presence here was to defend Dixon from his own foolhardy impulses.
Edith sprang through the doorway without warning. She had the drop on Vincent before he was aware there was any one inside the house except himself and his frightened host.
"Drop your gun!" Edith cried. "If you move an eyelash, I'll shoot to kill!"
She meant it. Her taut eyes warned Vincent instantly that a move meant death. He did the only thing possible. The gun slid from his fingers and thumped to the floor.
"Back up!" Edith commanded. "Against the rear wall! Turn your face to the wall! Palms flat!"
Dixon cried hoarsely from his chair: "Edith! Don't be a fool! This man is not a crook! He's - he's here to help me!"
The girl paid no attention. Dixon, she thought, was merely repeating some thing the desperado had taught him under pain of death if he refused.
Also, her eyes saw something that made them harden like ice. She moved quickly toward the bureau where a small stone lay, partly covering a piece of paper. Her gun was ready to kill Vincent, if he changed his helpless pose against the rear wall of the room. She snatched the note, backed toward the open doorway.
Holding the paper over the barrel of her gun with a free hand, Edith was able to read it with a lightning glance. It was the same note that The Shadow had hurled from the ground through the open window, ordering Clyde Burke to join him at the fire-blackened ruin of the Carruthers house.
Edith uttered a clipped cry of comprehension. She darted swiftly from the room.
"Stop!" Harry cried. "Don't go! You'll be killed!"
Arnold Dixon added his shrill cry to the warning of Vincent. Harry ran to the hallway, but Edith was already on the floor below, racing away with every atom of speed in her lithe, young legs.
Had Vincent been free to rush from the house and pursue the girl through the grounds, he might easily have caught her. But he dared not stir a step outside. The Shadow had ordered him to remain on duty at the side of the threatened millionaire.
"Stop her, before it's too late!" Dixon shrilled.
Vincent shook his head.
"It's too late already," he murmured, quietly. "Her only help now is the brain and strength of The Shadow."
THE SHADOW, at this moment, was no longer on the surface of the ground.
He had lifted a small link of copper imbedded in the stone of a square flag in the center of the cellar ruins of the Carruthers house. The stone had lifted slowly, ponderously. Through the opening descended The Shadow, followed by the agile body of Clyde Burke.
The Shadow used his tiny flashlight sparingly. When it shone, it was a mere flicker of light. These tiny firefly glints were all the guidance The Shadow needed on his silent journey through twisting underground corridors that
led to the hollowed-out chambers in the heart of the cliff.
The Shadow had been through these passages before. He knew exactly what lay ahead. He knew, also, the exact whereabouts of the Cup of Confucius. The whisper of his grim laughter echoed softly from the rocky walls.
Occasionally, a side passage radiated off from the main corridor. Some of these passages were mere offshoots, smaller caves filled with dust and musty odors. But from one of them a faint groan sounded, as The Shadow's light winked
briefly. The groan was barely audible, but The Shadow heard it and motioned to Clyde to follow him.
It was with difficulty that Clyde repressed a cry, as he saw the gagged-and-bound figure. The Shadow's hand grasped Clyde's in a warning gesture. Clyde clamped his lips together and made no sound. He followed The Shadow back to the ever-descending slope of the winding passage.
Another opening appeared on the left. It was similar to the one in which the gagged figure had lain. But there was no human being in it. It had evidently been used as a storeroom by the bootleg gang of the past. Its contents were grimly ominous. Boxes were piled up in a narrow tier along the cobwebbed wall. The lid was off one of them.
Dynamite sticks! Packed loosely in a protecting matrix of slightly damp sawdust.
Something equally dangerous - more so, in fact - was visible in other cases across the damp floor of the dungeon. The calm finger of The Shadow pointed; his faint whisper breathed at Clyde's ear.
"Mercury - fulminate of mercury!" Clyde repeated, his eyes round with wonder.
He knew the explosive force imprisoned in those innocent little objects in
the open case. They were detonating caps. Made of sensitive chemical gelatin, they would explode from the tiniest impact. A single one in the hands of a careless man could transform him instantly into bloody tatters of flesh and rags.
CLYDE'S hair prickled on his scalp, as The Shadow drew him out of the storeroom and led him silently onward into the rocky heart of the cliff.
The corridor was widening, spreading into a huge underground cave. In size, the place was enormous. But the size was not readily apparent because of the odd way in which the cave was broken up. Huge stalactites like enormous stone icicles hung from the damp roof of the chamber. They had been formed by the slow drip for centuries of water that had seeped through the rock.
Each drop left its deposit of carbonate of lime. The result was these crusted monsters of stone hanging like pointed pillars from the roof, dividing the cave into a network of smaller chambers.
Clyde Burke stood perfectly still. The finger of The Shadow was pointing.
A light glowed in the midst of this underground maze. To the sound of dripping water was added still other sounds - the clink of a pickax, the rough metallic scrape of a shovel.
Two men were digging furiously at a spot in the floor where the earth looked as though it had been recently disturbed.
The man with the shovel lifted his sweating face. It was a mean, ratlike countenance. Beside him, the man with the pickax swore fiercely. In the lantern
light, Clyde caught a glimpse of a pointed brown beard and ruthless pinpoint eyes.
The underground diggers were Paul Rodney and his evil little henchman, Squint.
CHAPTER XIX
THE END OF THE RIDDLE
"IT'S no use," Rodney snarled. "Get up out of that hole. We're wasting time!"
"We've only dug about three feet," Squint protested. "The cup may be buried deeper than we thought."
The Shadow and Clyde Burke watched the crooked pair. The Shadow had drawn his agent into a tiny grotto of the cave wall, formed by the rough juncture of two huge stalactites. Neither Rodney nor Squint were aware that they were under
surveillance.
"The cup can't be buried any deeper," Rodney growled. "It's been stolen already! I was afraid of this, when I saw how soft the earth was. Somebody has been here ahead of us!"
"The Shadow!" Squint muttered.
Rodney's bearded face seemed to twitch under the impact of sudden murderous rage.
"That damned paper of his! It must have been a deliberate plant! He found the cup, long ago! He meant us to read that note and come here. It might be a trap!"
His arm gestured fiercely.
"Quick! Get back to that water tunnel! See if the exit is still open! I remember now - there was a boulder that might be - Quick!"
Squint turned, raced off through the cave. Rodney's gun whipped into his hand. He turned, his glance searching the darkness beyond the lantern's glow with the stare of a cornered animal. He could see neither The Shadow nor Clyde.
But by some evil intuition, he remained facing the tiny grotto in which they were hidden, as if he were dimly aware that peril might lurk in that particular
spot.
It would have been easy to shoot him where he stood, but The Shadow had other plans. He intended to take full advantage of the play of evil against evil in this cliff cavern. He knew now the various forces involved against one another - and the amazing truth back of it all.