The Red Blot s-31

by Maxwell Grant

  The safe was, indeed, formidable. The turning dials seemed to defy The Shadow’s probing touch. Slowly, carefully, the fingers worked, while keen ears listened for the sound of falling tumblers. Minutes drifted by; at last, a sound from the blackened door of the safe told that The Shadow’s task was successful.

  The light glimmered upon the watch. Eight minutes before eleven. The Shadow had accomplished his work in nine minutes. A finger touched the watch significantly.

  The numbers that it indicated upon the face showed that The Shadow had planned to begin at ten forty-five and end at ten fifty-five. Starting two minutes ahead of schedule, he had gained another minute!

  A hand turned the knob. The door of the safe moved slowly outward. Within The Shadow’s grasp lay the contents of this treasure box.

  Why had The Shadow come to obtain it?

  There could be but one reason. The close adherence to a scheduled routine proved that The Shadow was not here to commit crime himself; his purpose was to forestall the efforts of crooks who were soon due!

  SURPRISE would be in store for those who attacked this strong box. Instead of wealth, they would find only what The Shadow might choose to leave for them. The Shadow had anticipated crime tonight. He was to view the contents of this safe before the others saw it.

  The door was open. The Shadow’s light glimmered into the interior of the safe. It paused motionless, its glare revealing an amazing situation that brought a momentary period of inaction. Even The Shadow had not expected the surprising sight which his eyes now saw.

  No money; no jewels; no articles of value. The interior of the safe was a blank, save for a single object. Yet that one article was more startling than any dazzling array of hoarded gems.

  A piece of white paper lay upon the bottom of the safe. It contained no writing; but in its center was a signature more potent than any inscription could have been. Its crimson hue and its grotesque shape told by whose order it had come there.

  The sheet of paper which lay in the rifled safe bore the crimson splotch of crime - the mark of The Red Blot!

  CHAPTER III

  THE SHADOW SPEAKS

  THE flashlight moved again. Its probing ray was swift, yet thorough, as the keen eyes of The Shadow commenced an inspection of the interior of the safe. A hand, now covered with a black glove, lifted the crimson-spotted paper from the floor. The flashlight’s gleam moved beyond the sheet so that the paper became transparent.

  Every detail, even to texture and watermark, was observed by The Shadow. At last, the hand replaced the paper exactly where it had been found. The door of the safe moved sullenly shut. The flashlight shone upon the front of the strong box; then along the floor.

  Clews were here - for The Shadow - yet there was no evidence of sufficient importance. The previous crimes engineered by The Red Blot had not been covered well; in every instance, the elusiveness of the evildoers had been their chief forte.

  The Shadow had come here to anticipate crime. The misdeed had already taken place. Nevertheless, The Shadow remained. His tiny light showed the surface of the watch. Eleven o’clock. The glimmer disappeared. The Shadow still remained.

  Why?

  The answer came a few seconds after the light was out. A vague, scratching sound began less than a dozen yards from the place where The Shadow stood. The noise was from outside the building. Someone was trying to enter.

  A curious paradox! The Shadow had scheduled his work to be finished by eleven o’clock, the time that the crooks were due to arrive. He had found traces of completed crime; yet here was indication that the criminals had not been present until this hour!

  Silence reigned before the closed but rifled safe in Timothy Baruch’s pawnshop. The outside scratching continued. It changed to a series of muffled thuds. A pause; then boards creaked. The marauders were within the building.

  The beam of a powerful flashlight swept across the floor. It kept away from the walls, where its rays might have shown through barred windows. Hence it failed to reveal the tall, motionless figure that stood in a corner. The Shadow had become a shadow.

  The torch was focused upon the front of the safe. Two hardened faces came into view. While one grim, square-jawed ruffian held the lantern, the other, sharp-faced and blinking, thrust out a hand and grasped a dial.

  THE identity of these men was plain. Any mobster would have recognized the pair, well known in the underworld. One - the man with the lantern - was Hurley Brewster, a dock-walloper, who had abandoned a safe-blowing career to organize gangs of mobsters. The other - the man whose hand was on the safe - was Tweezers Darley, whose skill at opening strong boxes was so widely recognized.

