The Red Menace s-4

by Maxwell Grant

  "That's the column you mean, isn't it?"

  "Yes, sir."

  "The idea is preposterous. I can't give you an interview on that subject."

  The reporter looked dismayed.

  "It means a lot to me, sir," he said. "It's too late for me to see any one else. I have to get the interview,

  Mr. Graham. I'll quote you accurately -"

  A look of mild sympathy came over the millionaire's face as he saw the worried expression of the

  reporter. He arose from his chair, placed his hands behind his back, and strolled to the large open

  window. There he pressed one knee against the low sill, and looked out at the city.

  Finally he turned and faced the reporter.

  "I'll give you a short interview, my boy," he said, in a kindly tone. "I don't like the subject, and I would

  ignore it under ordinary circumstances.

  "But I'll help you out. I'll tell you just what I would do if I had one hour to live."

  Instinctively, the reporter glanced at his watch and saw that it registered exactly four o'clock.

  "At this particular moment," said Jonathan Graham, "I have several letters to dictate. It is the wind-up of a

  day's routine. I shall be finished at exactly five o'clock. That's just about an hour from now, isn't it?"

  The reporter nodded.

  "Very well," continued the millionaire. "This coming hour is set and established in my mind. I expect to

  carry it to its normal conclusion.

  "It matters not to me whether I have one hour, or one hundred years, of life ahead of me. That hour will

  be devoted to the work for which I have appointed it."

  While Stevens jotted his notes, the millionaire walked a few steps; then turned and took his position

  facing the window.

  The reporter looked up and spoke.

  "What else, sir?" he questioned.

  "That is all," replied the millionaire, resting his knee against the window sill.

  "Nothing else, sir?" asked Stevens.

  The millionaire retained his pose, which seemed to be a favorite position.

  "Nothing else," he said. "Your interview is over. That will have to satisfy you. I have work to do, and you

  must go now."

  SHORTLY before five o'clock, Stevens humbly submitted his story to the city editor. The result was a

  storm of sarcastic disapproval.

  "Is this all you got!" exclaimed the city editor. "I wanted a column. You bring me a couple of sticks!"

  "That's all he told me, sir," said Stevens.

  "Didn't you ask him any questions?"

  "No, sir. I told him what I wanted to know; and that's what he gave me."

  The city editor glared at the copy.

  "Stevens," he said, angrily, "you're the dumbest man I've ever had on the staff. Your work hasn't been

  worth a plugged nickel.

  "I thought I'd give you a chance to-day. You flopped. This story is so punk that it can't even be

  rewritten."

  He started to toss the copy into the wastebasket; then, changing his mind, he thrust it in a desk drawer.

  "I'm keeping it, Stevens," he said gruffly, "so there will be no comeback if you kick because I fired you.

  Don't bother about any assignments to-night. You're through right now.

  "I sent you out to find out what a man would do if he had one hour to live. You bring back a story that

  has nothing in it. Jonathan Graham simply ignored the whole idea, and you were too dumb to ask him

  questions that might get him started.

  "The column won't appear in to-morrow's paper. Your copy is no good, and neither are you. That's final.

  Goodbye."

  "It was very late when I saw Mr. Graham," pleaded the reporter. "Four o'clock, you know. I mentioned

  that in the story. He had a lot of work to do— I couldn't bother him too much -"

  "Get out!" ordered the city editor.

  Stevens was dejected when he left the newspaper building. He had counted a lot on his job as a reporter.

  Now it was all over.

  He stopped at a lunch wagon near his uptown rooming house, and ate a tasteless meal. Then he went to

  his lodging.

  He sat mournfully in his room until nearly eight o'clock. His mind seemed unable to grasp the fact that his

  job was gone.

  Some one knocked at his door. It was the landlady.

  "Telephone call for you, Mr. Stevens," she said.

  The young man walked slowly downstairs and answered the telephone. He recognized the voice of the

  city editor.

  "Hello—Stevens?" came the question.

  "Yes, sir," replied the ex-reporter.

  "Get back here to the office, right away. I want to talk to you."

  "But"—Stevens' voice was doubtful—"I thought you fired me, sir."

  "I did. But I'm hiring you again. You're due for an increase in salary. I want to discuss it with you."

  "But I don't understand," blurted Stevens. "You said -"

  "Forget what I said. We've put your story on the front page in a two-column box. It's a scoop!"

  The receiver clicked at the other end.

  Stevens started for the subway. He stopped at a stand and bought a copy of the final edition of his paper.

  The big headlines on the front page brought a gasp of astonishment to his lips.

  Jonathan Graham was dead! The millionaire had committed suicide by leaping from the window of his

  office on the thirty-eighth floor of the Farworth Building, at exactly five o'clock.

  He had lived just one hour after his interview!

  CHAPTER III. THE SHADOW KNOWS

  A CHUBBY-FACED man was seated at a desk in his office in the Grandville Building. Before him lay a

  pile of newspapers. Through his spectacles, he was studying clippings that he had cut from the journals.

