The Road Of Crime s-39

by Maxwell Grant

  “None at all,” replied Eunice patiently. “I am sorry for you, Graham. Sorrier for you than I am for father. He and I can stand poverty. My only regret is that you will suffer also if we can give you a home no longer.”

  Quietly, the girl left the living room. Graham could hear her going upstairs to talk to her father. The young man found himself recalling the sincere words that Eunice had uttered. He began to fume - to curse himself for his own meanness. Rising from his chair, Graham walked about the room. His eyes fell upon the newspaper which he had dropped on the floor.

  A determined sparkle came in Graham Wellerton’s eye.

  Crime!

  He had abandoned that profession. He realized now that he would never be a crook again. But with a consummate desire to go straight came a willingness to once more participate in criminal activity.

  Stealthily, Graham Wellerton donned hat and coat. He strolled out through the front door and stepped into darkness. The chill wind of the night was invigorating. It gave him a new impetus.

  Once again - for the last time in his life, he decided - Graham Wellerton would play the part of a gentleman of crime.

  CHAPTER XIII

  THE ROBBERY

  HEAVY winds were sweeping the deserted Southwark street as Graham Wellerton made stealthy progress away from Ralph Delkin’s home. Storm clouds had gathered overhead; these added to the blackness of the faintly lighted byway chosen by Graham.

  During his stay at Delkin’s, Graham had left the house only on rare occasions, but his few excursions had been sufficient to refresh his memory regarding the streets of Southwark. Sidling through the night, Graham reached a road which led him toward Ralph Delkin’s factory; a short distance farther on, he took a lane to the right.

  Through the black night loomed a ghostly mass of gray. Graham had reached the cliffs of an old quarry - a spot which he had long remembered. They had been blasting at the quarry during the past week. Graham felt sure that he would find what he had come to seek.

  The young man drew forth a flashlight which he had picked up in Delkin’s home. Using it discreetly, he found a huge red box which bore two words in white:

  DANGER

  DYNAMITE

  The box was fastened with a large padlock. Graham picked up two large stones. He let the padlock dangle upon the piece of rock which he held in his left hand. He used the other stone to deliver a series of sharp blows.

  The padlock broke. Graham opened the box, played the flashlight within and removed a stick of dynamite from the mass within.

  Closing the box, he retraced his steps. He turned this time toward Delkin’s factory which lay farther down the side road. Graham used his flashlight intermittently and soon arrived in the vicinity of the plant.

  A few lights from factory windows enabled the stealthy man to approach with ease.

  Graham had been here with Ralph Delkin. He had made mental notes of the place. He knew that a watchman was on duty, but he did not expect to encounter the guardian. Delkin’s plant turned out metal castings and it offered no spoils of value for prowlers. The watchman’s duties were no more than mere routine.

  Graham forced a basement window and entered the lower portion of the factory. He found an unlocked storeroom. He went in and turned on a light. The room was windowless. Moreover, it contained the very supplies which Graham required.

  The young man crumpled his dynamite into a small pail. He found some cakes of soap and began a mixture. All the ingredients that he needed were here. The room contained all sorts of odd equipment, even to a pair of small electric stoves.

  Cautious at times, Graham paused to listen. He heard nothing of the watchman. Probably the man did not intend to visit this obscure portion of the factory. Graham applied himself to the task before him. He was mixing “soup” - the compound used by safe crackers.

  When the job was done, Graham took his supply of explosive and left the storeroom. He made his way through the window and started back along the road. He had fuses in his pocket - he had obtained these from the dynamite box. Everything was ready for tonight’s work.

  WHISTLING winds and heavy clouds were broken by distant flashes and occasional rumbles. A thunderstorm was approaching. It was not the season for such a disturbance, but that did not trouble Graham Wellerton. The storm was to his liking - provided it did not break too soon.

  A roar sounded from overhead. Graham paused to look up from the lonely road. An airplane was passing, its lights low. Graham did not envy the pilot. He decided that the ship must be making for the airport on the other side of Southwark, to avoid the approaching thunderstorm.