  “Take it slow, Tweezers,” urged Hurley. “Remember - you ain’t been doin’ this work for some time. Them tumblers is tricky.”

  “Leave it to me, Hurley,” growled Tweezers. “I hope the bulls think the same as you - that a guy gets slow when he lays off a while. Then they won’t ask me any questions.”

  “They won’t be askin’ nothin’,” snorted Hurley. “When I set the time fuse, this old box will blow flooey after we’ve cleared out. Keep busy, there, bozo.”

  “Less noise,” retorted Tweezers. “I’ll have this thing done inside an hour, if you leave me alone.”

  That ended the conversation for a while. Minutes dragged by while Tweezers worked on. Half an hour elapsed before the safe manipulator paused.

  “Say, Hurley” - Tweezers’s voice was irritable - “this sure is a tough baby. I’ll bet you Moocher Gleetz couldn’t make any better speed. I’m right back at the beginning.”

  “Maybe we’ll have to blow it.”

  “No. Give me time. You know what they’ve said. Moocher or me - we’re the only ones.”

  “And Moocher ain’t around.”

  “Yeah?” Tweezers’s tone was a snarl. “Maybe if he had been around, you’d have taken him in on the job instead of me?”

  “I ain’t sayin’ that,” returned Hurley. “Stick with it, bozo! I’m countin’ on you!”

  Twelve minutes more of silence while Tweezers worked. Suddenly the sharp-faced man emitted a low cry of satisfaction. He placed his hand upon the knob of the safe.

  “Got it, Hurley!” he asserted. “We’ll pull open the door and mop up the gravy. I told you it wouldn’t take me a full hour. I’d like to see anybody do it in less time than I took! You won’t find the guy in New York, I’m telling you!”

  Hurley Brewster offered no argument. Tweezer Darley’s boast stood. Yet even then, within fifteen feet of the safe openers, stood one who had completed Tweezers’s forty-two minute job in nine minutes by the watch.

  The door came open. The torch gleamed. A snarl came from Hurley Brewster. The dock-walloper was staring at the paper on the floor of the safe.

  “The Red Blot!” Hurley’s words were a harsh growl. “He’s beat us to this lay. Look at that, Tweezers! Can you beat it? Say -“

  The square-jawed man pulled back from the safe. In sudden apprehension, he swung his light toward the side of the room.

  At the same instant, a slight click sounded, and the glare of another torch met that which came from Hurley Brewster’s hand.

  Hurley and Tweezers alike caught the glimpse of a strange, black clad outline - the figure of a being who had advanced from the wall. One black glove held the flashlight; the other gripped a huge automatic.

  It was Tweezers, this time, who uttered a startled cry of recognition. Where Hurley had growled in anger at the sight of the red blot, Tweezers gasped in fear when he saw the form that loomed ahead.

  “The Shadow!”

  BOTH ruffians were armed; but they made no attempt to reach for their weapons. Their hands went up, and Hurley’s torch clattered to the floor, then rolled to a stop.

  With backs against the opened safe, the crooks faced the glare that betokened The Shadow. The expressions upon their evil countenances showed plainly the effect which the arrival of The Shadow had created.

  A low, sinister laug
h crept through the room. The Shadow held these men of evil at his mercy. He had captured them in the act of crime, and both knew the reputed methods of The Shadow when he dealt with crooks such as themselves.

  “You fear me!” The Shadow’s tone was a scornful whisper. “You have cause to fear The Shadow! I came here to thwart you in the act of crime. I found the trace of one beside whom you are mere novices!”

  “The Red Blot!” blurted Tweezers Darley.

  “The Red Blot,” announced The Shadow, in his awesome tone, “has been here before you. That is fortunate - for you. The Red Blot is the one whom I seek.”

  “I don’t know nothin’,” gasped Hurley Brewster, “Honest - we ain’t workin’ with The Red Blot! Ain’t that empty safe enough - with all the gravy gone? Before we got here?”

  “You planned this crime,” The Shadow, invisible, was speaking sternly, “in a dive called Red Mike’s. You set the hour at eleven o’clock.”

