Maxwell Grant - The Shadow - 157 - The Golden Dog Murders

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THE GOLDEN DOG MURDERS
by Maxwell Grant
As originally published in "The Shadow Magazine," September 1, 1938.
The blood sapphires, heritage of the Dog goddess, drip their trail across
Manhattan in The Golden Dog Murders.
CHAPTER I
A PERFECT CRIME
A MAN was moving cautiously through the landscaped grounds that
surrounded
the quiet suburban cottage. His feet made no sound in the darkness. The man
moved swiftly, as though afraid to waste a moment of time.
The wind carried with it a strong hint of rain. Clouds raced overhead
past
a ragged moon. Whenever the moon shone, the furtive figure halted. As soon as
darkness followed, he was again swiftly in motion, making his way grimly from
bush to bush toward the rear of the silent house.
All the front windows were dark. The man had expected this. Circling the
house to the rear, he made sure that the back windows, too, were unlighted. He
was absolutely certain that this house was empty.
The intruder peered at the rear cellar window through which he intended
to
enter this house. He was less cautious now. Moonlight laid a quick-passing
brilliance on his out-thrust face.
Acting Inspector Joe Cardona, of the New York police, would have
recognized that face. A sly countenance, with a brutal mouth and glittering,
murderous eyes. The crook was Sam Baron. He was a trigger-man for a powerful
underworld mob that specialized in "hot ice". Cardona had arrested Baron a
half-dozen times, but had never been able to pin a single jewel theft on him.
A fence through which Baron worked remained unknown. So was the actual
leader of this clever mob of thieves. Insurance detectives were as baffled as
Cardona. And, no wonder! Not even Sam Baron himself knew who his big-shot boss
was. A secretly relayed order had sent Baron to this quiet house in the
suburbs.
He snapped the frail lock of the rear cellar window with a tiny bar of
tempered steel. An instant later, Baron dropped inside. Moving swiftly toward
the staircase, he snapped on a small electric torch. He didn't bother drawing
a
gun.
Drexel, the butler, was the only person who would normally be in the
house
at this time. But Baron had shrewdly taken care of that. A fake phone call had
sent Drexel off on a wild-goose chase.
That left Sam Baron approximately fifteen minutes before Rodney Mason
would arrive home with Isabel Pyne. Baron knew they were on the way now.
Acting
on orders from his unknown chief, Baron had gone to a celebrated night club
and
had sat near the table where Rodney Mason was entertaining the beautiful Miss
Pyne. He had been able to eavesdrop on their conversation.
Baron had heard Mason beg Isabel to drive out to his home for a highball
before they ended a pleasant evening. Isabel had hesitated. Then Mason had
told
her about his private chemical laboratory. He had promised to show her
something
in the line of jewels that was worth seeing. Laughingly, the young chemist had
alluded to the stodgy presence of his butler, Drexel, as a chaperon.
Isabel Pyne had smiled and nodded. She liked this tall, good-looking
Rodney Mason. The two had leisurely left the night club and climbed into
Mason's car.
It was then that Sam Baron had made his fake phone call to the
unsuspecting butler. Now, having driven at reckless speed along back roads, he
was alone in the young chemist's house.
He had a double plan in mind. If he failed to find the loot he was after,
Baron intended to hide and await the arrival of Mason and Isabel Pyne. The
chemist, anxious to impress the girl, would produce the jewels. The rest would
be up to Sam Baron.
Theft or murder - or both - depending on the way events worked out. Baron
had killed too many tough guys in his grim career to worry much about
murdering
a young research chemist and a blond "deb" from Park Avenue.
MASON'S laboratory was in a ground-floor wing of the cottage, just beyond
the chemist's living room and study. The crook's electric torch probed the
dark
room, passing swiftly across a bewildering array of apparatus. His attention
focused itself on a safe in the corner.
Baron attacked the safe promptly. He used only his ears and his sensitive
finger tips. In seven minutes, he clicked the tumblers and swung open the
door.
Then he cursed viciously. The jewels he had hoped to find were not in the
safe!