  Some one tapped at the door. The man arose and opened it, peering into the outer office. It was the

  stenographer who had knocked.

  "It's nearly five o'clock, Mr. Fellows," said the girl. "My work is finished. Is it all right for me to leave?"

  "Certainly," replied the round-faced man.

  He closed the door and returned to his desk.

  This man, despite his quiet and almost lethargic appearance, was in reality a very unusual person.

  As Claude H. Fellows, the insurance broker, he had a wide circle of acquaintances, who looked upon

  him as a prosaic business man. But Fellows' real work in life was more dramatic. He was the confidential

  agent of that mysterious personage called The Shadow.

  The insurance broker was an important cog-wheel in the human mechanism that served The Shadow in

  his encounters with master criminals.

  Fellows was a methodical man who had the ability to assemble facts and information. It was his duty to

  maintain contact with the unknown Shadow, and to pass instructions along to other workers.

  To-day he had been busy all afternoon, clipping items that pertained to the suicide of Jonathan Graham,

  the millionaire importer. It was nearly twenty-four hours since Graham had died, and Fellows had

  gathered everything from all the newspapers.

  The insurance broker went to the typewriter and prepared a synopsis that dealt accurately with the

  accounts of Jonathan Graham's death. It was his duty to prepare reports on such occurrences as this one.

  Jonathan Graham gave an interview to a reporter at four o'clock, stating that if he had but one hour to

  live, he would go about his work in regular procedure.

  He lived up to that statement. He called in his secretary, Berger, and a stenographer, Miss Smythe, and

  dictated a number of letters, which he signed.

  At precisely five o'clock, Miss Smythe left the
private office. Berger followed with the signed letters.

  Miss Smythe was halfway across the waiting room when Berger came out. She had forgotten a pad, and

  she returned to the inner office.

  She was speaking to Berger as she opened the door. He had turned toward the door, and as the

  stenographer opened it, Berger could see directly across the private office.

  He dropped the letters suddenly, and leaped forward, crying, "Mr. Graham! Stop! Don't! Don't!" Then

  he slumped against the wall, gasping in horror.

  Miss Smythe rushed into the office and was surprised to find that Jonathan Graham was not there. There

  were two men in the waiting room: one ran to the private office; the other went to aid Berger.

  The secretary pointed and gasped: "The window! He jumped—we were too late."

  The man looked out the window, and saw a crowd gathering on the side street below. The explanation

  was obvious. Jonathan Graham had leaped to his death.

  The newspapers have hinted various motives for suicide. No one was in the room when Berger saw

  Graham leap. No person could have escaped from the room.

  FELLOWS ran down the margin of his report and inscribed certain numbers with a blue pencil. These

  corresponded to numbers on the newspaper clippings. When he had finished the work, the insurance

  broker folded the paper and clippings, and inserted them in a large manila envelope. He took the

  envelope with him when he left the office.

  Hailing a cab, he rode to Twenty-third Street, and entered a dingy office building.

  On the third floor he stopped in front of a door near the end of the hall. On the frosted glass appeared

  the name—B. Jonas.

  The shadows of cobwebs appeared through the pane. Evidently the door had not been opened for many

  months. Thick dust on the glass was additional evidence to that effect.

  Very little light came from the room within; evidently there was a single window that provided very little

  illumination.

  There was a letter chute in the doorway, bearing the sign, "Leave Mail Here." Fellows dropped the

  envelope in the chute.

  What lay behind that door was a mystery to Claude Fellows. Once he had wondered about it—long ago.

  He had questioned tenants in the building, and had learned that no one ever entered the room—not even

  the janitor, for the tenants paid for cleaning service and Jonas had never requested it.

  So Fellows had come to accept the strange, closed office as a very ordinary matter. To-day he walked

  away without even giving it a second thought.

  It was simply the place to which he brought or sent reports and messages intended for The Shadow.

  Once Fellows thought he had identified The Shadow, but he had found that he was mistaken. So he

  continued his routine work, satisfied with his reward, which came in the form of a monthly payment from

  some unknown source.

  Who and what The Shadow was no longer concerned Claude Fellows' mind.

  The insurance broker remembered the envelope as he rode uptown. He thought of it lying beneath the

  mail chute; then he dismissed the matter.

  But at the very moment that the thought of the envelope lingered in Fellows' mind, that same envelope

  was lying open on a table, and two long-fingered hands were drawing the clippings from it.

  THOSE hands were working in a circle of light that came from a shaded lamp, directly above the table.

  They were amazing hands, white and supple.

  On one finger of the left hand gleamed a mysterious gem—a glowing fire opal that shone with crimson

  hue, and seemed like a living coal.

  Beyond the hands was darkness, amid which invisible eyes watched and directed the hands in their work.

  A pointed finger ran along the lines of Fellows' brief report.

  Then the hands spread out the clippings. One by one they came under inspection of the invisible eyes;

  then all attention was directed to the front-page story that had appeared in the Sphere—the report of the

  last interview with Jonathan Graham.

