A long moment elapsed. Then, from that light on the right, came the figure of a man. Moocher Gleetz stood outlined in the door frame, above the bodies of his fallen gunmen. He was a safe cracker, not a gunman. From the inner office he has ordered his pair of subordinates to attack from ambush.
Moocher Gleetz scowled. He shoved a body aside with his foot, and moved in long strides to the outer office. He did not turn on the light of the central office; hence he never saw the tall shape that loomed in the darkness a scant six feet away. Moocher softly opened the exit door — the opening which he believed the victor had taken.
The sound of bedlam was coming down the corridor. Moocher’s cautious eye saw figures huddled by the screen. People were coming here; the quarry had escaped. Now was no time to linger. With long leaps, Moocher bounded back into the lighted office.
The Shadow moved. A long arm stretched to the closed door that led to the corridor. A firm hand silently turned the key; then softly withdrew it. Stooping, The Shadow slid the key out along the corridor.
It would be found there — apparently dropped by one who had escaped and fled, locking the door on the outside as he left!
With an automatic in his left hand, The Shadow swept boldly into the lighted office on the right, striding over the bodies of the men who lay before him. This was the way that Moocher Gleetz had taken; now, the room was empty!
The Shadow’s laugh was a low, barely audible whisper. Like a creature from another world, the black-garbed phantom stalked across the room and reached the farther corner. There, against the wall, was the cabinet with its shelves. His automatic dropped beneath his cloak, The Shadow sought for the combination to this solid-set article of furniture.
PANDEMONIUM was coming from outside the door of the center office. People, in the corridor, were trying to break down the heavy barrier.
The Shadow’s hands reached within the cabinet and joggled the uppermost shelf. It shifted downward. Pressing firmly, The Shadow pushed the shelf steadily. It descended, taking the next shelf with it. Small stacks of magazines and papers were compressed between.
The series of shelves, jammed down together, left a large space above them. Upon this, The Shadow rested.
A lull was apparent from the corridor. A shouting voice replaced the confused babble of excited tongues:
“Here’s the key! Here’s the key! We don’t have to break through! Give me room — stand back!”
A black-gloved hand had gripped the back of the cabinet behind the shelves. With a quick sweep, The Shadow slid this barrier to the side. An opening was revealed in the wall.
The black form scaled into total darkness. The back of the cabinet slid shut; the shelves came up automatically, now that pressure was released.
Men were in the suite of offices. They were surveying the forms of sprawled gangsters. Two — those who had come with Moocher — were dead. To meet their desperate attack, The Shadow had fired for their hearts as they loomed from the sphere of light.
The other three were wounded. They were the ones who could tell nothing. Crippled, they had known nothing but confusion after they had fallen. They were aids of Dynamite Hoskins. Their leader had gone; their enemy had gone also.
Police were coming in to learn the details of this new gang feud. The key that had been found upon the floor of the corridor seemed proof that someone had made a getaway by that route.
Senorita Juanita Pasquales, nervous and approaching hysteria, could tell nothing. She had been on the nightclub floor when the shooting had occurred.
But in her heart the woman knew that another man had disappeared tonight. Lamont Cranston, millionaire, had passed from view. Had he escaped? Even though she had signaled for those in ambush to arrange his certain doom, Juanita hoped that Cranston was the one who had left in safety.
The menace of The Red Blot — fear of it had made the nightclub proprietress obey the bidding of Socks Mallory. She knew the secret of that inner office; but she had stood the test of silence.
Police would come as they had come before. Nothing would be learned. Yet tonight, another man had disappeared. Lamont Cranston had left the Club Janeiro. If he had not escaped, he must be dead by now; slain by those in ambush, and carried through the secret way.
Dead or alive, he had given an amazing accounting for himself. Yet Juanita Pasquales felt positive that Cranston must either be a victim of murderers or a fleeing man who knew nothing of the mystery which enshrouded the Club Janeiro.
Senorita Pasquales did not know that Lamont Cranston had become The Shadow. Not for one moment did she suspect that he, as an invisible master of darkness, was now upon the trail that would lead to the heart of crime!
The disappearance of Lamont Cranston was of The Shadow’s making. The master of detection had not only won a mighty fight. Silent and unseen, he was on his way to the lair of The Red Blot!
CHAPTER XIX
FIVE MILLION DOLLARS
IT was nearly half past nine. Far from the area where The Shadow’s automatics had roared their deadly retorts to the revolvers of those who had sought to slay him, the directors of the Amalgamated Builders’ Association were assembled for their crucial test.
They were gathered about the large table of the conference room. Five stories above the street, in a secluded corner of a mammoth building, they were uneasy despite the security which reason told them was theirs.
The room was lighted. Upon the center of the table lay a long box; beneath its cover was the wealth which had been brought here by Felix Cushman’s order. Like a grim guardian, the black-haired man sat scowling at one end of the table.
Dobson Pringle, his gray hair giving an aged look to his peaked face, sat at the opposite end of the table. During this final lull when all were tense, he put a question which he had propounded previously.
“Where can Carlton Carmody be?” he asked.
“Will you stop asking that question?” queried Felix Cushman. “What has Carmody to do with this meeting? He is not a director — nor an officer of this association.”
“He was to be here,” responded Pringle.
“By whose order?” demanded Cushman.
“Mine,” asserted Pringle.
“You had no right to tell him to be here,” came Cushman’s angry retort.
“Let me explain,” persisted Pringle. “Carmody stayed late this evening. The detective — Hembroke — found him in the office. Carmody insisted that he must see me — here in the conference room — regarding plans for buildings. I told him to remain until we came—”
“Plans for buildings!” snorted Cushman, in contempt. “A fine time for such trivialities. Carmody must be crazy!”
“From what Hembroke said,” declared Pringle, “the matter must have been urgent. It might have had a bearing—”
“On tonight? Nonsense. Let us discuss more serious matters. Gentlemen” — Cushman glanced at his watch and turned to the directors — “it is nearly half past nine. The outer door of this conference room — through the little entrance there — is closed. Any emissary of The Red Blot must open it to appear here.”
“Detectives are planted outside. In the offices at the end of the large central room are three men. Detective Hembroke is one. Others, headed by Detective Cardona, are outside in the long corridor by the elevators and the stairway.
“They slipped in when the money was delivered. Commissioner Weston himself is with them. They are spread out — peering from side offices. They are allowing every opportunity for a man to enter — none for a man to escape.