“I’ll be here tomorrow morning,” promised Cardona.
AN approaching train, coming around the bend, ended the conversation. Cardona, glancing toward the hawk-faced stranger, noted that the man was watching the train intently.
The stranger stepped aboard, and that was the last Cardona saw of him. Yet, all during the remainder of his fruitless investigation, Cardona could not help but recall the remarkable appearance of the man whom he had seen upon the platform.
The detective had not noticed the stranger’s arrival. He did not know that the powerful roadster belonged to that man. When Cardona had hunches, he did not hesitate to follow them; but in this instance, Cardona had no hunch. He was simply impressed by a chance observation; and he reasoned with himself that he should forget this detail which had no apparent bearing on the death that struck at Felswood. Hence Cardona did not inquire if any one had noted the stranger arrive.
It was shortly after three o’clock when Cardona reluctantly boarded a westbound train for Manhattan.
Extreme measures had brought no result. Grayson’s body had been removed from the death car; and the car itself was to be shunted from the siding.
Riding toward New York, Cardona mulled over the police surgeon’s report, which corresponded exactly with those on the two previous deaths. Grayson’s system had shown traces of a poison. There must be something odd and unexplainable about the unfound missile that had brought such immediate death.
As the train dipped into the tube beneath the East River, Cardona had a last thought of the stranger on the station platform. He decided that the man must be merely a resident of Felswood — some late morning commuter. He wondered what time the man would be returning to the local station.
Cardona was sorry that he had not waited at Felswood; but he knew that it would be a great mistake to go against Inspector Klein’s instructions because of a blind quest.
When the train pulled into the New York station, Cardona’s thoughts were back at Felswood. Singularly enough, a train was just then stopping at the way station out on Long Island, and from it was alighting the very man who had been so definitely in Cardona’s mind!
There was nothing suspicious in the man’s carriage; indeed, his bearing and important appearance certified him as a person of influence. Cardona had merely noted the man particularly because he had chanced to come within earshot of the conversation between detective and inspector.
The hawk-faced stranger went directly to the expensive roadster and took his place behind the wheel.
But he did not drive away.
Two men were still on duty; they did not pay special attention to this returning commuter. Hence the man sat unobserved, well back in the deep seat within the shelter of the blind sides of the long, heavy car. At times, he peered intently forth; and his sharp eyes were keenly observant.
Parked directly alongside of the roadster was the sedan which Cardona had seen come to the parking lot just before the eight thirty-eight had arrived at Felswood. The hawk-faced stranger was noting the position of that car; the fact that it was no more than forty feet from the railroad track; and that it rested parallel to the right of way, its position differing to some degree from that of other parked cars.
HALF an hour went by; another train arrived from New York. Several commuters stepped off, among them the nervous man with the Vandyke, who had just made the eight thirty-eight that morning. The man went to the sedan. He did not notice the eyes that were watching him from the roadster.
The sedan backed from the parking lot and turned up the road that led from the station. The motor of the heavy roadster now purred rhythmically but softly. The powerful car swung away and moved in the direction that the sedan had taken.
As the roadster came into a side street half a mile from the station, the sedan was turning up a driveway beside a new house. The driver of the roadster, leaning over the wheel, saw the sedan move into a garage. The roadster kept on along the street.
A block away, a strange, low sound came from the interior of the roadster. The whispered tones of a mocking laugh emerged from the lips below the hawklike nose. That laugh was one of understanding — a weird, mirthless cry that carried a chilling note.
Had Joe Cardona been there to hear that sinister burst of irony, he would have recognized the author of the weird laughter. He would have known then why he had been impressed by the tall, hawk-nosed stranger at the station.
For the eerie cry was the laugh of The Shadow — the strange, shuddering note of doom that had spread terror through every bailiwick of the underworld. The laugh of a superbeing, it betokened the power of that unknown personage called The Shadow.
To-day, Joe Cardona had failed. A third tragedy had occurred at Felswood station, under the very eyes of the ace detective. A squad of sleuths had failed to find the inkling of a clew.
But The Shadow had not failed. He had arrived after the crime had been committed; but, nevertheless, he had shrewdly traced a connection between the deaths and an individual.
A man with a Vandyke beard who lived half a mile from Felswood station — a commuter who drove a large sedan, and left it parked on the lot beside the tracks. This was the man whom The Shadow had placed under observation.
Death would not strike again at Felswood. The Shadow, arrived from afar, would be there to prevent it!
CHAPTER III. ONE MILLION DOLLARS
WHEN the next morning dawned, Detective Joe Cardona was again at Felswood station, determined to watch the arrival of the eight thirty-eight. The detective was somewhat nervous — an unusual condition for one so stolid as Joe Cardona.
Mayhew had again been dispatched to the end of the line. He was there now, Cardona knew. This branch of the Suburban Railway terminated at the town of Belgrade, ten miles beyond Felswood.
Mayhew had gone to Belgrade simply because it was the starting-point of the commuters’ train, which left there at eight ten. There was no other reason why Mayhew should be there, in Cardona’s opinion.
Nevertheless, that town of Belgrade was due to play an important part in the activities of both Cardona and Mayhew. For at the very time when Cardona arrived at Felswood — shortly before seven in the morning — new events were shaping in the town where Mayhew had gone.
One of the most imposing residences in Belgrade was the home of Henry Bellew, multimillionaire clothing manufacturer. Henry Bellew, a thin, cadaverous man of sixty years, was a firm believer in the adage of early rising. On this particular morning, as was his regular custom, Bellew was seated at his dining-room table, awaiting his morning course of bacon and eggs.
“The morning newspaper, Barcomb!” ordered Bellew, in an impatient tone.
“Yes, sir.”
The quiet response came from a sad-faced butler. Barcomb, although he was scarcely forty, was a bald-headed man of patient demeanor, who always responded promptly to his master’s bidding. Within a few seconds after Bellew had given his order, the newspaper lay upon the dining-room table.
Henry Bellew glanced at the headlines. His face clouded. He was reading the story of the third death aboard the commuters’ train at Felswood.
That story struck home. It was annoying to Henry Bellew. He had been aboard the train on each day of tragedy. Although he had not been a passenger in the car where death had struck, Bellew had suffered the delay, and had listened to the awed comments of his fellow riders.
“Hm-m-m!” mumbled Bellew. “If this keeps on, no one will ride that train.”
The remarks were addressed to no one. Barcomb had gone from the dining room to get Bellew’s breakfast. The rest of the millionaire’s family were not accustomed to rising at the early hour of seven.