Lingo

CHAPTER XII. VILLAINS DEDUCT

AT nine o’clock that evening, Bart Koplin strolled into a subway entrance at Times Square. Newsboys were selling early copies of tomorrow morning’s newspapers. Bart bought one of the “bulldog” editions.

Passing through a turnstile, the heavy-jowled private dick followed the planking and boarded a waiting shuttle train. Seated in the half-empty car, he read new reports concerning the supposed death of Rook Hollister.

The front page carried a photograph of The Hotel Thurmont, with arrows marking the rear windows of Rook’s apartment. Other pictures showed Rook, himself, in various poses. One when he had attended races on Long Island; another when he had left a courtroom after a squashed trial.

The shuttle train started and carried Bart clear to Grand Central before he had finished reading the padded accounts of gangdom’s revolt against its wavering czar. Bart tossed the newspaper on a seat. He left the train and made his way out through Grand Central Station.

Choosing an avenue, Bart walked northward. After several blocks he began to look upward across the street. He was in a district of towering hotels, huge structures that rose many stories above the thoroughfare.

One, in particular, interested Bart as he approached it. In any city other than New York, this hostelry would have been a civic pride, for it reared twenty stories skyward, not counting a small tower that added a few floors more above the roof.

In Manhattan, however, the building was dwarfed by surrounding edifices. A nearer hotel was bulkier and thirty floors in height. One across the street had forty stories. Further along, Bart viewed a mighty shaft that boasted fifty lines of horizontal windows.

Bart’s goal was the twenty-story building. A flashing electric sign gleamed the name “Hotel Moselle” in vertical lights of white. At top and bottom were short, horizontal words in red. These lights, unblinking, read:

BART entered the lobby of the Moselle. He joined a small throng in an elevator. The car sped upward to the twentieth floor. Bart alighted, walked through a space that served as upstairs lobby and chose a short, thronged passage that led to an outdoor roof.

There the private dick chose a table. He ordered a drink and waited methodically until he saw a tall, dark-visaged man in evening dress, who was conducting a group of guests to a table by the parapet.

THIS was Prexy Storlick, the proprietor of the Moselle Roof Cafe. The cafe itself was a concession that Prexy had taken from the hotel management. Shrewd in business, genial in personality, Prexy had been making the place pay.

Prexy’s past was a well-covered one. His geniality was a smooth mask, actually he had been guilty of cutthroat practices. Prexy had been the silent partner behind a chain of notorious speakeasies, each of which had boasted a dummy proprietor.

With the end of the speakeasy period, Prexy had seen a chance to step out into legitimate business. All his old “fixing” had been completely covered. The men who had served as “fronts” were in wrong with the law; but Prexy was not.

Bulging with cash, Prexy had bluffed the Hotel Moselle management into thinking that he was a legitimate restauranteur. Sole governor of the Roof Cafe, he had made the place into a bright spot that had attracted multitudes of patrons.

Turning from the new customers, Prexy caught a glance from Bart. In gracious fashion, the proprietor stepped over to speak to the heavy-faced patron, just as he might to any regular customer. But the words which Prexy uttered were out of the ordinary.

“All right, Bart,” announced the tall man quietly, “you can go up. Rook told me to send you as soon as you came in.”

Prexy walked away. Bart finished his drink. Then he arose and strolled back into the corridor that led to the elevators. Halfway along this corridor was a short passage. At the entrance was a table on which rested a telephone.

Beyond that, the passage terminated with the door of a little-used service elevator. But halfway along was another door in the side wall. This was the one that Bart chose. Hunching against the door, that passers-by in the corridor might not see him, he thrust a key into the lock.

Opening the door, Bart stepped directly to a stairway. He latched the door behind him and went upward through a gloom that was tempered only by a light from the top of the stairs. He came to a landing one flight up; there a closed door indicated an old storeroom. Bart continued to the second floor. He reached a little anteroom and knocked cautiously at a barrier.

The door opened. Bart Koplin was face to face with Rook Hollister.

THE big shot motioned Bart into the living room of an oddly arranged apartment. These quarters, twenty-two stories above the street, constituted Rook’s hideout.

This floor was like a cap stone that topped the Hotel Moselle. The tower itself was not central in the building. It reared from the south wall. A two-story structure, the first or storeroom floor was a solid hulk. This apartment, a sort of penthouse, was of smaller dimensions than the storeroom below it. Hence it was surrounded on all sides by a porchlike walk, edged with a cement rail.

The windows of the living room were shuttered; straight across, at the south side of the room, was a grilled double door that afforded access to the promenade that flanked all four sides of the penthouse.

Prexy Storlick, when he had rented the concession from the Hotel Moselle, had taken the roof and the two floors above it. This penthouse was his reputed residence; that fact was a perfect blind that protected Rook Hollister.

It was plain that Rook had been anxiously awaiting Bart’s arrival. The big shot wanted to know what Bart had learned. As they sat down, the dick lost no time in slipping the news.

“I have fixed Buzz Dongarth,” he declared. “It worked out just the way you said it would. What’s more, Buzz handed me a piece of info that’s going to knock you for a loop!”