  Graham thought no more of the airplane. He was too much concerned with his own problems. He was moving carefully along the road, yet he was anxious to make good time. Preliminary raindrops came as a warning that the storm might break.

  Graham passed directly by Ralph Delkin’s home. He noticed upstairs lights. He hid his soup behind a hedge and strolled into the house. He could hear Eunice talking with her father.

  Whistling as he strolled about the hall, Graham knew that his absence had not been noticed. He was making sure that he would be heard from above, so that Ralph and Eunice Delkin would believe that he had been in the house throughout the evening.

  A muffled thunder clap reminded Graham that it was time to proceed. He slipped from the door, regained his hidden explosive and started along the street. He slipped out of sight behind a tree as a coupe turned a corner and came into view. The car rolled by without stopping.

  Graham congratulated himself that he had not been observed. In that belief, he was wrong. Peering eyes had noticed him; even as he watched the departing coupe, a strange, invisible figure dropped from the moving car some fifty yards beyond the spot where Graham was standing.

  Graham kept on his way. He was nearing the business section of Southwark. He turned into a narrow side street and drew up beside his uncle’s bank.

  Laying his soup aside, he drew forth tools that he had taken from the factory storeroom. He deliberately set to work to open one of the barred windows at the side of the old bank.

  The task proved amazingly simple. Graham chuckled. His uncle, the old miser, had been too cheap to install burglar-proof devices. Getting into the bank was almost as easy a task as breaking into Delkin’s factory.

  Graham clambered through the open window. The storm was breaking outside. People would be indoors. This was the time for the job. Graham stared out into blackness; then hurried away from the window, realizing that it would be unwise to show himself in case a flash of lightning might suddenly occur.

  Such a flash did come a few moments later. Graham was not at the window to see it. Hence he did not observe a chilling sight - a spectral phenomenon that human eyes would have considered unbelievable.

  In the sudden brilliance of a vivid flash, total darkness was transformed into day. In the midst of the street scene remained one touch of blackness. A human form - a spectral figure in inky cloak and hat - was revealed just outside the open window of Ezra Talboy’s bank.

  Tall, sinister, and silent, this being stood like a visitor from another world. The Shadow, weird master of darkness, had come to Southwark. Riding in a coupe piloted by Harry Vincent, the agent who had met him, The Shadow had spied Graham Wellerton. The Shadow, wizard of gloom, was trailing the gentleman of crime!

  GRAHAM WELLERTON, within the bank, was not thinking of The Shadow. With his flashlight sending intermittent flickers, he was choosing between the large vault and a small safe which stood in Ezra Talboy’s office. With a grin, Graham chose the safe.

  The young man began his task. He worked his explosive mixture about the safe in preparation for a blast. He was pleased with the soup that he had made.

  “Slam broth,” chuckled Graham, using his favorite term for the explosive soup. “Wait until this wakes old Uncle Ezra. He’ll pop out of bed when he hears this.”

  Graham arranged his fuse. He applied a match. He backed from the office, acro
ss the outer room and waited by the window. The results were startling.

  The charge went off just as a terrific flare of lightning burst outside. The soup exploded with a roar amid a tremendous thunder clap. The mighty outburst of the heavens outdid the explosion both in flash and sound.

  A strange occurrence! But Graham Wellerton, as he faced the office, failed to see the most amazing phase of it all.

  Standing within ten feet of him was a tall personage in black - a creature who might well have materialized with the thunderbolt, so uncanny was his bearing.

  Graham fancied that the rumble of the elements had drowned the roar of his explosion. He was wrong. The flash and its dull reverberation had been witnessed by another than himself - The Shadow!

  Graham had intended that the explosion be heard. He believed, with reason, that it had not. Nevertheless, the occurrence did not change his necessary action.