The crook slipped on gloves and removed all marks of his finger tips from
the safe door. He began to move swiftly about the room, searching for a hidden
vault and careful to disarrange nothing in his search. Baron had already
determined on a "fall guy" to frame with the cops; he was going to pin this
job
on Drexel, the butler.
Suddenly, he heard a sound from the distant front door: the grate of a
key
in the lock! Instantly, Sam Baron snapped off his torch and shoved the tiny
cylinder back in his pocket. Rodney Mason and Isabel Pyne had arrived.
Baron tiptoed behind a heavy drape and waited. He could bear Isabel's
silvery laughter. It was followed by the clink of ice in tall glasses. Mason's
deep voice said:
"Here's to the loveliest girl in New York!"
"Thank you, Rodney." Isabel Pyne's gay voice sounded puzzled. "Where do
you suppose Drexel is? You said that your butler would be at home."
"I can't understand where he went. I hope you don't think that I -"
"Of course not, Rodney! You're a sweet boy and I like you. But I really
can't stay. It isn't quite proper - not while there are scandal columnists on
the lookout for people like you and me."
"Please!" Mason sounded boyishly eager. "You haven't seen the surprise
promised to show you. It will take only a minute or two. Then we'll go."
"All right."
THEY came into the laboratory. Mason switched on the lights. Sam Baron
watched them grimly from behind the tall drape that concealed his rigid
figure.
Mason was tall, slim, good-looking in his dinner jacket.
Isabel Pyne was a vision of gorgeous loveliness. She had honey-colored
hair and deep-blue eyes. She was wearing an evening gown of powder blue, with
a
rather daringly cut bodice that revealed the smooth perfection of creamy skin.
She was aware that the shimmering gown outlined her attractive figure, and she
enjoyed Mason's breathless admiration. But her voice was calm and
matter-of-fact when she asked:
"Where is this big surprise? In your safe?"
"Not at all. I have a special hiding place for my pets. Just a moment."
Mason moved a shelf sideways on a metal pivot. Bending forward, he opened
a panel in the wall and removed a small chamois bag. The chemist emptied its
contents on a table.
Isabel Pyne gasped with delight.
"Oh, how gorgeous! They're perfect!"
A dozen shimmering blue stones lay on the bare table. Sapphires!
"Not quite," Mason said. His voice sounded dryly amused. "Actually, they
are not perfect. They're not even natural stones. They're the product of
chemistry and heat. I made them here in my laboratory. But, unfortunately, I
haven't yet succeeded in producing a large-size synthetic sapphire without a
flaw. Hold one of them to the light and you'll see what I mean. Notice the
blood smear?"
Isabel obeyed. In the center of the stone was a cloudy dot of crimson
light. It was, as Mason had said, exactly as if a smear of blood were
imprisoned within the sapphire.
Mason explained.
"Sapphires and rubies have almost the same chemical composition. The
arrangement of the atoms within the molecule determines the color. All these
synthetic stones are hybrids - sapphires with a faint trace of ruby in them.
They are useless as jewels until I can find out what's wrong with my
experimental methods. I've been two years on this problem, but the stones are
still commercially valueless.
"Your uncle, Julius Hankey, would tell you that if he saw these beauties.
However, I'm not ready to show them to a Fifth Avenue expert like Julius
Hankey. Not until I have succeeded in removing the" - Mason laughed - "the
fatal smear of blood."
Isabel shivered a little. "I don't like that talk about blood. It sounds
sinister. Rodney, it's late! I want to go home."
The chemist smiled. "Of course! I had no right to bring you here so late.
But I just had to show you my sapphires. Promise to keep what you've seen a
secret? I don't want other chemists to get wind of what I'm attempting."
Isabel nodded. Rodney leaned forward suddenly and swept her into his
arms.
He kissed her passionately, and for a second the girl lay in his arms without
resisting. Then she stiffened and thrust him away.
"You're forgetting yourself!"
"I love you!" Mason gasped. "I - I -"
"I think you had better see me home!"
"Are you angry?"
"No. I'm to blame as much as you. I shouldn't have come here. Please get
my wrap."
The two went out to the living room. Presently, they left the house.
There
was the faint echo of a motor, then a silence flooded the house and the
grounds
outside.