  Tweezers threw a scared look at Hurley. Neither man would have believed that their conversation could have been overheard. The ears of The Shadow! How had they listened in? Tweezers and Hurley exchanged stupefied looks.

  “Therefore,” ruled The Shadow. “I have questions which you must answer. Where else did either of you discuss this planned crime? Who could have heard you?”

  Blank looks were exchanged between the two ruffians. Both understood the purpose of The Shadow’s demand. The safe had obviously been opened earlier in the evening. It was the work of the unknown criminal known as The Red Blot. Through indiscretion on the part of either Hurley Brewster or Tweezers Darley, the master plotter could have learned this game.

  It was Tweezers who spoke, staring sidelong at Hurley; then toward the light which The Shadow held. Tweezers’s words came like a confession, drawn forth by his fear of the invisible enemy who had questioned him.

  “SOMEBODY must have got wise when I called Hurley,” said Tweezers in a sulky tone. “You remember, Hurley” - Tweezers was looking furtively toward his companion for corroboration - “the night after we made the deal? I was to call you to make sure the lay was all right - and I may have said too much.”

  “Where did you call from?” came The Shadow’s demand, in a tone that carried no interrogation, a tone that gangsters feared.

  Hurley was glowering at Tweezers. The square-jawed ruffian recalled the incident. He was incensed because his companion was squealing to The Shadow.

  “I - I - don’t know.” Tweezers had caught Hurley’s look, and was hedging. “Let’s see - it was when I - ”

  “Answer the question!”

  The command came in a shuddering tone that made Tweezers Darley cower. Hurley Brewster, defiantly facing the light, chewed his lips, and lost his nerve as he heard the sardonic sound of The Shadow’s words.

  “At the Black Ship,” blurted Tweezers.

  “Name those whom you saw there,” ordered The Shadow.

  “I didn’t know any of them,” pleaded Tweezers, “none except old Louie, who runs the joint. There was a little, rat-faced guy hanging around, though. Louie couldn’t have heard me on the phone, but the little guy might have. Kind of a hunched-up fellow - looked like a hop head -“

  Tweezers threw another glance toward Hurley. The square-jawed dock-walloper was staring toward him no longer. Instead, Hurley’s eyes were directed toward a point to the left of the glaring light.

  As Tweezers faltered in his admission to The Shadow, he saw a sudden look of determination appear upon Hurley’s tough face. Although Hurley made no move, Tweezers knew that something unexpected had occurred - something which Hurley alone had noticed.

  Trapped by The Shadow, forced to listen to his companion’s blurted words, the hard-faced dock-walloper was looking for a break which would enable him and Tweezers to engineer an escape.

  The Red Blot had beaten Hurley and Tweezers to their job; The Shadow had surprised and captured them; now, another factor was about to enter into this curious series of events.

  Tense, yet wisely restrained, Hurley saw the break coming. Tweezers caught the situation, also. Had The Shadow been unwary, his position would have been a serious one. But The Shadow worked in split seconds.

  His keen eyes were watching Tweezers Darley. They saw the look of sudden interest that appeared upon the safe cracker’s peaked face. Instantly, The Shadow noted Hurley Brewster’s steady gaze - the expression which had caught Tweezers’s attention.

  Like a flash, The Shadow swung to face the direction in which Hurley was staring. His torch cut a swath as it spread its glare toward the front of the room.

  The glow revealed a group of uniformed policemen; the fraction of a second later, the powerful illumination of a bull’s-eye lantern filled the entire room.

  The Shadow’s tall form was only momentarily revealed. The light in the gloved hand went out; the figure in black seemed to fade as it made a whirling glide toward the side of the room.

  Revolvers barked as the invaders fired at the spot where they had seen the light. Futile bullets plastered themselves against the wall. The police were firing at blankness. The Shadow was gone - so rapidly that no one had caught more than a fleeting glance of his sable-hued shape.

  But amid the echoes of revolver shots came the rippling sound of a vague laugh - a tone of undefinable mirth that seemed to hover at the spot where The Shadow, himself, no longer stood.

