The Red Blot

CHAPTER XVIII ANOTHER DISAPPEARANCE

IT was precisely nine o’clock when Lamont Cranston appeared within the portals of the Club Janeiro. There was something mysterious about the millionaire’s arrival. The head waiter, watching the usual entrances, did not see him until after he was seated at a table far from the screened archway that led to the offices.

There was a reason for this phenomenon. Cranston had come in by one of the side corridors — a route which the police had searched in the belief that Socks Mallory had escaped by such an exit on the eventful evening when Tony Loretti had been slain.

In fact, Cranston had done more than simply enter. He had paid a brief visit to the center of the three offices; there, he had deposited a bundle in an inconspicuous spot beneath a desk.

The millionaire had not lingered long, however. The voice of Juanita Pasquales, speaking over the telephone in an adjacent office, had caused him to stroll away before the call was completed.

When he noted Cranston, the head water immediately started toward the screened archway. He must have met Senorita Pasquales before he reached the office, for the man returned quite promptly; and the proprietress of the Club Janeiro appeared a few minutes later.

Five minutes went by; then the events of a slowly unfolding drama began their occurrence. The head waiter, stopping at a table where four men were seated, passed a card to one of them. This fellow, a heavy, full-faced man, who looked like an old-line political boss, nodded his head. He spoke in a low tone to his three companions.

Lamont Cranston, calmly puffing at a cigarette, observed the happening with an eagle gaze. Impassive, betraying no interest whatever, the hawk-visaged millionaire understood what was transpiring as clearly as if he had been one of the distant group.

The bluff-faced man was “Dynamite” Hoskins, a former denizen of New York’s underworld, whose persistent use of fuse and bomb had caused him to depart for places unknown. Back in Manhattan, Dynamite was making his first reappearance at the Club Janeiro.

At the end of the interval which followed the head waiter’s message, Dynamite Hoskins arose and strolled past the fringe of tables that surrounded the dance floor of the night club. The spotlight was on the floor; couples were dancing there; and the passage of this one man was unnoticed — with one exception.

Lamont Cranston, his keen eye watching through the semi-gloom, saw Dynamite pass behind the screen that led to the office archway. A few moments later, Juanita Pasquales left in the same direction.

More minutes passed; then Cranston himself arose. Quietly, he strolled to the edge of the screen, paused, and stepped out of sight.

THE action brought an immediate response from the three men whom Dynamite Hoskins had left. They arose together, slunk toward the side of the big room, and sneaked in file toward the spot where they had last seen the departing millionaire.

Short, crouching forms; tight, tough fists that gripped stub-nosed revolvers; these were the three that took up Cranston’s trail. Smooth and shaven faces had given a very flimsy gloss to these thugs. A stalking trio, they were now displaying themselves as hardened gorillas — paid assassins of the bad lands.

Meanwhile, Lamont Cranston had passed the crossing of the corridors. In fact, he had paused there a moment. Eyes from one hallway had seen his standing form. As Cranston went on toward the central office, Juanita Pasquales slipped into an empty dressing room and pushed back a cloak that hung in a corner of the wall.

Hesitating — almost fearful of the deed she was now to perform — the woman pressed the button and let the cloak fall back in place. Hastening to the door of the dressing room, Juanita was just in time to see the three stalking gorillas pass the crossing of the corridors.

Lamont Cranston had gone straight into the center office. The three men were on his trail. Juanita stole to the crossing; she noted the stooped forms waiting at the door down the hall. With trembling step, the woman hurried toward the archway, back to the night club where the entertainment was scheduled to begin.

A gorilla’s hand was on the door that led into the suite of offices. The barrier moved inward as the man turned the knob. Peering cautiously into the lighted room, yet seeing no one, the first of the assassins beckoned to his fellows. With guns ready, they sidled through the opening.

The leader of the trio had opened the door with his left hand. Peering past the edge, he had looked toward the office which had once been Tony Loretti’s, while the others had headed toward the little office on the right.

As the first man stepped just beyond the edge of the door the barrier was swung shut by the quick thrust of a figure that had stood behind it. The slam caused the three gorillas to swing in that direction.

Between them and the door was the sinister figure of a black-clad being that had appeared as suddenly as a ghost. A long cloak hung from hidden shoulders; an upturned collar obscured the lower portion of the face above it.

Topped by a black slouch hat, the upper portion of the countenance was concealed by the broad, turned-down brim. Two blazing eyes — optics that burned with a glaring sparkle — were the only visible features of that unseen countenance.

Blazing eyes! Threatening eyes! But they were not the only menace which the startled gunmen faced. Black-gloved hands projected from the folds of the cloak; each fist grasped a huge automatic, and the muzzles of the .45s were covering the trio who had come to slay an unsuspecting victim.