SAM BARON, stepped from behind the drape that had concealed his presence.
His eyes were glittering with greed. Again his torch glowed. But this time, he
did not approach the safe. He made for the shelf that Rodney Mason had pivoted
back into place when he had replaced the blood sapphires.
In a moment, the synthetic gems poured from their chamois bag into the
itching palm of Sam Baron.
The thief knew nothing about chemistry or heat. He knew less about atoms.
But he did know that Rodney Mason was a fool. And so was that blond dame with
the cute figure. Both of them thought that these fake sapphires were
valueless.
Sam Baron knew different!
He knew that the stones that lay in his gloved palm were worth the
pleasant sum of two million dollars!
Hastily, Baron crammed them back into the bag. He stowed the bag in an
inside pocket. A swift glance about the laboratory showed him that he had left
no telltale marks of his presence to tip his identity to the police.
Chuckling, Sam Baron turned on every light in the laboratory and stepped
behind the curtain. He was waiting for the return of Drexel, the butler. Baron
had condemned that innocent butler to death!
His fingers tightened about the handle of a long-bladed knife. He waited
patiently. Finally, he heard the slam of the front door. Feet came slowly
through the silent house toward the lighted laboratory.
"Mr. Mason!" The voice was Drexel's. "I didn't intend to be out at this
time, sir. A very queer thing happened. Someone telephoned and told me -"
Confident that his employer was working in the lighted laboratory, the
butler stepped across the threshold, saw that the room was empty.
Fear came into his eyes. He backed toward the doorway, shouting shrilly:
"Mr. Mason! Are you home? Where are you, sir?"
Sam Baron leaped like a panther from behind the drape. Drexel had no
chance to turn in order to grapple with him. The long blade of the knife
plunged hilt-deep into the butler's back.
Drexel fell without a groan. He was dead before he hit the floor. The
point of the knife had penetrated his heart.
Baron jerked the blade free. Coolly, he wiped it on the dead man's
clothing; then bent over him and wrapped him in the rug underneath until the
dead man was encased like a mummy. A stout length of cord made the gruesome
bundle tight.
The window of the laboratory opened without a squeak. It was pitch-dark
in
the ground back of the house. A few drops of rain spattered on the peering
face
of the murderer. Baron grinned. A swell night for a job like this!
He lifted the wrapped corpse carefully over the sill and lowered it down
to the lawn; then, his beady eyes made a last careful survey of the
laboratory.
Not a single article of furniture was out of place; not a single betraying
drop
of crimson marred the floor or the window sill.
A perfect kill! All that was needed now was a perfect burial for Drexel's
corpse. And Baron had arranged for that, too!
BARON'S car was parked under an overhang of shrubbery in a side lane. He
placed the body in the back seat and drove off swiftly. His goal was a pond
about eight miles distant. It was in a back area beyond the little suburban
town, reached only by a rough and unfrequented road.
The drizzle of rain had stopped by the time Baron reached the pond. He
was
glad of that. This murderer was like a cat; he had an instinctive hatred of
getting wet.
In a few minutes, he had carried Drexel's rug-wrapped body through a
thick
fringe of wind-tossed bushes. He stood on the muddy margin of the deep pond,
keeping his neatly polished shoes out of the soft earth.
No footprints, thank you! Not for a wise guy like Sam Baron! He stood on
a
tiny hassock of grass, grinning ferociously as he eyed the surface of the
pond.
It was covered with a flat, unbroken expanse of green scum.
That was the payoff - this green scum on the surface. Picking up a fallen
branch, Baron pointed its thin end toward the pond. He used it like a
makeshift
knife, cutting neatly through the green muck.
The parted sections floated aside under the careful guidance of the stick
in the hands of the murderer. Baron was very gentle in his work. A dark patch
of open water widened bit by bit.
Drexel's body went feet-first into the watery grave. Baron was careful to
avoid making a splash. The heavy stone he had weighted to the victim's feet
drew the body downward into the deep water with barely a sound.
Baron waited grimly, a grin on his twisted lips. The slight swirl the
body
had made as it slipped out of sight was drawing the edges of the surface scum
together again. The open patch of water was getting steadily smaller. Finally,
there was no water visible.
