“Some more smart stuff, Nubin? Say — you’re the wisest dick that ever worked on this road. Where are you going to hop on?”
“Same place as usual, I guess. B and R crossing. I’ll get aboard when the train comes through. So keep your mouth shut.”
“All right, Nubin. But you’d better start hoofing it if you expect to be there in time.”
With this admonition, Zach Hoyler went back into the station. Perry Nubin strolled about until he heard the clicking of the telegraph key. Then he sidled off into the darkness of the tracks. The Shadow watched until the green glow of a signal light showed a momentary glimpse of the chunky form. Then The Shadow followed.
The railroad dick was walking back in the direction of the shack. But he did not go that far. Instead, he scraped down the embankment and headed across fields. His course led toward the Breck mansion. It was slow and cautious; Nubin seemed to be in no hurry. In fact, the whistle and clatter of the Dairy Express was already audible when the dick reached his destination.
This was the third spot that The Shadow had intended to visit. The presence of Perry Nubin had caused a change in his plans. By the darkened side of the house, The Shadow waited. At intervals, he could hear Nubin’s cautious prowling. Only the keen ears of The Shadow could have detected the sound, for Nubin was well away from the house.
HOURS passed. The clear starlight presaged an early dawn. Yet Perry Nubin kept up his vigil. He chose new spots more distant from the house; yet all the while he watched. During this period, The Shadow waited, unseen. Though time was shortening, he could afford to lose it. His business here was too important to neglect; and it had to wait until the railroad dick departed.
At last there were no more signs of Nubin. The Shadow sensed that the detective had left. Moving silently from the cover of the house, The Shadow glided to the rear and approached the square outline of the closed smoke house. This was the third tiny block that had appeared upon his map.
The glimmer of the little flashlight shone upon the massive padlock that guarded the smokehouse door. No search had been made in this building, because the lock itself gave evidence that the building had not been entered. The Shadow had learned this fact from Harry Vincent. But The Shadow’s opinion concerning the locked door was different from the one that had entered the mind of Sheriff Tim Forey.
Indeed, the whispered laugh that sounded in the darkness was evidence of definite knowledge. The Shadow knew that the sheriff had overlooked a simple possibility; yet one on which new facts of crime were hinged. The Shadow had left details in the hands of the law. The law, represented by Forey, had failed in its quest.
A blackened pick of steel probed the padlock. After a short while, a click sounded. The lock snapped open. The Shadow removed it; softly, he opened the door of the smoke house, entered, and closed the door behind him.
MANY minutes passed before The Shadow’s figure reappeared. A black-gloved hand snapped the padlock back in place. The Shadow moved toward the house. His flashlight glimmered along the ground. A whisper sounded as The Shadow found an object that would suit his next purpose. It was a small hand-sledge that lay with other rusted tools on the little back porch by the kitchen.
Dawn would soon be due. The last period of darkness was suited to The Shadow’s next purpose. Without using his flashlight, The Shadow returned to the smoke house. There, he relinquished his usual mode of silence. The Shadow had brought the sledge with him. Swinging it through the darkness, he pounded fiercely upon the steel door, aiming haphazard for the big padlock.
Crash! As The Shadow’s strokes continued, lights began to blaze in the Breck house. Windows came open. Excited shouts sounded from within. With two final strokes, The Shadow used precision in the darkness. These blows sufficed to completely shatter the padlock.
Hurling the sledge to the ground, The Shadow swung off past the smoke house, heading for the rear fence. But as he rounded the final corner, a stocky figure came hurtling upon him from the darkness. The Shadow swirled just as heavy, hamlike hands caught him by the throat.
Wrestling free, The Shadow grappled with a powerful foe who emitted incoherent roars. Doors were clattering from the house. Men’s voices shouted as flashlights began to blaze. The Shadow’s enemy gave a hoarse shout. It was triumphant, for the black-cloaked form was slumping downward.
“I got him! I got—”
The man’s cry ended as The Shadow’s back shot upward like a spring. Clawing nothingness, the fellow went hurtling head foremost over The Shadow’s shoulders. He thudded heavily upon the dried ground and rolled along the tufted grass. Swiftly, The Shadow swept away into the darkness. His figure merged with the blackness beyond the fence.
HARRY VINCENT was the first to spy the form of The Shadow’s overpowered adversary. Harry’s flashlight showed the fellow lying face downward. Elbert Breck arrived; then Craven. While the servant held the light, Harry gripped the prone man’s shoulders. The fellow mumbled; he came to a sitting posture. Harry saw the dull face of a yokel. Craven uttered an exclamation.
“It’s Hiram!” declared the servant.
“Who is Hiram?” questioned Harry.
“The lad who works about the place,” explained Craven. “He always gets here just about dawn, sir. A dullard, but faithful and as powerful as a bull. I am amazed, sir, that he was so promptly whipped in the struggle.”
Slight streaks of dawn were appearing as Craven spoke. Harry Vincent recalled that he had reported no mention of Hiram to The Shadow. Harry realized who the yokel’s adversary had been. Then Harry’s thoughts turned to the present. Hiram, propped against the back corner of the smoke house, was beginning to talk.
“I heard him,” asserted the rustic. “Bang — bang — that’s the way he was goin’ — right at the smokehouse door. I knowed he’d come this way. I can rassle, I can. So I grabbed him, by heck.”
“Are you hurt, Hiram?” inquired Craven.
“Nah,” responded the hired man. “Might have been, though, if I’d bumped a rock. Say — I wisht I knowed the rassling holt that feller used. Picked me up like this” — Hiram swooped his arms upward — “and heaved me, he did. Then he run away.”
“Which direction?” inquired Elbert Breck.
“How’d I know?” retorted Hiram. “I was layin’ kinda foolish like, with all the wind knocked out of me.”
Elbert stared off toward the fence. Though the sky was lightening, the ground was still hopelessly dark. Pursuit was impossible; Harry Vincent promptly killed all thoughts of it.
“I heard the hammering on the smokehouse door,” declared Harry. “Hiram says someone was trying to get in there. I thought I heard the lock smash. Suppose we look and see what happened.”
“We should aid Hiram first, sir,” put in Craven. “Perhaps we should help him to the house.”
“A good idea,” chimed Elbert. “Come on, Vincent, give me a lift with him.”
“I can walk,” protested Hiram, as Harry and Elbert aided him to his feet. “Leave me use my own legs.”
“Take it easy,” ordered Elbert.
“That’s right, Hiram,” added Craven, who was leading the way with the light. “Do as young Mr. Breck orders. He is the master here at present.”
Hiram showed no ill effects from his struggle. By the time they reached the living room and propped him on the couch, his face was wearing a sour look.
“I want to go back to the smoke house,” he complained. “I tell you, the feller was trying to get in there. Leave me go—”
A motor came to a stop out front. Then a clang of the door bell. Craven looked worried; then went to answer the call. Sheriff Tim Forey stamped into the living room.