“The Shadow!”

The gasp came from three husky throats; and the echo of those words was a whispered, mocking laugh that issued from beneath the brim of the slouch hat. By a ruse as simple as it was daring, the terror of the underworld had gained the drop on the three armed desperadoes!

THE taunt of The Shadow’s mirth was a command. The gesture of those looming automatics brooked no opposition. Sullenly, the gangsters backed across the room, their arms rising.

The Shadow’s back was against the door; his enemies were at his mercy. One second more — his opponents would have been totally helpless.

But in that fleeting instant, The Shadow’s keen eyes caught a sign that came as a strange satire to his own mighty presence. Across the center of the room, The Shadow’s silhouette lay in ominous blackness. Now, from the doorway of the dimly lighted office on the right, The Shadow saw a shadow!

Someone was creeping to the edge of that door; someone lying in wait until the three assassins had acted. The Shadow had no choice. Another moment spent upon the three men before him would mean a menacing attack from the other room.

The Shadow was prepared. In that split second, he performed the unexpected. His position against the door was one of clever design. The elbow of a right arm moved beneath the folds of the enveloping cloak. It pressed the light switch at the right of the door.

Darkness. With it, two men sprang forward from the other room. As quick fingers pressed revolver triggers, the blackened form of The Shadow dropped into total darkness. That fade-away came just before the shots were fired.

Guns roared, and leaden slugs shattered the woodwork at the spot where The Shadow had been standing. In response came fierce tongues of flame, and terrific thunder blasts, as The Shadow’s right-hand automatic cannonaded its reply.

As one man hurried forward into the darkness of the center room, the other seemed to crumple in his tracks. Going down, he tried to rattle off further shots. His trigger finger faltered after the first wild bullet was discharged.

To the three gorillas in the darkened center office, these amazing events had happened with whirlwind rapidity. Accustomed to critical situations, they managed to respond after a momentary loss of action.

A rescue had been launched and thwarted — all in the space of one long, momentous second. The Shadow, he who counted time in delayed throbs, had proven his uncanny skill.

Now, revolvers about to slip from yielding fingers were caught with a new grip. Stabs of flame shot through the darkness as the three gorillas, dropping to the floor, aimed for the spot where The Shadow had been.

A master of strategy, The Shadow had expected this step. Knowing that his enemies would fire quickly, hoping to down him by spreading shots, he had not given his location by a left-hand fire against a trio of revolvers.

Instead, his lithe form had whirled across the room toward the door at the left. Three revolver shots — four — five — six — had come from gangsters’ weapons before The Shadow’s automatics barked their grim return.

With two guns, not with one, The Shadow aimed for those telltale jets of flashing light. Burning bullets rocketed through blackness. A scream told that one man had received a leaden messenger; an oath came as a gorilla dropped his gun and gripped his shattered right hand with his left.

Quick seconds in which more than a dozen round-nosed slugs had seared their way through that gloomy atmosphere. Burning powder bore silent evidence of the conflict. Four men were down; each a victim of The Shadow’s marksmanship; yet the phantom fighter remained unscathed.

Not only in the perfection of his aim had The Shadow succeeded. The timeliness of his shots was the factor that had climaxed his success. His speed, his swiftness in shifting to a new position, had enabled him to foil his adversaries.

Well did The Shadow know the futility of trying to outdo a bullet’s speed; just as certainly did he understand that the aiming of a revolver was no more than a human action.

In the space that others had leveled their guns at the spot where they believed the blackened target to be, The Shadow had left blankness for the bullets that were to follow.

SHATTERING echoes of the shots died in quick reverberations. Well did The Shadow know that one among his foemen was still active — one who was crouching in the darkness waiting for The Shadow to reveal himself.

There was one way to meet that hidden enemy. The Shadow’s hidden form stalked silently until it stood three paces from the door of the office on the left.

With his left hand, The Shadow fired a single shot into the room. A burst of flame; hidden behind its sudden light, The Shadow’s form made another fade-away. Not to the left, as the waiting gorilla would expect; but toward the right — away from the security of the inner office — out in the direction of the door that led to the night club.

The ruse was doubly effective. Not only did the lurking gunman suppose that The Shadow would dive back toward the inner office; he had also accepted the gun burst as a right-hand shot.

This last enemy was a desperate marksman. Three times his revolver coughed forth its message, directing well-sprayed shots toward the corner opening, following the course which The Shadow should logically have taken.

The answer came from the main door — the spot from which The Shadow had begun his original attack. An automatic thundered the single shot that brought quietus to the last of the three assassins.