The green scum formed a solid covering on the surface of the pond. The
edges that Baron had separated with his stick now merged together without a
sign of a break.
Drexel's murderer drew a breath of hissing satisfaction. A perfect murder
had been followed by a perfect disposal of the corpse. Drexel would never
return to deny that he had fled with Rodney Mason's synthetic sapphires.
Mason would take it for granted that a trusted servant had fallen for
temptation. And the presence of Sam Baron in the riddle would never be
suspected.
Baron hurried back to his car and slid jauntily behind the wheel. He
drove
to a main highway and headed swiftly back toward New York.
In a chamois bag in his inner pocket were a dozen blood-flecked,
synthetic
sapphires which Rodney Mason thought were valueless. But that only proved that
crooks were a lot smarter than scientists! Baron chuckled at the size of the
split he would get from two million dollars of good money!
All he had to do was turn the sapphires over to Otto Muller. Muller would
pass them along to the unknown big-shot who ruled the mob in which Sam Baron
was a trusted trigger-man. Neither Baron nor Otto Muller knew who their
powerful boss was. Nor did they care. Not when they were to get a slice of two
million in loot!
Sam's car scudded swiftly along. Theft and murder had been accomplished.
Other murders - infinitely more horrible than the death of Drexel - would
follow. An amazing carnival of crime had begun.
Could the police stop it? And if they failed - could The Shadow?
CHAPTER II
THE DOG GODDESS
LAMONT CRANSTON was sitting in the lounge of the famous Cobalt Club,
reading an evening newspaper. No one paid any particular attention to this
tall, distinguished-looking man, for this New York club was membered with many
wealthy and famous people.
Lamont Cranston was fabulously wealthy. His social position was of the
best. The newspapers often recorded his exploits as a big-game hunter, a world
traveler. To the world in general, he was simply a wealthy idler and charming
host at his huge country estate in New Jersey.
But Lamont Cranston was not the wealthy idler he seemed.
He was watching a man who sat uneasily near by, smoking a thinly rolled,
foreign-looking cigar. This man's name was Senor Ramon Ortega. He was living
temporarily at the Cobalt Club under a guest card privilege. His home was in
Singapore. He was a wealthy Spanish rubber planter on a vacation trip to New
York.
Ortega's face was pale under its dark tropic bronze. He got up finally
and
began to pace up and down, as though enjoying the mild exercise after his long
relaxation in a big armchair. Cranston, however, knew this Spaniard was
frightened. His gaze kept veering slyly toward the clock on the wall. Cranston
watched him over the top of his spread newspaper.
He was convinced that Ramon Ortega was a suave criminal!
Cranston's ideas about this sleek Spaniard were far from guesswork. He
had
been keenly interested in the activities of Ortega ever since the man's
mysterious arrival at the Cobalt Club with excellent letters of introduction.
A
piercing gaze came into Cranston's steady eyes. They glowed like flame.
Lamont Cranston was The Shadow! For The Shadow, at times, adopted
Cranston's personality.
CROOKS and police alike were aware of the existence of The Shadow. They
knew he smashed crime when all other means failed. But no one suspected that
The Shadow used the guise of Lamont Cranston.
Not even The Shadow's agents knew that. They never communicated with him
directly. Their reports were relayed through a contact man named Burbank,
himself utterly unknown except as a calm voice on an unlisted telephone.
Reports had come to The Shadow concerning this Senor Ortega. Cliff
Marsland had furnished the information. Cliff was one of The Shadow's most
trusted agents. And Cliff Marsland was now an undercover spy in the mob of a
crook named Sam Baron!
Baron, The Shadow knew, was a trigger-man for a mob of jewel thieves. But
the fence through whom Baron worked was unknown. So was the mysterious
supercriminal who led the mob. Now, at last, The Shadow was aware of a strange
fact: Senor Ortega had been secretly in touch with Sam Baron. That was the
news
that Cliff Marsland had relayed to The Shadow, through Burbank.
Lamont Cranston saw Ortega suddenly throw away his cigar with a nervous
gesture. The hands of the clock pointed to nine. The swarthy Spaniard got his
hat and coat and left the club. Cranston didn't follow him. He had already
arranged for that detail. Harry Vincent was waiting outside.
