Maxwell Grant - The Shadow - 162 by Maxwel l Grant

Author:Maxwel,l Grant
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf

CHAPTER XII

DEATH'S DEAL

AGAIN on the move, The Shadow's first concern was for Herb Waylon. Making a convenient stop, The Shadow called the Southlake Hotel and held a brief conversation with Harry Vincent.

No outside listener could have suspected the purpose of that call. The Shadow spoke in the tone of Cranston, and the talk was brief. It meant, however, that Harry could expect a later call, in a drugstore a block from the hotel.

Boarding a cab, The Shadow gave a West Side address. Though perplexed by so sudden and mysterious a passenger, the cabby soon recovered from his puzzlement. He decided that he had merely been dozing when the fare stepped in.

The cabby was due for a real surprise at the end of the trip.

Finding the address to be an old boarded-up and shuttered house, the cabby

turned to inform his passenger of such. Except for a bill that lay on the rear seat, the cab was quite as empty as the house where it had stopped.

How and when the passenger had left the taxi, the driver couldn't guess.

He gave a glance at the old residence, muttered something about spooks and started on his way.

Curiously, in regarding that house as haunted, the cab driver was merely expressing the opinion of the neighborhood.

Recently, the old building had been a place of peculiar manifestations,

which several persons had reported but which none could prove. One chance passer had sworn that a ghostly figure had been swallowed by the blackness close to the old house. Another declared to have seen a gleam of light at an upper story window, where the boards had cracked open. There was also talk of a

batlike shape that had been glimpsed upon the roof.

Tonight, all those weird happenings were in operation, although totally unseen.

The Shadow moved into a space beside the building; the gloom engulfed him.

Scaling a dark wall, he opened the broken shutter and eased inward. Once he had

closed the shutter, he blinked a tiny flashlight.

A telephone appeared in the narrow beam. It was connected with an outside line, for The Shadow had attended to that some days ago. Dialing a number, The Shadow heard Harry Vincent answer from a pay station. In quick, whispered tones, The Shadow asked regarding Herb Waylon.

Harry had something to tell. He had been in the lobby when Herb had arrived at the Southlake Hotel, assisted by a cab driver. A bellhop had helped Herb to his room. From all appearances, Herb had been drinking heavily.

There had been no later results. It was evident that Chet and others in the racket knew of Herb's condition. Overindulgence in liquor was a light offense among crooks. In Harry's opinion, Herb had not put himself in wrong with the gang.

The Shadow agreed. It was certain that Herb would not be under suspicion because of The Shadow's own appearance outside the Club Miche. Criminals would figure that if Herb had been working for The Shadow, he would surely have kept that appointment.

ENDING the call with brief instructions to Harry, The Shadow followed the thin rays of the tiny flashlight, until he reached a top-floor skylight.

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