Maxwell Grant - The Shadow - 155 - Death Jewels

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DEATH JEWELS
by Maxwell Grant
As originally published in "The Shadow Magazine," on August 1, 1938
Robbery, then death - and New York was stunned with the swiftness of
crime! But faster was The Shadow, Crime Fighter Extraordinary!
CHAPTER I
CRIME'S WARNING
It was midnight, and the Star Club was crowded with patrons, packed at
the
tables that were set around three sides of the dance floor. A floor show was
in
progress; a line of chorus girls were doing a rhythmic dance, to music that
rose above the clatter of dishes.
There wasn't a spare table in the place, for the Star Club, with its
two-dollar dinner-and-floor show, was the most popular night spot in
Manhattan.
Even with all its glitter, the club was merely an annoyance to Valencia
Gaylor. She wasn't exactly bored, for Valencia was an enthusiastic person on
most occasions. But she couldn't see why Reggie Taunton had chosen to bring
her
here, when so many other New York night clubs were quieter and less crowded.
The Star had become a place for out-of-town visitors who came to New York
on round-trip tours that included rail fare, hotel accommodations, and
sightseeing trips. They thought they were seeing New Yorkers who liked night
life; instead, they were cooped up with a flock of other visiting delegates.
Valencia could observe that when she looked at the tables close by. She
and Reggie seemed to be the only persons who had ever seen a Manhattan floor
show before. That thought made Valencia smile. At least they provided some
atmosphere for the tourists.
They did make a good-looking pair.
Reggie was a handsome chap, with his sleek hair and well-formed features.
He looked best from a full-face view, for his profile showed a nose that was a
trifle pointed, with a chin that wasn't quite strong enough.
He made up for these minor shortcomings by his attire. Reggie's tuxedo
was
faultless in its fit. His black bow tie had that perfect adjustment that only
deft fingers could produce.
Valencia was a girl of real charm. Her light hair made a shimmer that
matched the sparkle of her eyes. The slight snubbiness of her nose was no
detraction; it went with the winsome smile that so often adorned her lips. Her
chin was perfect. It had the firmness that Reggie's lacked.
"You look swell, Val," commended Reggie as he looked in the girl's
direction. "That evening gown is perfect! You don't have to wear jewels to
complete it."
His eyes had followed the girl's bare arms to her hands, that rested on
the table. Except for a simple signet ring, she wore no jewelry at all.
Reggie's comment, however, brought a smile from Valencia.
"I wanted to wear my bracelets," she remarked, "and the emerald ring, as
well. But with all those recent robberies, it just wouldn't do to flaunt my
jewels in a public place."
Reggie agreed. Everyone knew that crime was rampant in Manhattan. The
police were looking for "fingermen" who spotted persons that flourished too
much cash or displayed too many gems. The law had not found those malefactors.
Nor had the police rounded up the crime specialists who staged the robberies
after they received the tip-offs from the finger-men.
Crooks had cracked into large New York offices and pretentious
residences.
They had opened safes that invariably contained large amounts of swag. Stolen
property had remained untraced. The brain who controlled this present crime
ring, also had fences who knew how to unload the pilfered goods in secret.
"You're tired, Val." Reggie's smooth tone was sympathetic. "The floor
show's finished. Suppose we leave."
Valencia took the suggestion eagerly. So apparently, in fact, that Reggie
framed an apology.
"I didn't know this place would be so jammed," he declared. "It wasn't,
the last time I was here; but that was six months ago. Let's start, Val - wait
a minute, though. I need some cigarettes."
Reggie snapped his fingers toward a passing cigarette girl. Valencia
recalled that he had bought a pack of cigarettes only an hour before. She
remembered that he had handed the same girl a folded five-dollar bill.
Probably
Reggie had forgotten that he still had a pack in his pocket. Valencia decided
it
didn't matter.
THEY left the Star Club in a cab. Valencia was still adjusting her
evening
wrap when Reggie started a purry tone that told her what was next. It was the
same old story. He wanted her to announce their engagement.
"I can't, Reggie," declared Valencia, frankly. "Because we aren't
engaged."
"We intend to be, Val. Very soon."
"Perhaps." Valencia admitted that much. "I may change my mind, though."
Reggie was silent while the cab rolled northward. At the end of half a
dozen blocks, he spoke ruefully:
"You care for me a lot, Val. What's the real trouble? Don't you feel that
you can trust me?"
"Why do you ask that, Reggie?"
"Because you never seem to trust anyone."
Reggie was correct in that statement. Valencia did find trouble in
trusting people. That applied particularly to Reggie, although Valencia didn't
like to tell him so.