Vincent was the oldest agent of The Shadow in point of service. He would
do well on this delicate assignment.
Leaving the lounge room, Lamont Cranston went upstairs to his private
suite. Twenty minutes later, his phone buzzed.
"Burbank speaking."
"Report."
"Vincent trailed Ortega, as ordered. Ortega drove aimlessly for ten
minutes, to dodge pursuit; then went straight to home of Inspector Joe
Cardona.
He is there now."
The Shadow's face looked startled. But no hint of his surprise came into
the crisp words he uttered:
"Report received. Stand by."
The news from Burbank amazed The Shadow. Why should Ortega sneak so slyly
to the home of Joe Cardona? Cardona was the ace detective of the New York
police department. He was also a good friend of Lamont Cranston. Why should
Ortega first contact a killer like Sam Baron, then coolly visit Joe Cardona?
It
puzzled The Shadow. So did something else.
The Shadow had a queer feeling that he had seen Ortega somewhere else.
Far
from New York. Yet he had been unable to remember where.
He waited in his room, eyes closed, sunk in deep thought. Then again his
telephone rang.
This time, The Shadow had an even bigger surprise. The call was from Joe
Cardona! Joe's request was startling. He wanted Lamont Cranston to come over
to
his apartment at once. A Spanish gentleman named Senor Ramon Ortega wanted to
meet him!
The absolute gall of Ortega tightened The Shadow's lips. He gave a harsh,
sibilant laugh.
Five minutes later, he was in his car, speeding toward Cardona's
apartment.
JOE CARDONA'S face was expressionless as he ushered Cranston into his
living room and introduced him to Ortega.
The Spaniard was blandness itself. He shook hands as though he had never
before in his life seen this wealthy clubman.
He sank back in a leather chair and lighted another of his long foreign
cigars. Cardona busied himself with drinks. Cranston watched the dark-skinned
face of the Spaniard. It was clearly etched in the strong light of a bridge
lamp tilted above the leather chair.
Suddenly, Cranston restrained a quick exclamation. The strong yellow
light
reminded him of hot tropical sunshine. His memory leaped backward in time for
two years. His brain bridged a gap of more than five thousand miles. He
remembered this dark-skinned man!
Cranston's eyes closed as if in boredom, while Cardona fizzed soda into
tall glasses. He could see hot, blinding sunlight; streets packed with
frenzied
Mohammedans. A white marble temple whose roof was solid gold. And on the altar
within that temple, the sacred statue of a grim goddess - a statue that was
carved from a single block of solid gold! The head was that of a snarling dog.
But the rest of the body glowed with the exquisite loveliness of a nude,
golden
woman!
Cranston's eyes remained closed. His memory brought other pictures.
Outside that temple in India, a procession was approaching through a
packed mob of frenzied worshipers of the Dog goddess. Elephants swayed in
stately pride. On the foremost of those elephants, high above the worshipping
crowd, a virgin rode, decked in the white robes of purity. Around her throat
was a string of magnificent sapphires.
It was the feast of the Ten-year Vigil. The sapphires were being brought
to the temple to renew their purity. The virgin on the elephant would place
them reverently about the nude throat of the golden Dog goddess.
Cranston opened his eyes slowly. He smiled as he took the drink Cardona
handed him. He nodded to Senor Ortega.
"That's a nice comfortable chair you picked," he said quietly. "The
leather is a really excellent grade of pigskin."
Ortega gave a choked cry. He leaped from the chair as though he had been
struck. His glass fell to the rug from his trembling fingers. His face was
twisted with loathing.
Cardona gave a grunt of amazement. "What the devil -"
But Cranston's voice cut him short. He was talking softly to the
terrified
planter from Singapore:
"Your name is not really Ortega, is it? You are not a Spaniard. You are a
Mohammedan. That's why you couldn't bear the defiling touch of pigskin
leather.
Your real name is Ali Singh, and you are the Maharajah of Rajkumana. Why are
you
in New York incognito, your highness?"
ORTEGA gasped. He swung toward Cardona; his voice was like a whiplash.
