The Unseen Killer

CHAPTER XXII. WEALTH REGAINED

“So it finally drilled through your head, eh?” questioned Darring, addressing Joe Cardona. “Filtered through the skull of the dumbest dick in the business.”

“How long did you practice that act of yours?” retorted Joe. “Wrestling yourself, like you did in the hall?”

“A long time,” acknowledged Darring. “That was part of the game — like the murders that I prepared. Trip Burgan was working for me. But I handled the killings myself.

“You’re dumb, Cardona. But not so dumb as your boss, Barth. He pulled the prize muff, right here to-night, when he chased Cranston out. I wondered how long I could stall off while Cranston was here. But when he went, I felt easy.

“It will be curtains for the three of you, thanks to you again, commissioner. Sending Markham away with the corpse. Well, when he comes back again, he’ll find four more.”

Darring paused. He held the others helpless. They were bunched together, three of them, under the muzzles of his guns. The fourth, Crofton, was still handcuffed. He could make no move, though he was wide awake by this time.

“Those three swindlers had plenty of easy money,” remarked Darring, referring to Hildon, Amboy, and Norgan. “I saw that as soon as I took up the executive job with Centralized Power. I knew that they were too smart to have left a loophole for the law.

“You, Warlock, were a fool. I knew that when I looked into Professor Lessep’s turbine inventions. When you told me about his scheme for devisualization, I knew the man was crazy. But it gave me an idea.

“Through Trip Burgan, I framed things with the professor. Trip did the talking. Lessep did not suspect that I was in it. He went through with the fake demonstration. Crofton vanished, as he told you.

“I wanted an Unseen Killer. One that I could use as a blind. That’s why I had Trip Burgan tell a man named Crazy Lagran to turn stool. So Crazy could get Joe Cardona on Crofton’s trail. It worked.”

Joe Cardona glared angrily. He saw the rest. Crazy had been paid to give the tip-off. It worked two ways. It made Crofton a hunted man, marked as a killer. It also kept Crofton silent in the hideout that Trip had provided.

“The professor began to weaken,” chuckled Darring. “I expected that. He kept calling up Trip. Something had to be done. Trip told him to ditch some of the apparatus. He did. I was with the rest of you. While we were looking for the missing lever, I put the bomb bulb in place.

“The professor did write himself that note — at Trip’s suggestion. Well, his death added another boost to the stock of the Unseen Killer. It also put Crofton in a worse light than ever.

“Then, I began. I knew all about Hildon’s house and Amboy’s apartment. I had been both places, talking over matters that pertained to Centralized Power. I mailed them death notes — Norgan, too — and they failed to answer. So I killed Hildon. As Cranston elucidated.”

Another chuckle. Darring was relishing this talk. He feared no interruption. In sneering fashion, he resumed:

“Amboy and Norgan double-crossed me. I found the black box. Loaded with blank paper. So I headed for the empty apartment and finished Amboy. I had no plan for killing Norgan. I knew he wouldn’t dare to welch.

“But I gave him an extra day to think it over. Cardona pulled something in the interim. The dragnet. That meant bumping Crazy Lagran. Chuck Galla did the job. Neat enough to make Cardona think he had bumped into the Unseen Killer.”

Darring paused a moment; then he glared venomously at Commissioner Barth who was blinking through his spectacles.

“You fool!” gloated Darring. “Cranston was right. Norgan should have been safe here to-night. But he tried some funny idea of his own — thinking that Warlock was behind the Unseen Killer’s game.

“This house, that Warlock bought so cheaply, I fixed it and arranged its sale to Warlock. That’s how he got the bargain. Why? So I could make it fit the Unseen Killer’s game. Warlock was a good goat. I knew that if any one began to wise up — like Norgan — he would blame Warlock because this was Warlock’s house. Look, you fools!”

BACKING to the wall, Darring pressed the back of his hand against a spot near the rear doorway. A panel opened with a click.

Three men stared. They were looking into the interior of Warlock’s wall safe. There, before their gaze, were the securities that Norgan had placed in the wall of Warlock’s study.

“A dumb-waiter once,” laughed Darring. “It made a perfect elevator. The upstairs safe has a solid front. But in back, the interior slides up and down. When this box is on the ground floor, another container is on the second.

“When this goes up, the other rides clear to the third floor. When they put the black box in here, I came downstairs and pressed the molding. One safe lining slid down; the other lowered into its place.

“The same thing happened to-night. But Norgan must have suspected something. That’s why he raised the fuss. Come here, Warlock” — Darring motioned with a gun — “and take a look inside. Don’t touch those securities. Just tell me if you see anything else.”

