Harry could make no conjecture. Little did he realize that The Shadow was following an air trail; that the autogyro had carefully descended along the course by which an escaping murderer had dropped from the great dirigible Munchen!
Silently, Harry followed the man ahead. He could see no outline of The Shadow’s form. A larger flashlight was working now, sweeping along the ground as The Shadow led the way in a methodical search.
Suddenly the light stopped. A soft laugh came from above it. Harry shuddered. He had heard that laugh before; it was a laugh which he, as The Shadow’s trusted agent, had no cause to fear. Nevertheless, its sinister, whispered tones were uncanny. There was something in that amazing mockery that brought dread to all who heard it.
The laugh of The Shadow!
“Come.”
The voice followed the laugh. The single word brought Harry forward. The young man stared at the spot where the flashlight’s rays formed a luminous circle upon the ground. There, Harry saw the marks of two feet impressed in the soft earth. The traces of those implanted shoes possessed one noticeable oddity: the left was on the right; the right on the left.
The fact caught Harry Vincent’s eye, but his mind gained no explanation. The Shadow’s laugh, however, showed that The Shadow understood. A man, descending in a parachute, had landed with crossed legs — in the proper method of terminating a landing via parachute.
These were the marks that The Shadow had come to find; they were the sure trace of the man who had dropped from the swift German dirigible. The Shadow had picked up the trail of the man who murdered Von Tollsburg!
THE light moved along the ground; again, Harry followed. Here were faint traces of footprints going toward the clump of trees. Harry himself would have lost the trail; but The Shadow’s eagle eye did not fail. With uncanny precision, the bearer of the flashlight followed the course that the murderer had taken.
There was brush among the trees. The flashlight spotted a clump of bushes. A broken branch gave a quick clew. A low command came in The Shadow’s whisper. Harry separated the bushes, and there, while the flashlight played ahead, he discovered a mass of crumpled cloth. Dragging out the discovery, Harry spread a parachute upon the ground.
Once again, the keen eyes of The Shadow were taking up the trail along the ground. The path brought the searchers to an embankment. Footprints showed in the earth. They led to the dirt road, and mingled with the dust.
Harry Vincent strode along, still behind that light that flickered from an unseen hand. There was something ghostly in the atmosphere. The light itself seemed detached from a human being. Suspended in air, it might have been moving of its own accord, as it searched the dirt of the road and never ceased its progress.
When the light finally stopped, it was at the point where the old road encountered a paved highway. Here, under the scanning glare, Harry could see another telltale mark in a patch of mud. The footprints again, turning down to the left. That was the direction in which the man had gone!
The light went out. Harry Vincent felt a sudden dread amid the gloom.
Out of the darkness came a low, eerie whisper. Its strange note made Harry tense. The Shadow was speaking in a sinister voice that seemed unreal. Only once before had Harry Vincent so fully realized the commanding force of his mysterious master; that had been upon the eventful night when The Shadow had plucked him from death’s brink.
“Follow the trail,” came The Shadow’s words. “The man was here last night. He chose this spot at random — three o’clock — make inquiries — learn his destination—”
The young man understood the vital orders. Some one had dropped from the air. That man had been traced by The Shadow. A stranger in a place chosen through necessity, the man must have sought to gain his location. His first stop would have been a habitation close by.
“I understand,” declared Harry. There was no response from the darkness. Harry hesitated; then realized that he must go back along the road until he reached his car. With the coupe he could take the paved road and run along the trail toward the nearest town. Harry was a trained investigator for The Shadow. He knew how to do the work that was now required of him.
PLODDING along the dirt road, Harry experienced the strange sensation that some one was close beside him. The feeling was intermittent; at times, Harry was sure that The Shadow was here; then he would suddenly become convinced that the invisible companion was gone.
When he reached the coupe, Harry clambered into the car and turned on the headlights. The focused glare illuminated the road ahead. Strange, long silhouettes of black spread across the dirt byway. They seemed to sway as Harry watched them; but he could not discern whether any one might be the shadow of a man or merely the blackness caused by some tree beside the road.
The starter clattered; the motor throbbed; and Harry urged the car into gear. As he neared the paved highway, he caught the sound of a purring mechanism. Staring upward, Harry caught a fleeting glimpse of a mass that was lifting itself through the air.
The autogyro! Silently, swiftly, The Shadow had returned to his ship. He was rising now, in his mysterious departure. No lights twinkled. Only the thrum of the motor told of The Shadow’s course. The purring died away while Harry Vincent listened from his car.
For Harry Vincent remained with a quest before him. The Shadow, his strange task accomplished, had gone into the upper realm of the night.
While Harry was performing his simple task, The Shadow had more difficult matters to do.
CHAPTER V
IN THE SANCTUM
ANOTHER night had come, and with it darkness. But it was not the shroud of night that pervaded this hidden room somewhere in Manhattan. This place was dominated by the blackness of closed walls and ceiling. It was a spot where daylight never came — the sanctum of The Shadow!
Click!
The sharp sound brought light — a strange, eerie glow that filled a corner of the room. A bluish illumination shone upon the surface of a polished table; but the shade above the lamp hid the form that stood close by.
A pair of hands appeared beneath the light. White hands, long hands, they showed sensitive touch combined with latent power. Upon the third finger of the left hand gleamed a shining gem — a radiant stone that glowed with ever-changing hue. From deep maroon, it became mauve; then purple. Its depths sent forth sparkling shafts of light. This was The Shadow’s emblem — the girasol that was his only jewel. A fire opal of rarest luster, this precious trophy was unmatched in all the world. A relic of the Romanoff jewels, The Shadow, wore it constantly. With mysterious sparkle, the girasol betokened the strange, unknown personality of the one whose finger it adorned.
When the hands of The Shadow appeared beneath that light, there was work ahead for them. Tonight, they were engaged in an important task. They were assembling the shreds of information which The Shadow had gained in his quest to find the murderer of Baron Hugo von Tollsburg.
First, the hands produced a report from Harry Vincent. This, by the tabulation which it bore, had come to The Shadow early in the day. The Shadow’s girasol sparkled while the left hand held the paper, and the right forefinger pointed to important passages in the report. A low laugh came from the gloom as hidden eyes scanned the lines.
First logical building from dirt road — service station owned by Asa Rothrock — one mile six-tenths — man stopped there at four o’clock in morning — inquires regarding locality—
The Shadow read on. Harry’s report was a mingling of essential and varied facts. It was conclusive in one important point, namely, that The Shadow’s agent had unquestionably picked up the trail of the man whom The Shadow sought.