  The finger moved from word to word, as though ferreting the thoughts that had been in the mind of the

  millionaire when he had given the interview.

  Had young Stevens been an experienced reporter, or one gifted with imagination, he might have

  presented a skillfully changed story, emphasizing certain details and subordinating others.

  But as it was, his account was an accurate description of exactly what had transpired in Jonathan

  Graham's office at four o'clock the preceding afternoon.

  The hands suddenly folded the clipping and thrust it, with the report, back in the envelope. The other

  clippings were also put away. Then the hands produced a sheet of paper and a pencil.

  Slowly and carefully the right hand wrote, and the words were so carefully marked that they seemed like

  spoken thoughts as they came on the paper.

  Jonathan Graham's death is classed as suicide. There are hints of motives. Every life has possible motives

  for suicide. Jonathan Graham did not contemplate suicide when he gave the interview. Nothing that

  occurred in the following hour could have made him decide to end his life.

  Therefore Jonathan Graham was murdered. Only one man's testimony disputes that fact—the testimony

  of the secretary, Stanley Berger.

  Berger claims that he saw Graham leap from the window.

  Graham did not leap from the window.

  Therefore Berger did not see him leap.

  Why did he make his statement? To aid the murderer.

  Why did he wish to aid the murderer?

  Because he was the murderer.

  The hand stopped writing. Then it began again, and the words that it inscribed came as a revelation that

  told exactly what had transpired in the office of Jonathan Graham.

  It was a perfect reconstruction of the crime—formed by a master mind that had the uncanny ability to

  picture the thoughts and actions of another person.

  Jonathan Graham had a habit of standing by the window, which had a low sill. This fact appeared in the

  account of his last interview.

  Berger and Miss Smythe were in the office with Graham at five o'clock. Graham turned to look out of the

  open window, as Miss Smythe left. Berger was gathering a few letters. He was standing close to Graham

  as the door closed behind Miss Smythe.

  It was an opportunity. Like a flash, Berger pushed Graham through the window, catching him off

  balance, sending him to his doom.

  Berger left the room immediately. It was done so rapidly that he seemed to come out right behind Miss

  Smythe. That was to be his alibi. Yet he must have had qualms.

  When Miss Smythe turned to go back to the private office, Berger gained a sudden opportunity. Staring

  directly into the office, he screamed a warning as the stenographer opened the door. Then he yielded to

  his shaking nerves.

  The hand stopped writing. It began to tap the pencil against the paper, counting the seconds that were

  marked by a watch that lay on the table.

  The brain in the darkness was going through the murder of Jonathan Graham, counting from the very

  instant when Berger pushed the millionaire through the window until the moment when the secretary

  screamed his warning.

  Thirty taps. Then the hand wrote:

  Half a minute at the most. No one knows the exact minute at which Jonathan Graham's body crashed to

  the street. The time element is perfectly in Berger's favor.

  Berger's alibi is n
ow perfect—to the unthinking minds of those who were in the office—and to the minds

  of the police.

  But to the deductive brain, Berger's action betrays his crime.

  The right hand picked up the paper, and crumpled it into a ball. The hand disappeared and returned

  without the paper. Then on another sheet, it wrote:

  Stanley Berger murdered Jonathan Graham.

  The pencil remained still for two short seconds; then it moved again, and the hand inscribed these words:

  The Shadow knows!

  CHAPTER IV. THE RED ENVOY

  LATE that evening, a man entered an apartment house in upper Manhattan. He was short and heavy set,

  with a grim face that bore signs of ugliness. He walked abruptly through the hallway and took the

  automatic elevator to the third floor.

  There he opened the door of an apartment and entered a darkened room. He pressed a switch on the

  wall. Then he turned toward the far corner of the room. A quick gasp came from his lips.

  Behind a small desk sat a man in a dark-blue overcoat, who wore a crimson mask that covered the

  upper half of his face.

  "The Red Envoy!" exclaimed the man who had entered the room.

  The figure behind the desk did not reply. The man in the crimson mask was motionless. His hands lay

  upon the desk; they were hidden within thin red gloves.

  The man who had come into the apartment recovered his composure. He glanced about the room,

  noticing that the shades were drawn. He deposited his hat on a chair, and approached the desk.

  "I did not expect you to-night," he said respectfully.

  "Why not?" asked the man who wore the crimson mask. His voice was low, and even-toned. "You have

  much to report, Comrade Prokop."

  "That is correct." Prokop was speaking in English, his words slightly thickened by a trace of foreign

  accent. He drew up a chair and sat opposite the Red Envoy.

  DESPITE his formidable appearance, the man called Prokop seemed nervous in the presence of the

  masked man who wore the red gloves.

  Coming back to his apartment to find the Red Envoy awaiting him had been a startling experience.

  Prokop did not know how the mysterious man had entered the apartment; nor did he ask.

  "What took place to-night?" questioned the Red Envoy.

  "Reports," replied Prokop tersely. "Two enemies have been eliminated. Graham and Berchik are dead."