There was something oily about him at times; he could become too smooth.
Earnestness did not fit the shrewd expression that so often flickered on his
sallow face. To be fair to Reggie, though, he had never done anything to make
Valencia actually dislike him.
"I can't trust people," admitted the girl. "I've known too many
disappointments. There is only one exception. That is my uncle."
"That's odd, Val," rejoined Reggie. "I don't want to offend you, but the
fact is, there are a lot of people who don't trust Everett Gaylor."
"I know that, Reggie. He made his wealth by driving hard bargains. Many
people have criticized his recent business mergers, but they have always been
legal."
"Is that good enough, Val?"
"The law is the only existing standard, Reggie. So I can't find fault
with
Uncle Everett. I have found him kindly and generous. My parents had no money
when they died, but my uncle supplied me with more than they could ever have
given me. There is nothing - I mean it, Reggie - nothing that I would fail to
do, if my uncle requested it!"
The cab stopped in front of a huge brownstone house, the residence of
Everett Gaylor. It looked like a citadel, with its heavy-shuttered
ground-floor
windows. Beyond the house was a vacant space; Reggie pointed to it as they
alighted.
"I'd think your uncle would keep the shutters open," he said, "since he
bought those other houses and had them torn down. The windows could give you
some light, for a change."
"They do, in the daytime," laughed Valencia. "They're only closed at
night, Reggie. Particularly when Uncle Everett is away, as he is tonight."
"When will he be back from Cleveland, Val?"
"Sometime tomorrow. After he finishes the merger of those Great Lakes
shipping lines. You have my key, Reggie. Will you unlock the front door,
please?"
Reggie obliged. He said good-night to Valencia and handed her the key.
The
girl went inside, and was closing the door when Reggie reached the cab. After
that, all sounds were cut off, for the door was massive and fitted tightly in
place.
VALENCIA locked the door with the same key that Reggie had used to open
it. She went upstairs. In her room, she laid the key on a dresser. She gave a
sigh of relief at being home again, then added a smile.
Reggie really didn't have much cause for fault with her. Most girls would
have been anything but cordial after a dull evening like the one they had
spent
at the Star Club.
The girl turned off the large lights of the room. By the soft glow from
the dresser lamp, she discarded her evening gown, then her shoes and
stockings.
As she stepped into slippers, she picked up a dressing gown that lay on a
chair
beside the bed. She didn't feel as tired as before, so she decided to stay up
a
while and read.
Attired in her dressing gown Valencia found a magazine and took a chair
near the dresser. Reading was easy by that light, for its glow was at her
shoulder. The short story that she picked was one that engrossed her. It must
have been fifteen minutes before she finished it.
Closing the magazine, Valencia reached to the dresser for a cigarette. As
she drew one from the box, her eyes were fixed on an object that lay beside
it.
It was the front-door key, which she herself had laid upon the dresser, but
there was something about it that puzzled her.
The key was a specially made one, for the front-door lock was the last
word in burglar-proof protection. Valencia had never seen another key that
looked like it; that was why she remembered her own key so well.
This wasn't her key at all. The one she always carried was dull, with a
slightly brassy color. This key was of steel, and shiny.
For a moment, Valencia thought that it must be a key that one of the
servants had left here; but that did not solve the problem. This was certainly
a key to the front door, and there were only two like it - her own, and the
one
her uncle carried.
Valencia started to put down the cigarette in order to pick up the key.
On
the dresser were some folded bills that she had taken from her purse. Bills,
cigarette, key - they linked with a sudden inspiration. Valencia grasped the
reason why Reggie had taken her to the Star Club.
REGGIE had known that she would give him her key, as she always did. When
he bought that first pack of cigarettes, he had folded the key inside his
five-dollar bill. Not this key, but the original one.
The cigarette girl had worked with Reggie. She had sent the key out to
have a duplicate made. That was why Reggie bought the second pack of
cigarettes. Both keys had been inside it.
In the cab, Reggie had opened in his pocket the cigarette pack. He had
held one key ready, had kept the other for himself. That was where Reggie's
scheme had slipped. He'd expected the duplicate to match the original; he
didn't think it mattered which one he gave to Valencia. As chance had it, she
had received the new key. From it, she held the clue to Reggie's game.
Reggie Taunton was in league with the slick band of crooks who were
staging those smooth robberies. With the key to this house in their
possession,
the criminals would attempt an entry here.
Perhaps the robbers would strike tonight.
That thought was enough for Valencia. The mirror of the dressing table
showed the prompt thrust of her determined chin. She opened a dresser drawer,
found a pearl-handled .22 revolver that her uncle had given her in case of an
emergency like this. Turning out the little lamp, Valencia stole to the hall.