  CHAPTER IV

  THE LAW DECIDES

  To Hurley Brewster and Tweezers Darley, the intervention of the police was opportunity. Raiding bluecoats had fired at the light. They had failed to clip The Shadow - had failed, even, to recognize the elusive personage whom they had mistaken for an enemy.

  The Shadow had been forced to meet the emergency; his swing toward the wall had carried him straight through the door that led to the stairway. Wisely, The Shadow had posted himself at that strategic spot.

  With the raid directed toward the door, Hurley and Tweezers dropped toward the floor in front of the safe, drawing their revolvers as they sought this protection.

  A policeman saw them and opened fire. Crouching and sidling hastily toward the door that led to the rear of the building, the crooks returned the shots with gusto.

  A policeman fell, wounded. Others dropped behind odd articles of furniture that were in this back room. A filing cabinet was cover for one; another entrenched himself behind a large chair. Two officers jumped behind the opened door through which The Shadow had gone.

  The man with the lantern was crouched by the front door of the room. The police had entered through the pawnshop itself. This fellow kept the light in action; for the odds lay with the police. But Hurley Brewster was a tough customer with the gat.

  “Clear a path through the back door,” he growled to Tweezers. “I’ll take care of these bimboes.”

  The dock-walloper opened fire as he spoke. He had drawn a second revolver, and his huge smoke wagons sent whizzing bullets toward the barricaded raiders.

  He had but one purpose; to keep the officers under cover. He succeeded. Then, with a malicious snarl. Hurley aimed point-blank toward the wounded policeman on the floor.

  Tweezers was shouting from the door, crying that the way was clear. Hurley ignored the call for the moment. He was set to deliver death to a helpless victim. The other policemen recognized their comrade’s desperate position. but they were too late as they sprang from their places of safety. Hurley’s finger was already on the trigger.

  Then came a shot from the blackened doorway across the room - the exit through which The Shadow had departed! Unerring aim found its human target. As Hurley Brewster’s lips mouthed a curse, the dock-walloper’s arm dropped, and his body sagged. Both revolvers dropped from numbed fingers.

  The Shadow had winged a leaden messenger straight from the muzzle of his automatic into the crook’s black heart!

  POLICEMEN were raising their guns. They were firing now - adding bullets to Hurley’s toppled body. Each thought that one of his companions had fired
the first good shot. Only one man knew what actually had happened.

  Tweezers Darley, just beyond the rear door of the room, had seen the blaze of The Shadow’s automatic. He knew who had dropped Hurley Brewster; and with eager frenzy, he made a quick effort to gain revenge. Behind the doorway, he thrust out his revolver and aimed straight toward that blackened area where he knew The Shadow must be.

  The automatic roared again. This time its target was not a body; it was a hand - the fist of Tweezers Darley. A cry followed The Shadow’s second shot. Tweezers’s gun fell. Grasping his mutilated fingers, the safe cracker staggered away, rendered powerless by The Shadow’s skillful stroke.

  Bluecoats were surging through the room. Some were helping their wounded comrade. Others were on the trail of Tweezers, firing after the fleeing safe cracker. More were piling through the doorway from which The Shadow had fired those telling shots, seeking vainly for one who had vanished in that direction.

  A tall, powerful man in plain clothes strode into the room. He came from the front doorway; and he pressed a wall switch which brought lights and made the bulls-eye lantern unnecessary. He was joined by another plain-clothes man - the one who had handled the lantern.

  At the same time, a stoop-shouldered old fellow came into the room through the door from the stairway. With faltering step, Timothy Baruch hastened to the open safe, and emitted a cry of anguish when he saw that it was empty. He turned to face the big man who appeared to be the leader of the raiding crew.

  “Baruch?” questioned the big fellow.

  The old man nodded.

  “I’m Detective Hembroke,” returned the other, “from headquarters. Got a tip-off there was something going on here tonight. Came in through your front door. Don’t you ever lock it?”

  “The front door?” queried Baruch, in a dazed tone. “Sure, it was locked - on the inside -“

  “Not tonight,” returned Hembroke shortly. “Unless these birds came in that way, or opened it after they were in here.”