"How much does this man know?"
"Nothing, as yet," Cranston interrupted. "I hope to be honored by your
confidence. I presume that is why you sent for me."
"It was I who sent for you," Cardona admitted uneasily. "I wanted to ask
your advice about some jewels. I know that you are a collector and an
authority
on gems - particularly sapphires."
He explained to Ortega:
"Mr. Cranston has access to the homes of the wealthiest men in New York.
He knows every collector of consequence. If the sapphires are hidden in New
York, as you suspect, Mr. Cranston may have seen some of them."
Ortega was still glaring at his smiling visitor.
"I expect you to remain silent about what you may see or hear in this
room," he rasped finally. "Have I your word?"
"Naturally."
Ortega took a small parcel from his pocket. He unwrapped it reverently
and
handed something to Cranston that flamed with a deep, burning blue in the
millionaire's palm. It was a huge sapphire.
Cranston held it to the light. In the center of the stone was a fleck of
red like an imprisoned drop of blood.
"Have you ever seen a stone like this in New York?" Ortega asked.
"Never! I know what it is, of course. It's a sapphire from the Necklace
of
Purity. Has the necklace been stolen?"
"Stolen!" Ortega's voice echoed grimly. "Snatched by a sacrilegious thief
from the golden throat of the Dog goddess. The necklace broke when the thief
snatched it. The sapphires spilled on the holy floor of the temple. I found
this single gem under the body of a murdered priest.
"The thief escaped. The rest of the sacred sapphires vanished with him.
He
came to America - to New York. Who the thief is, I do not know. But I know he
has sold the stones separately to wealthy collectors."
"And you have come to America to find them?"
Ortega nodded.
"No one but the priests of the temple and my eldest son are aware of the
theft. For my people to know would be to risk bloodshed, revolution. They
would
think - and think rightly - that the gods have abandoned their maharajah. The
Ten-year Vigil comes to an end this year. The scattered sapphires of that holy
necklace must be found and returned to the Dog goddess before then."
"If not?" Cranston asked.
"If not, I shall have to atone by disemboweling myself on the altar of
the
goddess. Ten years later, if the necklace is still missing, my eldest son will
die by his own hand. Those red sapphires must be found!"
"Can't you get more of the stones?" Cardona asked. "You own the mine
where
they come from."
"The mine," Ortega said harshly, "is no longer in existence. Out of the
hundreds of sapphires taken from it, only twenty-one had the sacred drop of
blood in the depths of the gems. There can never be more. For when the
twenty-first blood sapphire was blessed and borne to the temple, the Dog
goddess stamped her golden foot and an earthquake destroyed all trace of the
mine."
NEITHER Cardona nor Cranston smiled at the thought of a nude golden
statue
stamping its lifeless foot. There was a blaze of fanaticism in Ortega's eyes
that deterred them.
"You're handing the police a tough job," Cardona said, dryly. "I can't go
into millionaires' homes and search their jewel cabinets for stolen goods. Not
without proof and a search warrant."
"Have you tried to get the help of the New York underworld to aid you in
your search?" Cranston asked the maharajah.
"No"
That was a lie, Cranston thought; the first Ortega had uttered. Or was it
the first? Cranston knew that Ortega was already in direct contact with Sam
Baron's mob. Perhaps this tangle was a lot deeper than it appeared on the
surface.
"If the police fail," Ortega said, "the goddess of the temple will aid
me.
You may laugh, gentlemen, but I had a holy vision in my sleep last night. The
Dog goddess appeared before my eyes - naked, golden, terrible. She promised
success in my pilgrimage. She reminded me that the sapphires become evil the
moment the string is broken. Death will come to every man or woman who tries
to
hide one of those holy blue stones!"
Cardona frowned.
"You better forget about that part of it, your highness. Remember, you're
not in India now! If you try anything in that line -"
Ortega's smile was edged like a knife.
"The goddess will strike, not I. She will strike this very night! Where
or
at whom, I have no knowledge. But tonight, some guilty man will die because he
holds one of those sacred blood sapphires! You don't believe me? Wait!"
