided for the sequel quite
artfully, when he spoke to two attendants who were standing by.
     "Show Miss Blye to her room," ordered Cranston. Then in an undertone that
Bonnie didn't hear, he added: "The number is sixteen twelve."
     Cranston himself followed to the door of the Crystal Room. He was alone
there, when Bonnie, nearing the elevator, thought she imagined that she heard a
strange, parting message that somehow boded success as the climax of her
troubles.
     It wasn't imagination. Bonnie really heard it, the whispered laugh of The
Shadow!


     THE END