Fingers of Death
- Автор: Грант Максвелл
- Серия: The Shadow #25
- Год: 1933
- Язык: английский
- Год: The Shadow Magazine
- Жанр: Крутые детективы
Электронная книга - «Fingers of Death». Краткое содержание книги:
The Shadow’s presaging tones ended in a low, eerie laugh that reverberated strangely through that narrow room. As the hideous echoes threw back a ghoulish, dwindling cry, Josiah Bartram flattened on the floor dead.
EVER since his arrival in Holmsford, The Shadow had trailed the murderous course laid by fingers of death. His keen deduction had enabled him to judge men by their worth. He had known that Hurley Adams was no murderer. He had picked Julius Selwick as a man who sought safety through protection.
He had seen in Felton Shores nothing more than a man who would stoop to the folly of minor crime — not murder.
He had known that the importance of the secret shared by six had protected the secret itself. One of those conspirators was surely the man of murder. If no living man could have been the one, the only course was to choose from among the dead!
The Shadow had waited for the culmination of Josiah Bartram’s scheme. As Harry Vincent had supposed, The Shadow had learned the secret of the monument by sheer deduction. Knowing the final scene that Josiah Bartram had planned for his amazing drama, The Shadow had arrived to draw the curtain.
Harry Vincent, at a signal from The Shadow, departed from this room, where death had struck. He was needed no longer. Hurley Adams and Willard Saybrook could do the rest. The trapdoor lay below.
Beyond it was a barrier; but that meant nothing now, since these men knew that there was a tunnel leading to the mausoleum.
The stolen wealth that had been kept for twenty years would now be restored. Josiah Bartram had come from his chosen grave. The millions would come from there, also. Hurley Adams looked at Willard Saybrook. The young man gripped the lawyer’s hand.
“Bartram takes the blame,” announced Saybrook. “Forget the past. We have uncovered Bartram’s crime. He was the man who stole the gold. No one will ever know you shared the secret.”
Hurley Adams thankfully mumbled his understanding. The lawyer’s burden of worry was ended. The dread of twenty years — his vow never to betray those who had conspired — no longer held him, now that none remained but himself.
“Come,” said Saybrook. “We will call the police. Let them uncover the way to the mausoleum. It is obvious that Josiah Bartram came from there.”
THE two left the ghastly room of death. But the spot did not long remain devoid of human presence. A tall, black-cloaked figure entered after Saybrook and Adams had gone. The Shadow, invincible, stood silent and observant.
His sparkling eyes gleamed upon the bodies on the floor. Mahinda had served his master, even though it had meant murder; nevertheless, the Hindu had deserved the death which he received. Josiah Bartram, the superfiend, was the one whom death should have conquered long ago. Better far that his pretended death had been a real one!
That could not be rectified. The man had met the doom that belonged to him. Another master mind of crime had failed before The Shadow’s might.
Spread crazily upon the floor, Josiah Bartram lay with extended arms. His clawlike hands were out before him, each with widespread digits.
Fingers of death!
They were dead fingers now. Their work of murder was ended. Never again would they move to slay.
The Shadow’s laugh came as a weird epitaph. It sounded loud and terrible amid that silent room. It was a mirthless, solemn laugh, chilling in its fantastic tones.
The echoes of that laugh were heard by Hurley Adams and Willard Saybrook as they returned to the room where the bodies lay. The two men paused beyond the passage, waiting for the heart-stopping sound to end before they dared advance.
A grim, whispered echo seemed to persist even after they had come to the doorway of the room. Yet they saw no living presence there. The Shadow had departed through the door which had been Josiah Bartram’s secret.
A fleeting blot against the white wall of the mausoleum. That alone, marked the passage of The Shadow.
He had been there before, knowing that the silent building must be the abode of Josiah Bartram; knowing that a murderer lay safely within the protection of his tomb.
The murderer had come forth to gloat in triumph to meet Hurley Adams and ridicule the lawyer whose code of honor had been warped, but bound by oath.
Fingers of death would move no more!
Fingers of death had met The Shadow!
The Shadow was triumphant!