The Shadow had a queer certainty that this zealous maharajah was not
quite
as fanatical as he wanted to seem. His suspicion grew that Ortega had lied
about
his contact with Sam Baron in order to cover himself from the consequence of
murder.
Cranston left Cardona's apartment in company with the suave Ortega. They
drove together to the Cobalt Club and went to their separate suites.
Calmly, Cranston drew a table close to his window. He opened a heavy book
on his table and began to read.
The book was a volume of Indian philosophy. But Cranston's eyes kept
moving from the pages to the flat surface of a mirror he had tilted near the
book. The mirror gave him a view of another mirror - and that in turn outlined
the window of Ortega's room.
Cranston expected Ortega to squirm stealthily to a broad ledge outside
that window. A leap would carry him across a dark void to the roof of an
adjoining building. If Ortega was planning to commit murder tonight, it was
the
only way to leave the club unseen. Employees on duty downstairs would see and
remember him.
So Cranston sat and watched.
He stayed at his post until daylight streaked the darkness. But he saw
nothing to justify his vigil. Ortega never left his room.
The Shadow had a queer feeling that, somehow, he had failed. Had murder
actually been committed somewhere in the darkness of Manhattan while The
Shadow
waited impotently?
Did Ortega actually believe in the living vengeance of the golden Dog
goddess? Or was he framing a cunning alibi to escape the consequences of
murder?
The Shadow's sibilant laughter was grim.
CHAPTER III
THE GRAY MR. FRICK
THE town mansion of Peter Randolph was a big one. Situated on a side
street not far from Riverside Drive, it stood in parklike grounds, surrounded
by shrubbery and gardens. There was a walk in front, paved with ornamental
Chinese brick. A board fence separated the grounds and house from the
sidewalk.
The Randolph mansion was the last of its kind in the section. Millionaire
neighbors of Randolph had sold their homes and had moved to Park Avenue. But
not Randolph. He was a stubborn old man, massive like the house he lived in.
Every winter he returned from his summer estate in Lakewood and brought Parker
with him.
Parker was Peter Randolph's butler. The two lived alone in the old
mansion. Randolph hated servants, particularly women servants. But he liked
and
trusted Parker.
On the same night that Lamont Cranston had been summoned to the home of
Joe Cardona, Peter Randolph was seated alone in his library, reading the
financial columns of the evening newspaper.
Suddenly, Randolph heard a peculiar sound. His face turned ashen with
fear. The newspaper fluttered from his hands to the floor.
The sound that had startled him had come from Randolph's inner study. It
was so low that he was not certain whether he had actually heard it or had
merely imagined it. It was the muffled echo of a dog's bark!
Randolph stepped to a cabinet and snatched a pistol from a drawer. He was
moving stealthily toward the door of his study when he halted abruptly.
Footsteps were audible outside, in the hallway of the mansion.
Peter Randolph hid the gun in his pocket. A moment later Parker, his
butler, appeared. Parker was out of breath. His face looked queer.
"Are - are you quite all right?"
"Of course! What the devil do you mean?"
"I - I thought I heard you cry out," Parker gasped. "I thought something
was wrong!"
Randolph's eyes flicked briefly toward the closed study door.
"I don't need you. You may go."
As Parker turned obediently away, the millionaire halted him for an
instant.
"Was it a cry you thought you heard - or a bark?"
"A - a bark, sir?"
"Don't look so stupid! The noise a dog makes."
"No, sir. I heard no dog."
"It doesn't matter," Randolph said, faintly. "Go back to your quarters
and
don't bother me for the rest of the evening. I've got some important business
papers to look over."
Parker backed out of the library, his well-trained face wooden. Peter
Randolph whipped his gun from his pocket. He tiptoed to the closed door of his
study. He waited rigidly for almost two minutes, listening.
摘要：

THEGOLDENDOGMURDERSbyMaxwellGrantAsoriginallypublishedin"TheShadowMagazine,"September1,1938.Thebloodsapphires,heritageoftheDoggoddess,driptheirtrailacrossManhattaninTheGoldenDogMurders.CHAPTERIAPERFECTCRIMEAMANwasmovingcautiouslythroughthelandscapedgroundsthatsurroundedthequietsuburbancottage.Hisfee...

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