Three jabs of flame had given The Shadow his target. A whimpering gasp announced the accuracy of his final delivery against the now defeated trio.

The way to escape was open. The Shadow did not take it. Instead, he aimed an automatic toward the office on the right — the only spot from which a new attack might come.

Splintering shots crashed into desk and chairs. A lull; the door of the center office opened and closed with a resounding slam. Silence was the condition that followed.

A long moment elapsed. Then, from that light on the right, came the figure of a man. Moocher Gleetz stood outlined in the door frame, above the bodies of his fallen gunmen. He was a safe cracker, not a gunman. From the inner office he has ordered his pair of subordinates to attack from ambush.

Moocher Gleetz scowled. He shoved a body aside with his foot, and moved in long strides to the outer office. He did not turn on the light of the central office; hence he never saw the tall shape that loomed in the darkness a scant six feet away. Moocher softly opened the exit door — the opening which he believed the victor had taken.

The sound of bedlam was coming down the corridor. Moocher’s cautious eye saw figures huddled by the screen. People were coming here; the quarry had escaped. Now was no time to linger. With long leaps, Moocher bounded back into the lighted office.

The Shadow moved. A long arm stretched to the closed door that led to the corridor. A firm hand silently turned the key; then softly withdrew it. Stooping, The Shadow slid the key out along the corridor.

It would be found there — apparently dropped by one who had escaped and fled, locking the door on the outside as he left!

With an automatic in his left hand, The Shadow swept boldly into the lighted office on the right, striding over the bodies of the men who lay before him. This was the way that Moocher Gleetz had taken; now, the room was empty!

The Shadow’s laugh was a low, barely audible whisper. Like a creature from another world, the black-garbed phantom stalked across the room and reached the farther corner. There, against the wall, was the cabinet with its shelves. His automatic dropped beneath his cloak, The Shadow sought for the combination to this solid-set article of furniture.

PANDEMONIUM was coming from outside the door of the center office. People, in the corridor, were trying to break down the heavy barrier.

The Shadow’s hands reached within the cabinet and joggled the uppermost shelf. It shifted downward. Pressing firmly, The Shadow pushed the shelf steadily. It descended, taking the next shelf with it. Small stacks of magazines and papers were compressed between.

The series of shelves, jammed down together, left a large space above them. Upon this, The Shadow rested.

A lull was apparent from the corridor. A shouting voice replaced the confused babble of excited tongues:

“Here’s the key! Here’s the key! We don’t have to break through! Give me room — stand back!”

A black-gloved hand had gripped the back of the cabinet behind the shelves. With a quick sweep, The Shadow slid this barrier to the side. An opening was revealed in the wall.

The black form scaled into total darkness. The back of the cabinet slid shut; the shelves came up automatically, now that pressure was released.

Men were in the suite of offices. They were surveying the forms of sprawled gangsters. Two — those who had come with Moocher — were dead. To meet their desperate attack, The Shadow had fired for their hearts as they loomed from the sphere of light.

The other three were wounded. They were the ones who could tell nothing. Crippled, they had known nothing but confusion after they had fallen. They were aids of Dynamite Hoskins. Their leader had gone; their enemy had gone also.

Police were coming in to learn the details of this new gang feud. The key that had been found upon the floor of the corridor seemed proof that someone had made a getaway by that route.

Senorita Juanita Pasquales, nervous and approaching hysteria, could tell nothing. She had been on the nightclub floor when the shooting had occurred.

But in her heart the woman knew that another man had disappeared tonight. Lamont Cranston, millionaire, had passed from view. Had he escaped? Even though she had signaled for those in ambush to arrange his certain doom, Juanita hoped that Cranston was the one who had left in safety.

The menace of The Red Blot — fear of it had made the nightclub proprietress obey the bidding of Socks Mallory. She knew the secret of that inner office; but she had stood the test of silence.

Police would come as they had come before. Nothing would be learned. Yet tonight, another man had disappeared. Lamont Cranston had left the Club Janeiro. If he had not escaped, he must be dead by now; slain by those in ambush, and carried through the secret way.

Dead or alive, he had given an amazing accounting for himself. Yet Juanita Pasquales felt positive that Cranston must either be a victim of murderers or a fleeing man who knew nothing of the mystery which enshrouded the Club Janeiro.

Senorita Pasquales did not know that Lamont Cranston had become The Shadow. Not for one moment did she suspect that he, as an invisible master of darkness, was now upon the trail that would lead to the heart of crime!

The disappearance of Lamont Cranston was of The Shadow’s making. The master of detection had not only won a mighty fight. Silent and unseen, he was on his way to the lair of The Red Blot!