“Bad news?” inquired Rook anxiously.

“No, no,” assured Bart, “it’s all right; but before I come to it let me give you the layout from headquarters. I breezed in on Joe Cardona. Pulled a stall about that movie contest of Waylock’s. I heard Cardona talking to some reporters.

“First off Cardona muffed his chance just like you thought he would. One look at Manthell’s mug made him sure the guy was you. He knew Trip Burley, so he shipped his body to the morgue along with Manthell’s.

“We hadn’t figured on him finding two corpses. So I don’t blame you for being worried by those afternoon newspapers. But it’s all right. Cardona muffed; and I guess his identification of Trip helped instead of hurting.”

“But who got Trip?” queried Rook. “Did Manthell find that rod of mine that I left in the dressing room?”

“No,” replied Bart. “He had an automatic on him, but it wasn’t yours. It was a .45 — and what a cannon it was! Cardona was showing it to some newshounds.”

“How do you explain that?” demanded Rook.

“I’m getting to it,” affirmed Bart. “First off, Cardona has heard that a bloke named Lingo Queed is to be the new big shot.”

“LINGO QUEED?” quizzed Rook savagely. “Why he’s nothin’ but a go-between! A smart guy, right enough, who knows a lot; but he hasn’t even got a rep as a first-class torpedo.”

“He’s got one now,” assured Bart, “and Buzz Dongarth told me the answer. Lingo Queed was in on that plot down in Chinatown, wasn’t he?”

“Sure. Trip told me that Lingo was the mug who arranged the meeting place. He knows the chinks and their talkee-talkee.”

“Well, Buzz says Lingo took credit for bumping you; but only those on the inside know it. Even the grapevine hasn’t got it.”

“You mean Lingo found out about that secret elevator of mine?”

“That’s it, Rook. I don’t know how he did it, though.”

“I do” — Rook was musing — “because I remember Lingo talking to that Jap who used to work for me.”

“Did the Jap know about the elevator?”

“Of course. It was the Jap who fixed it for me. But I didn’t suspect nothing wrong when Lingo talked to him in Japanese.”

Bart chuckled.

“It’s plain enough,” asserted Rook. “When Trip sprang that gag at the meeting, he gave Lingo a break that we didn’t know about. Lingo must have beaten Trip getting up to my place. He rubbed out Manthell and then plugged Trip.”

“It don’t fit, Rook,” declared Bart with a solemn shake of his head. “No it don’t fit.”

“Why not?” questioned Rook.

“Because Manthell and Trip were plugged with different rods. Here was the layout. Manthell had the big .45 on him, and the bullet in Trip came from that howitzer. Trip had a little .32; and the slug in Manthell fitted it.”

“You say that Trip had a .32? Stub-nosed?”

“Sure, I saw the rod myself.”

Rook nodded. His molded face was meditative.

“That was Trip’s rod,” asserted the big shot, musingly. “I told him to use a .32 because it wouldn’t make too much noise. I figured Manthell was a setup.”

“Then Trip really got Manthell?”

“Sure. And Lingo got Trip. Say, Bart — I see it! Here’s the way Lingo must have worked it! He got in there after Trip had bumped Manthell. He blasted Trip with the .45. Then he planted the big cannon on Manthell to make it look like the hick finished off Trip.”

“Sounds right, Rook. Only one thing though: Buzz says Lingo called the boys up there to look it over. How did he handle that? He had to make it look like he’d humped Manthell.”

“That would have been easy. Lingo could have switched rods around to make it look like he had plugged Manthell after Manthell got Trip. Lingo must have swiped that rod of mine out of the table drawer. Then, after bluffing the boys, he rigged the setup that Cardona found. The .45 on Manthell and the .32 on Trip.”

“A .45 is a pretty big wagon, Rook. It’s funny they fell for it, there in Manthell’s mitt.”

“What was funny about it?” Rook’s tone was scornful. “They all thought Manthell was me, didn’t they? I’ve got a rep, haven’t I? Wouldn’t I be a logical guy to have a .45 on hand? Especially when there was no other rod around the place?”

BART pondered; then he nodded.

“Lingo Queed is a smart gazebo,” decided the private dick. “A mighty smart gazebo, even if he isn’t a hot gunner. He was good enough to beat Trip to the shot. But that wasn’t tough, I don’t think. It was brain work helped him out after that. I’d like to figure out just how he did switch things around. Let’s see: first off, he came in with that .45—”

“Wait a minute!” Rook came to his feet with an excited interruption. “Say, Bart, we’re all wet! Lingo wouldn’t have had a .45! I’ve told you he has no rep as a gunner. It wasn’t Lingo that bumped Trip! Lingo just used his noodle — that’s all.”

“Who got Trip then?” queried Bart. “Answer that one, Rook.”

“I’ll give you a question of my own,” proposed the big shot. “Answer it for me. Who is it that they say always handles a .45 automatic? Not just one gun but two — maybe more when he needs ‘em?”

“The Shadow!”

Bart’s ejaculation came spontaneously. It was delivered in an almost frightened gasp. Rook nodded, and grunted a calloused laugh.

