Mox

CHAPTER XXII DOOM DEFERRED

A LAUGH from the anteroom was the answer to Mox’s pressure of the button. Looking up, the disguised villain gasped. The Shadow had not dropped with the falling of the trap. He was standing, apparently in air, within the anteroom!

As Mox stooped, rigid, The Shadow spoke. His words began just as the chimes had ceased their striking. The fatal hour of twelve had passed. Mox had not delivered death at midnight.

“I remain,” declared The Shadow, in an ominous whisper. “Your trap fell, but without its burden. I have been here before you, Mox.”

Staring, Mox saw now why The Shadow had not dropped through the opened trap. The being in black was standing on two steel rods that had been fitted across the floor of the anteroom. That was the work which The Shadow had done on his visit before midnight.

“I surprised your henchmen,” sneered The Shadow, “as easily as they surprised Cardona. Shots from this floor might be heard. Those downstairs were not.”

Slowly, The Shadow advanced across the room. He avoided Cardona, who was lying groggy, on the floor, and stood face to face with Mox.

“Your game was plain,” came The Shadow’s mocking tone. “I found your records — on my first visit here. You did not have your own name marked. Wyngarth and Salbrook were ones that I discovered.

“They were not victims; nor henchmen. They were dupes, who feared you because you knew too much about them. There were times when you were forced to be away. You needed some one to play the part of Mox — to stay in your living room — guised as an old man.

“Such dupes would be useful, later on, to mark as Mox. You had two in order to be safe. Hoyt Wyngarth and Irving Salbrook. They lived here in turns. They went outside — always guarded. Thus Jarvis Moxton was seen around his home even when you were away.”

Mox snarled. His chuckle was forgotten. The Shadow had told him the truth.

“You sent Sulu to kill Harlew,” resumed The Shadow, in a taunting tone. “Your note, written in Sulu’s scrawl, was duplicated by my hand. Two men brought in their suspects. Joe Cardona matched Junius Tharbel’s measure.

“Sulu was ready to kill Hoyt Wyngarth. He succeeded. Although I was watching affairs, guised as a stranger in Darport, I did not prevent that death. Wyngarth’s foolish desire to tell his story was something unexpected.

“I suspected you from the time I saw you. But your betrayal came at the time you least expected it. Then I was sure that you were Mox. Your dog betrayed you!

“The dog liked Wyngarth. He had made friends with it. Disguise means nothing to a dog. It recognized Hoyt Wyngarth as a master. Irving Salbrook, too, when he played the part of Mox, was friendly to the dog. It recognized him as a master that it also loved.

“But when the dog came to Junius Tharbel!” The Shadow’s laugh came now as a weird, taunting whisper. “That was different. That was chance. Tharbel had been with dogs all day. Of course, it was natural that another dog should come to him!”

JOE CARDONA was sitting up. Although half groggy, he was drinking in The Shadow’s words. He saw the tall form that dominated the cowering figure of Mox. He heard the name of Junius Tharbel as The Shadow uttered it.

“You” — The Shadow’s eyes were blazing upon the fiend before him — “were the dog’s real master. It should act toward you as toward no one else. It did act so!

“You, a fiend with no human kindness in your evil heart, could never win the love of even a dog! That is why I learned your identity — when the dog cowered and crawled away as it recognized the man whose evil wrath it feared. That is how I came to know you for Mox, Cuthbert Challick!”

The Shadow’s free hand shot forward and ripped the hair and beard from the monster’s face. Joe Cardona, staring, gasped in amazement as he recognized the features of the man whom The Shadow had named — Cuthbert Challick!

The truth was plain. Challick had posed as a future victim of Mox, the murderer. He had come boldly to Joe Cardona. He had given testimony to support Joel Neswick. He had signaled to Sulu to slay Hoyt Wyngarth. His effort to save the doomed man had been a dramatic pretense.

Joe Cardona, still half dazed, groped amid his errors. Pride, not falsity, had governed Junius Tharbel. The county detective had slain Sulu not to get rid of a wounded henchman, as Cardona had thought, but to actually stop a fleeing murderer. His explanation of the dog’s friendliness had been correct.

But Cuthbert Challick! Cardona understood. The cowering of the slinking dog, its immediate retirement to a corner; those were the signs of a real but brutal master. The dog had growled at others, but not at Cuthbert Challick! Tense seconds had passed, then came the counter move. It was so rapid that Cardona did not realize what happened until the action was finished. With a fiendish snarl, Cuthbert Challick snapped his right hand from beneath the table edge, swinging his revolver directly toward The Shadow.

A ROAR resounded through the secret room. Quick though Challick was, he could not match his hand swing against the finger pressure of The Shadow. The burst of flame that accompanied the roar was delivered from the muzzle of The Shadow’s automatic. Cuthbert Challick sprawled upon the desk; then rolled to the floor and lay still. He had made his last move.

The Shadow turned to Joe Cardona. The detective was half seated, with his hands propping his body behind him. A black glove whisked from The Shadow’s left hand. Cardona stared, fascinated, as he viewed the gleaming girasol on The Shadow’s finger.

The jewel went from sight as The Shadow brought the keys from Cardona’s vest. Stooping, the being in black released the detective’s wrists. Cardona staggered to his feet. He made his way toward the anteroom, with its open panel. The path was safe; the trap had risen automatically.

Cardona pressed the outer panel and found that it opened readily from the inside. He turned as he reached the corridor, holding the panel open. He stared as he saw The Shadow stooping within the fireplace. The lever clattered to the hearth. The Shadow laughed with bursting triumph. The floor of the secret room began to rise.

The wall blocked Cardona’s view. It kept moving up — up — up — until a crunching of woodwork and ruined furniture told of the finale which Mox had planned. Mox the superfiend was already dead. And now his body was crushed.

Thus came the end of Cuthbert Challick, the inventor who had sought wealth through the murder of men whose plans he stole.

Joe Cardona let the panel fall. He went downstairs. He passed the bodies of the gunmen whom The Shadow had conquered in a swift, fair fray — a lone hand against three. The cool air of night was reviving to Joe Cardona.

As the detective paused, breathing deeply, he heard a weird sound that came as a ghostly cry from the summit of the old house. The sibilant tones of a sinister laugh swept forth in triumphant merriment.

The triumph laugh of The Shadow! The victorious cry of the superbeing who had deferred the stroke of doom!

It was The Shadow’s knell above the tomb of Mox!