  Hurrying to the broken safe, Graham began to go through the papers, that he found there. His flashlight glimmered upon three documents held together by a paper clip. He read them eagerly. There were notes, to the sum of fifty thousand dollars, signed by Ralph Delkin.

  A chuckle of elation came from Graham’s lips. So intent was Graham that he did not realize a presence which had moved to a few feet behind him. He did not suspect that other eyes were staring over his shoulder; that the burning optics of The Shadow were also reading those documents.

  The Shadow faded like a living phantom as Graham Wellerton arose. Carrying only those stolen notes, Graham hurried to the window and dropped out into the street. He headed back along the way that led to Ralph Delkin’s factory.

  The rain was slight; the storm seemed to be passing around the town of Southwark. Graham Wellerton, no longer burdened with his soup, made quick progress by means of the occasional lightning flashes. Not once did the young man look behind him, so sure was he that he had eluded detection.

  Thus he did not see the phantom shape that followed in his wake, always maintaining an even distance behind him. That figure duplicated all that Graham Wellerton did, as the young man reached the factory, went through the open window and found his way to an office on the ground floor.

  Here The Shadow watched while Graham, his flashlight again in use, approached a small safe and fingered the dial. Graham had seen Ralph Delkin unlock that safe. The manufacturer had made no effort to hide the combination. The safe contained nothing more valuable than business accounts which Delkin kept here to avoid possible destruction in case of fire.

  Graham Wellerton placed the three notes in the safe. He closed the door and locked it. The Shadow merged with darkness at the side of the room. He watched Graham depart; then followed.

  Graham closed the basement window and made for the road. The Shadow softly raised the window, slipped through and closed it behind him. He followed Graham along the lonely road until the young man reached Ralph Delkin’s home.

  When Graham Wellerton disappeared into the house, The Shadow still lingered. From his hidden lips came a sighing laugh, that blended with the whistling wind that still marked the presence of the passing storm.

  THE SHADOW had come to Southwark to forestall crime. He had seen crime in the making. He had made no effort to prevent it. For The Shadow had seen a purpose other than evil in Graham Wellerton’s actions. The keen brain of The Shadow had divined that the former crook had not been working for his own gain tonight, but for someone else.

  Until The Shadow learned all the contributory factors to this case, The Shadow would restrain aggressive action. One test remained. If Graham Wellerton had planned further robbery, the temptation of the broken window in Ezra Talboy’s bank would still remain.

  That was why The Shadow waited, watching silently from darkness. He was lingering to learn if Graham Wellerton intended to venture forth again tonight.

  CHAPTER XIV

  BIRDS OF A FEATHER

  WHEN Graham Wellerton had regained his accustomed seat in Ralph Delkin’s living room, he felt a peculiar sense of satisfaction. He realized that he was through with crime forever. Tonight’s experience had been an odd one. He had acted as a criminal, but he felt that he had served the cause of true justice.

  Graham had not seen his uncle, Ezra Talboy. Yet he felt a great contempt for the man. So far as crookedness was concerned, Ezra Talboy won the grand prize. The old man’s dealings with Ralph Delkin had been nothing more than legalized crime, in Graham Wellerton’s opinion.

  All crime seemed sordid to Graham, yet the young man was pleased that he had committed tonight’s robbery, He realized that he had not done it from a sense of gratitude to Ralph Delkin. He had performed the deed because he admired the grand courage which Eunice Delkin had displayed in the face of approaching adversity.

  Graham intended to turn in. He felt sure that his actions of tonight would never be traced. He knew that his uncle would never dare accuse so fine a character as Ralph Delkin of entering a bank and robbing a safe to take away notes that bore his name. Graham realized, however, that it would be wise for him to establish an alibi through Delkin. Hence he was pleased when the manufacturer suddenly appeared in the living room.

  Evidently Delkin, in his talk with Eunice, had gained some of the girl’s courage, for the man showed no more signs of nervousness. He spoke in a friendly tone to Graham and seemed to take it for granted that the young man had been in the living room for the last two hours.