“That’s it, Bart,” growled the big shot. “I’ve figured out the whole lay. We’ve known that The Shadow was in back of these phony mobs that have been making trouble every time I tried to swing a racket. Sooner or later, The Shadow was due to pay me a visit. What’s more, The Shadow was smart enough to have trailed Trip without our knowing it.

“The Shadow must have walked in there right after Trip. He got Trip making a getaway, Bart. It was quick curtains for Trip, being up against The Shadow. Then The Shadow found Manthell, thought the hick was me, and planted his big smoke-wagon on the body.

“So as to fool everybody, see? That’s The Shadow’s way. He knew the bulls would figure that I might handle a .45; and he took my regular gat along with him, out of the table drawer.”

Bart nodded; but he remained a trifle dubious. Rook grunted inquiringly. Bart spoke.

“How does Lingo figure in it then?” queried the private dick.

“EASY,” responded the big shot. “Perfect. He came in later. Knew about that elevator, or guessed it was there, and decided to rub me out on his own. He breezed in and found things the way The Shadow had left them.

“The setup was a beaut. It ought to have been since The Shadow had framed it. Lingo fell for it, like anybody would that thought Manthell was me. Lingo saw it would do for the bulls. A swell find — Rook Hollister and Trip Burley, each wiped out by the other.

“But Lingo wanted credit for getting me. That was a cinch. He could leave the .45 on Manthell, to make it look like I got Trip. That part was great. Then all Lingo had to do was plant his own rod — a .38 probably — on Trip, while he took the .32 for himself.”

“And then,” inquired Bart, “he called the boys in?”

“Sure,” acknowledged Rook. “He let them take a look. They saw Trip with a loaded rod. The bunch thought I’d bumped Trip and that Lingo had got me. So they gave Lingo credit. He didn’t have to use any imagination after that.

“All he had to do was set things back the way that The Shadow had planted them. So’s the bulls would be guessing. And they are. Joe Cardona fell for it, like the boob he is. You can’t blame him, though.

“Nobody could have doped all this out but us. On account of our knowing that Manthell wasn’t me. Say, Bart — you burned up those photos you got from Waylock, didn’t you?”

Bart nodded. His expression was followed by a long pause, while he and Rook chewed the ends of half-smoked cigars. At last, Rook chuckled with satisfaction.

“I’m lucky to be out of it,” decided the big shot. “And Lingo is a sap to be in it. I wanted Trip to be the fall guy, running things while I was under cover. Lingo muscling in didn’t sound so good when you first told me.

“But it looks great now. I’ll tell you why, Bart. The Shadow was on my trail. That means he’ll be on Lingo’s later. If The Shadow gets Lingo, fine. If he doesn’t, we’ll rub Lingo after we get The Shadow. Then put a stooge in Lingo’s place.”

“But getting The Shadow’s no cinch,” put in Bart, ruefully. “It’s going to take a long time, any way you look at it. We’ve only got one way to pull it.”

“We have two, Bart. First, the system I intended to use. Through Buzz Dongarth. He’ll tip the real fellows in the bad lands to check on every mob. Sooner or later, they’re going to spot some of these mugs who are working with The Shadow.

“Get The Shadow’s agents, and we’ll have a lead on him. We’re hitting The Shadow where he’s weak, Bart. But that’s only one system. With what we’ve figured out tonight, we’ve got another way. Through Buzz himself.”

“How’s that, Rook?”

“Buzz will get close to Lingo. When The Shadow begins to put the heat on Lingo, maybe Buzz will be lucky enough to spot it. But grabbing The Shadow’s agents will be our first break.

“No matter how good The Shadow is, he can’t be everywhere. He was at the Casino Rouge the night Ping Gradley went to take Karl Durmsted for a ride. But there were others there, outside.

“Those are the ginks we’ll get for a starter. All the while, we’ll have Buzz keeping tabs on Lingo. We’re sitting pretty, Bart. I’m dead” — Rook laughed scornfully — “so they think; and that puts me at the top of the heap!”

ROOK HOLLISTER leaned back and puffed his cigar in satisfaction. Bart Koplin shared his chief’s elation. Big shot and lieutenant felt that their position was secure.

Both would have been concerned had they known of The Shadow’s own deductions, that the invisible scourge of the underworld was sure that Rook Hollister was still at large.

Yet, even with that situation existing, Rook Hollister held a powerful position. Untrammeled by the worries of kingship, this former ruler of the underworld was planning crafty measures from under perfect cover.

From the security of this hideout, Rook Hollister could strike as no foe of The Shadow had ever struck before. For the present, The Shadow could do no more than nullify Rook’s strategy.

Well had Rook planned this dive into obscurity. Through Bart Koplin and Buzz Dongarth, the big shot still retained a powerful grip upon formidable forces in the underworld.

Hidden conflict was in the making. Thrusts and counter-thrusts would come in the dark. The Shadow, by learning that Rook still lived, had merely lessened the odds upon which the big shot had counted.

All considered, the best was an even break for The Shadow. Rook Hollister, hidden ruler of crimedom, had reached the coveted position from which he could battle The Shadow upon equal terms!