Clyde had been watching for lack of vigilance on the part of the policemen at the apartment-house door.
Then the firing had begun. Clyde, spotting the third story room as the place of action, had clambered to the running board of a coupe to gain a better view.
Like policemen in the street, he had heard The Shadow’s shot. Although the report of the automatic had differed from those of the revolvers, Clyde had taken it for granted that the gun had been fired within the apartment.
Firing had ceased. Policemen were piling into the apartment house. Clyde decided that now was the time for his entry. He stepped from the running board of the coupe. He stopped stock still as he heard a hiss not three feet distant from his elbow.
A sinister whisper — a sibilant tone that Clyde recognized. The Shadow was here — within reach of his secret agent. Clyde did not turn. He knew the source of the sound. It came from within the coupe. The Shadow’s agent stood attentive.
“Strangler Hunn is dead.” The pronouncement came in a weird monotone. “You can enter. Stay with Cardona. Learn all that has happened.”
“Instructions received,” spoke Clyde, in a quiet tone. Then, without another word, The Shadow’s agent paced across the street to the door of the apartment house.
SHOUTS were coming from above. Word was reaching the men below, informing them that the raid had succeeded. A burly policeman, holding his arm as a barrier to keep Clyde out, suddenly dropped his hand.
“All right,” agreed the officer. “They’ve got the guy. That ticket will let you in now. I couldn’t have let you by while the fight was on.”
Clyde tucked his reporter’s card in the outer band of his hat. Scorning the elevator, he took the steps two at a time until he reached the third floor. A detective came forward to stop him; Clyde pointed to his hat.
The man let him by.
Then came another halt. Markham and the wounded detective were being carried to the elevator. Clyde watched them pass. He continued to the open door of the apartment.
Joe Cardona was in charge. Strangler Hunn’s body lay sprawled upon the floor. Cardona had drawn back the desk. Clyde turned to gaze at the dead form of MacAvoy Crane.
“Did Strangler get him?” questioned the reporter.
“Yeah,” returned Cardona, grimly. “Before we got here.”
“Do you know who he is?”
Cardona nodded.
“A private detective,” informed Cardona. “Called himself a special investigator. MacAvoy Crane. I knew him.”
“Why do you think Strangler bumped him?”
“Revenge, maybe. Crane may have had something on Strangler.”
Clyde stared at the wastebasket. The flames had died out. Nothing but charred remainders told of MacAvoy Crane’s documents. Cardona poked among the ashes. He shrugged his shoulders while Clyde watched.
Neither the detective nor the reporter saw the tiny bit of paper that had escaped the basket. Cardona raised the metal container as he stooped to study the ashes. When he replaced it on the floor, it went directly over that tell-tale fragment.
Cardona began a search of the dead men’s clothes. He found several dollars in Strangler’s pockets; nothing else of consequence. A search of Crane revealed identification cards; no papers of other importance.
CLYDE BURKE, watching the detective, saw every item that was discovered. By the time Cardona had finished this work, Inspector Timothy Klein appeared with a police surgeon.
Clyde listened while Cardona made a brief report. Standing by the window, the reporter heard the first account of the actual fight which Joe had waged with Strangler.
“He was standing right there” — Cardona paused to point toward the side of the window — “ready to plug me, when his arm dropped. I went for him; he broke loose. Parker got him at the door—”
“You mean,” broke in Klein, “that he had you covered, but deliberately lowered his gun?”
“Something must have got him,” explained Cardona. “Maybe one of my early shots wounded him so he gave out at the critical moment.”
“His wrist is shattered,” announced the police surgeon, bending over Strangler’s body. “A bullet did it.”
A sudden recollection came to Clyde Burke. He could hear The Shadow’s words, whispered from the coupe.
“Strangler is dead—”
How had The Shadow known it? Why had Strangler dropped his arm, just, at the moment when he had been about to slay his hated enemy, Joe Cardona?
“A funny thing,” the detective was saying. “I thought I heard a shot from outside just as Strangler’s arm dropped. Yet nobody could have fired in from the street. They couldn’t have seen Strangler, on account of the angle.”
Clyde’s gaze turned across the street. The Shadow’s agent saw the tiers of signboards. Clyde knew the answer. Posted above the signs, The Shadow, master marksman, had intervened to rescue Joe Cardona.
More than that, The Shadow had saved the lives of others. Strangler Hunn, breaking free, might well have blazed a way of destruction in his mad effort to escape below.
Cardona and Klein were summing up the case. The inspector had been talking with Farlan; the detective now appeared to take a look at Crane’s body. He nodded to the inspector.
“Farlan saw this fellow come in,” stated Klein. “It is obvious that Strangler Hunn came here to lie in wait for him — probably in that inner room. You say that Crane was a special investigator. He probably did know too much about Strangler. That accounts for the destruction of the documents.
“We’ve gotten the man we were after. That will suit the commissioner. Your job, now, Joe, is to find out more about Crane. If you can link him up with Strangler, that will clinch this circumstantial evidence.
“Do you hear that, Burke?” Cardona turned to the reporter. “You’ve got a real story. Play it big. That’s how we’ll learn about Crane’s past — through the newspapers. We don’t know who he was working for, but we’ll find out quick enough after your story goes in print.”
“Count on me, Joe,” assured Clyde. “I’m heading for the office right now. This is going to be a story you’ll like. What’s more” — Clyde was speaking to Klein — “you’re going to read about how Commissioner Weston’s order was put through pronto.”
A broad smile showed on the inspector’s bluff face as Clyde left the apartment. Klein was pleased. He knew that he would receive his share of the credit. Both he and Joe Cardona thought of Clyde Burke purely as a representative of the Classic. Little did they suspect that their findings would go verbatim to The Shadow before Clyde reached the newspaper office!
FIFTEEN minutes later, Joe Cardona was standing alone in the living room. The bodies had been removed. The police cordon had departed. The detective was preparing to leave.
Glancing at the wastebasket, Cardona scowled as he thought of the documents that had been so effectively destroyed. With an angry snort, the detective delivered a kick to the metal basket. The container rolled over on the floor, spilling ashes on the rug.
Cardona’s eyes opened. On the spot where the basket had been resting was a small piece of white paper. Cardona stooped to pick up the fragment. He carried it to the lamp light in the corner. He stared at the crude, poorly spaced letters and figures that appeared upon the bit of paper:
M E N
1 3
With thoughtful expression, Cardona drew an envelope from his pocket. He inserted the scrap of paper.
On the desk, he saw a partly used pad. He noted that a sheet had been torn from it, evidently in haste.