Maxwell Grant - The Shadow - 251 by Maxwel l Grant

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

CHAPTER XII

THE MISSING SHADOW

OUTSIDE Cue's office, music was wafting softly through the Forty-one

Club,

barely drowning the clink of glasses, chatter of conversation, and flurries of applause. The acrobats were finishing their number, to the tune of the usual music that acrobats prefer.

Over by the far wall, Cue was wishing that the act would get off the floor. He was anxious to view the next turn, a blues singer who was reputedly hot.

Always with an eye to the future, Cue wanted an attraction to rival Kay Lorley, on the mistaken assumption that she would renew her contract under such

pressure. If he'd known how long the acrobats were going to linger for the applause, he'd have gone back to his office for the unsigned contract form and taken it to Kay's dressing room, so she could read it while she listened to the

blues singer.

But Cue hadn't gone to his office, hence he was quite ignorant of what had

just happened there; how his sluggers, Gaffey and Wingo, had overcome that most

formidable of foes, The Shadow.

Cue was oblivious to other things, much closer at hand.

Over at the bar, Mark Robling and James Suttern were clinking glasses to mark the beginning of their Tom Collins session.

Walter Creff wasn't drinking with them. He was standing at Robling's elbow, scrawling a brief note on a slip of paper that he had taken from his pocket. Folding the note, Creff gave it to an attendant and told him where to take it.

Clyde Burke watched that process. He saw the attendant sidle past the floor and go toward the dressing rooms. When Clyde looked back at Creff, he noticed the gleam in the fellow's wise eye, his tight-lipped smile. Clyde had a

very good idea that Creff had sent that note to Kay Lorley.

Robling placed his empty glass on the bar, used his elbow to nudge Creff while calling for another drink, which Tom the barkeeper promptly supplied.

Suttern wanted another drink, too; like Robling, he was arguing that Creff ought to join them. But Creff didn't even look at Robling's face, nor at Suttern's.

"Perhaps later, gentlemen," said Creff. His hands were toying with his fountain pen as he closed it. "Have your drinks" - he pushed Robling's glass toward its owner - "so you will be a few up on me. You chaps are more used to it than I."

Clyde was working back to Margo's table, to tell her his definite suspicion that Creff was seeking an interview with Kay, thus adding another factor to the situation involving the Framingham heirs.

Clyde saw that Margo was watching Cue Herble; thus the circle was complete. Everyone in any way involved was quite too busy to be thinking of what might be going on in Cue's office.

THAT secluded room was now the scene of a dramatic climax. Crouched above the huddled form of The Shadow, two men were staring at each other in the fashion of prospectors who had happened on a gold strike but still found it hard to believe.

Gaffey and Wingo had struck crimedom's jackpot: They'd bagged The Shadow!

What to do, was the next question.

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