Warlock obeyed. Advancing, he peered into the opening. He nodded, falteringly, then spoke in a strained, quavering voice.

“I see a gummed label,” he informed. “It is attached to the side of this interior—”

“So that was Norgan’s trick!” snorted Darring. “Thought he ought to mark the inside of the safe. He didn’t find the sticker after the swag was gone. He came hustIing down to tell the police commissioner.”

With a wag of one gun, Darring forced Warlock back to where Barth and Cardona were standing.

“I came here after the black box,” he chuckled, “that night they left it in the wall safe. Started for my hotel with it, in a cab. I opened the box on the way and found it empty. That’s why I went to kill Amboy. But to-night, the swag is here. I knew it would be; that’s why I finished Norgan, when he began to talk smart. Well, you know now that there’s no Unseen Killer. That’s why I’m going to kill the lot of you, before you—”

He stopped. His eye had caught motion by the door. Turning his head, Marryat Darring stared squarely into a pair of burning eyes. There, in the doorway, stood the figure of The Shadow.

THE black-cloaked intruder had given no warning laugh. Only Darring had detected his arrival. Barth, Warlock, and Cardona were staring at Darring. Covered by the killer’s guns, they did not dare to move.

From his chair, Miles Crofton spied the figure at the door. He smiled weakly. The Shadow had made good his promise.

Crofton, alone, was a witness of the deeds that followed. He saw the sweeping move that Marryat Darring made. He observed The Shadow’s response.

Darring wheeled. Instinctively, he sidestepped, as he swung both guns toward the door. At the same instant, The Shadow shifted across the doorway. Crofton caught a glimpse of automatic muzzles.

A terrific roar filled the room as revolvers barked and automatics thundered. Tongued flame quivered from metal muzzles; pungent smoke wreathed upward from the weapons. Four shots seemed to come as one. Crofton stared.

No other shots were fired. Marryat Darring, his face venomous, stood like a statue. The Shadow, like a frozen silhouette, was rigid in the hallway. Then came the aftermath. Darring sagged.

The crook’s arms fell. Revolvers clattered to the floor. The self-confessed killer sprawled forward. His rugged frame spread out upon the floor. Marryat Darring fell dead on the very spot where Wallace Norgan’s corpse had lain but a little while before.

A strange laugh throbbed through the room. Like a whisper from a tomb, it brought a chilling awe with its terrible mockery. Paneled walls flung back sibilant echoes. Miles Crofton saw The Shadow swing away.

He caught the flash of crimson — the lining of The Shadow’s black-surfaced cloak.

Commissioner Barth sprang forward. He turned toward the hall. He saw no one. The Shadow had gone.

Only the last vestige of a hissing echo seemed present in the room. Barth hastened toward the hall. Again, he was too late.

Joe Cardona was bending over Darring’s body. He saw that the master crook was dead. Triumphant until the very last, he had met the death that he deserved. The man who had perpetrated the hoax of the Unseen Killer had gone, had paid the price of crime.

WHEN Lamont Cranston arrived at Warlock’s house, a half hour later, he was greeted with a warm handshake by Commissioner Wainwright Barth. The official did not suspect the dual role that his friend had played. He knew only that Cranston had paved the way to the exposure of Darring’s crimes.

Barth knew that some one — Crofton said The Shadow — had fired those shots from the hall. Whoever the deliverer, whatever his purpose, Barth was satisfied. Like Cranston, he held no grief for the three who had died: Hildon, Amboy, and Norgan.

Findlay Warlock had spread out the securities found in the lowered section of the safe. Wallace Norgan, fearing the Unseen Killer, had included all the spoils gained by himself and his associates.

Letters, agreements, options, together with cash and securities furnished proof of the game that the three had played. Shares of stock in companies that held riparian rights in Centralized Power territory were proof that the swindlers had planned their game long ahead.

Warlock’s company could gain prompt settlement through this evidence. With funds returned; with stocks of other companies obtainable, the Centralized Power Corporation could reorganize to the benefit of the men who had honestly invested in its future.

Miles Crofton stood exonerated from all charges. Darring’s statements, heard by Barth and Cardona, cleared him even of complicity in Melrose Lessep’s hoax; for Crofton had been forced into the deal against his will.

To a man, those who had died had been engaged in illegal undertakings. But the greatest crook of the lot was the one who had led others to their destruction. Marryat Darring, truly the Unseen Killer, even though he had gained no fabled invisibility.

Challenger of the law, vulture who preyed on others of his kind, fiend who had even plotted the destruction of those who had done his bidding, Marryat Darring had met one master whose power he could not break. The Unseen Killer had failed before the might of The Shadow.