Garry Hewes paused. Culbert Joquill frowned. His tone was cold as he replied to his henchman’s questions.
“Those matters,” asserted the old lawyer, “do not concern you, Garry. Forget them.”
“I can’t forget them,” pleaded Garry. “They do concern me. I figure you must have known Hobston personally. What’s more, you must have pulled some gag to get him and Norwyn into the office last night. Suppose the police get working right. Suppose this smart dick, Cardona, finds the trail to you. What then?”
A broad smile appeared on Culbert Joquill’s crafty lips. The lawyer’s frown was gone. Joquill had taken Garry’s questions as an unwarranted attempt to pry into affairs which did not concern him; but the henchman’s explanation of his qualms were justification.
“Do not worry,” purred Joquill, in a confidential tone. “You have admitted that I am smart. Take my word for it that the police will never trace me. I knew that George Hobston had that secret wealth in his vault. I knew that he and Howard Norwyn would be at the office last night.
“Yet I made no effort to trace those facts. To me, George Hobston and Howard Norwyn were nothing more than names. Let us regard the whole matter as one of coincidence. Better, let us state that I acted upon sudden inspiration; that the possibilities of crime came to me as in a dream.
“I am serious, Garry.” Joquill set his fist upon the desk. “Between those facts and myself is a breach that can never be leaped. No one will ever know how I came to enter into this successful episode of crime. You think of me as a crafty schemer, do you not? Let me tell you more: I have a certain possession — we might say talisman — that makes my position invulnerable.
“I did not need you for a henchman. I chose you simply because I knew your past; because I was positive that you were a strong-armed worker upon whom I could rely. I do not care to play an active part in crime. I have taken you as an instrument with which to work.
“I am the brain, so far as you are concerned. You know that I planned Hobston’s death some weeks ago. It occurred on perfect schedule. Do you think that my plans came to an abrupt ending with last night?”
Rising, Culbert Joquill approached his henchman. He clapped his hand upon Garry’s shoulder; then drew the ugly-faced killer toward the door to the hall.
“Forget your worries,” suggested Joquill. “You are safe because my position is secure. My part in this entire episode has been one of complete concealment. I am a recognized attorney; the fact that I have an office in the Zenith Building means nothing.
“I am but one of hundreds of other tenants. So far as Hobston’s death is concerned, I am but a chance reader of the newspaper accounts. You understand?”
Garry Hewes nodded. His qualms were allayed. Turning, this tool who had performed murder stalked, unseen, from Culbert Joquill’s private exit.
THE old lawyer chuckled as he returned to his desk. Taking pen and sheet of paper, he inscribed a series of odd-shaped circles. They apparently formed a code.
This done, Joquill began another peculiar inscription, formed with a succession of block-like characters in several lines.
Joquill placed the sheets together; he folded them and put them in an envelope. From memory, he made duplicates of each sheet, folded these pairs together and put them into a second envelope.
The lawyer addressed the envelopes and placed stamps upon them. Rising, he strolled to the door of the outer office, unlocked it and walked from his own room. He nodded to two clients who were seated on a bench and remarked that he would soon be back to interview them.
Stepping into the corridor, Joquill continued toward the elevators. There, he posted his letters in the mail chute. Wearing the ghost of a smile, the gray-haired attorney came back through the outer office and continued into his private room. He pressed a buzzer. A stenographer appeared to find him behind the desk.
“I am ready to see the gentlemen who are waiting,” declared Joquill, quietly. “You may usher them in here.”
With hands folded upon the desk, Culbert Joquill looked the part of a conservative English barrister. His task of crime had been completed; the mailing of those coded notes had been the aftermath of his talk with Garry Hewes.
The hideout closed; its occupant gone; the spoils of George Hobston’s vault stowed safely from view, Culbert Joquill had no worry. He was resuming the role which he could play so well because it was his actual capacity: that of a consulting attorney.
Murder remained unavenged; and Culbert Joquill was confident that no investigator in all New York could possibly trace crime to him.
CHAPTER VI
THE SHADOW WAITS
WHILE Culbert Joquill and Garry Hewes were discussing their successful crime, the murder of George Hobston was receiving close attention elsewhere. A tall, calm-faced personage was seated in a bizarre room, reading the complete accounts in the morning newspapers.
He was the same hawk-faced stranger who had rescued Howard Norwyn on the previous night. His chiseled countenance was steady, even when relaxed. His eyes seemed burning as they scanned the headlines.
The room in which this personage dwelt at present was remarkable to the extreme. Its walls were furnished with a remarkable assortment of curios.
Tapestries, adorned with golden dragons; a huge Malay kris suspended from the ceiling like the sword of Damocles; a portion of an Alaskan totem pole; a mummy case standing in a corner — these were but a few of the articles that made the place look like a museum.
The hawkish face turned toward the door as a knock sounded. Thin lips gave the order to enter. A servant appeared and bowed from the doorway.
“What is it, Richards?” questioned the occupant of the curio room.
“Your guest is awake, sir,” replied the menial. “I have served his breakfast. He is finished.”
“And now he wishes to speak with me.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Usher him to this room.”
Richards departed. He returned a few minutes later with Howard Norwyn. The young man was attired in a dressing gown that Richards had evidently provided. Norwyn blinked at sight of the odd curio room. He stared toward the seated figure; in response to a gesture from his host, he entered and seated himself on a cushioned taboret. Richards departed.
HOWARD NORWYN recognized his host as the person who had conducted him to the subway. Yet the young man seemed bewildered. He had slept steadily and had not awakened until late in the morning. The effect of The Shadow’s opiate had caused prolonged slumber.
“I presume,” came the tones of a quiet voice, “that you are somewhat befuddled regarding your surroundings. Perhaps you are a bit uncertain as to the circumstances which resulted in your arrival here.”
“I am,” admitted Norwyn. “It seems as though I have had a nightmare; yet events were too realistic to have been false. I know that my employer — George Hobston — was murdered. I realize that I was in a predicament from which you rescued me. But — but—”
“But you do not know where you are.” Thin lips formed a slight smile. “Nor do you know who I am.”
Howard Norwyn nodded.
“I shall explain,” resumed the tall personage. “My name is Lamont Cranston. Perhaps you have heard it.”
“Lamont Cranston!” exclaimed Norwyn. “The famous globe trotter?”
“Yes. This is the curio room of my New Jersey home.”
“I begin to understand,” declared Norwyn. “You purchased stock from Mr. Hobston some months ago. I remember him mentioning you as a customer.”
The thin lips still retained their smile. There was a reason for the expression. The face which Howard Norwyn viewed was the countenance of Lamont Cranston; but its wearer was not he.