  “I’m going to stay up for a while,” announced Delkin, in a cordial manner. “I’m going over my accounts, to see how badly off I am.”

  “Think I’ll turn in,” returned Graham in a sleepy tone.

  As he left the living room, Graham had a sudden thought. He realized that normally, the robbery of Ezra Talboy’s safe would have been discovered by this time. Roaring thunder, however, had drowned the sound of the explosion. If the broken safe were not discovered until morning, people would not know at what time the bank had been entered.

  This would certainly have an effect upon any alibi. Graham saw but one way out. The storm, had abated. He must go back to the bank, cause enough disturbance to arouse Ezra Talboy from his home adjoining the old building and make a quick getaway here to Delkin’s.

  Graham saw an easy way to do this. He went upstairs to his room, opened the window and stepped out on the roof of a low back porch. He dropped to the ground and circled to the front of the house.

  THE set-up seemed perfect. Graham thought of all possibilities as he hurried along the street. If there were people at the bank, it would mean that the blown safe had been discovered. A quick return to Ralph Delkin’s would suffice.

  If no one was in sight, it would be easy to alarm Ezra Talboy, then hurry back to Delkin’s. Up by the porch roof, then downstairs to chat with Delkin for a while. That would make a perfect alibi, for Ezra Talboy would set the time of the entry into the bank as the time of the alarm.

  Absent from Delkin’s sight for no longer than fifteen minutes, Graham could easily prove that he would not have had time to enter a window and blow a safe. Graham chuckled thoughtfully. He was sure that he would avoid all suspicion, so why worry about such consequences?

  Once again, Graham Wellerton was followed. The Shadow, taking up the trail, was moving silently and invisibly. He was there to witness the former crook’s next deeds.

  As Graham reached the side street that led by the bank, The Shadow paused. The street was silent and deserted - a re-entry through the side window would be easy. Yet Graham Wellerton was not going in that direction. He was heading through a space behind the bank - toward the house which adjoined the building - toward Ezra Talboy’s home.

  A soft, whispered laugh came from The Shadow’s lips. The black-garbed phantom moved slowly on the trail. Well did The Shadow divine Graham’s purpose. He knew that the young man intended to give an alarm.

  At the back door of Ezra Talboy’s home, Graham Wellerton paused. This had once been his father’s home. Graham knew that there was an inside passag
e between the bank and the house. It was better, however, to make some noise here than go back into the bank. Graham tried the knob of the door.

  To his surprise, the door opened!

  Cautiously, Graham crept forward. He heard the sound of growling voices. He saw light trickling from a door that was ajar. Realizing that something must be wrong, Graham approached and drew the door open inch by inch.

  He peered into a little room - its only window a small opening in a tiny court between the house and the bank building. At the other side was the door that connected, by a passage, to the bank. The occupants of the room, however, were of most interest to Graham.

  There were three men in the room. One was Ezra Talboy, sprawled in a great chair, attired in pajamas. The others were men who carried revolvers. They were threatening the old man.

  “So you didn’t like it when we began to work, huh?” one intruder was growling. “It ain’t so nice, gettin’ your feet singed with matches? Well - that ain’t nothin’ to what’ll happen if you’ve given us the wrong combination to your vault. Savvy?”

  Graham Wellerton had recognized the men. The speaker was Garry, Wolf Daggert’s pal. The other man was Pete - one of Graham’s own men. As Graham stared, the door opened, and another man stepped into view.

  “Say,” greeted the newcomer, “the old mug has given us a phony steer. We can’t get into the vault nohow.”

  Graham knew the speaker as another of his old underlings - a fellow called “Greaser.” These were the three who had avoided The Shadow in Grand Rapids, along with Wolf Daggert. At this very minute, Wolf Daggert must be in the bank building, working at the vault, trying a combination which had been forced, by torture, from Ezra Talboy’s lips.

  “So you bluffed us, eh?” snarled Garry. “Tryin’ to stall? Well, you’ll pay for it!”