It was very dark all through the house. The high-built hallways were the
sort that carried echoes. Tiptoeing to the head of the long stairway, Valencia
paused there. She had noted often that sounds from the lower floor could be
heard at the top of the stairway, for it came to a narrow point, like the
small
end of a megaphone.
There was stillness below, but Valencia expected it to end. After
long-drawn minutes, the break came. There was a trifling click that meant the
door lock. Next, the slight creak of the door itself. Finally, the muffled
sound when it closed.
Guarded footsteps moved in the hall below. They passed the bottom of the
stairway, faded in a hallway toward a side door. While Valencia wondered why
they had taken that direction, the footsteps returned. They crossed the
hallway, ended in the depths of a room on the other side.
Valencia's fingers tightened on the gun. The intruder had entered her
uncle's study. That was where Everett Gaylor had his big safe. Valencia's
jewels were in it, but the few thousand dollars that they represented were
small change. Gaylor, always ready for deals involving cash transactions,
invariably kept large sums of money in the house.
If the lone cracksman could complete his task, the burglary would net at
least a hundred thousand dollars; perhaps double that sum. He had solved the
difficulty of the locked front door and probably expected to open the safe;
otherwise, he would not be attempting it.
Only one factor could thwart the lurking crook. That was Valencia Gaylor
-
if she had the courage. To those who knew Valencia, that "if" could only bring
one answer.
Valencia had the nerve that this occasion required.
CHAPTER II
ODDS OFFSET
COOLLY, Valencia considered the best way to handle the burglar problem.
The right answer was to work alone. There were servants in the house, but they
were all asleep. They occupied remote rooms on the third floor, and it would
take too long to arouse them. Moreover, Valencia felt sure that they would
blunder, if called to emergency action.
Alone, she could outmatch the downstairs intruder at his own game of
stealth. She remembered the sounds of his footsteps. To avoid the same
mistake,
Valencia removed her slippers. Her bare feet were absolutely soundless as she
went down the stairs.
At the bottom, Valencia placed the slippers where she could regain them.
She approached the study door. At first, she saw it as a solid barrier; then,
from a new angle, she observed a crack of light beside it. The burglar had
found the door ajar; he had left it almost closed.
Valencia pushed the door three inches inward. That gave her all the view
she needed. She saw the light of an electric lantern set on a chair beside the
safe. Its glare revealed the dials, also the man who was working at them.
He was clad in rough, dark clothes, and was wearing a dark handkerchief
for a mask. He was using gloves as he fingered the dials to test the
combination.
Totally unaware that Valencia was watching him, the burglar proceeded
with
his task. Valencia had heard of safe-crackers with sensitive fingers who could
literally feel the fall of tumblers through steel; but that wasn't this
crook's
method. He went at the combination as if he knew it, up to a final point.
There,
he paused, calculated as he turned the dials slowly. He tried the knob. The
safe
failed to open.
It was plain that the burglar had somehow learned a portion of the actual
combination, probably all of it, up to the last twist. For with his failure,
he
started over again and went through the same process. By that system, he would
eventually get the full combination, for he had reduced the task to a limited
number of possibilities.
Another failure. This time, the masked man showed impatience. He spun the
dials, then removed his gloves, to rub his hands together. The mask bothered
him; he pulled it from his head and stuffed it in his pocket. As he reached
for
the gloves, he turned so that Valencia could see his profile.
The cracksman was Reggie Taunton.
VALENCIA lowered the gun. Her lip, compressed. She had not figured that
Reggie had done more than supply the front door key. She knew what would
happen
if she stepped in and trapped him. Reggie would whine pleas that would be
difficult to resist. Once Valencia turned him over to the police, there would
be an unpleasant scandal.
Plenty of persons that she knew would wonder why she had not given Reggie
another chance. Perhaps she would ask herself that question. She didn't like
the prospect. At the same time, her own integrity, plus her loyalty to her
uncle, demanded that she expose Reggie as the crook that he had proved
himself.
Reggie was at the dials again, and he was doing badly with them. His
fumbles were making him begin again. Reggie never had been able to show
patience when it was needed. That gave Valencia a prompt inspiration.
There was a way to handle this case easily; that was to call the police.
In reading reports of previous robberies, she had learned that officers had
been on hand five minutes after crimes were reported.
The telephone was in the hall by the side door. It would be easy to make
the telephone call without Reggie hearing it. She had that duplicate key with
her, she could unlock the front door before the police arrived, if Reggie
hadn't left it open. Valencia smiled to herself as she tiptoed back toward the
stairs.
It was easy - simply a report that she suspected a burglar in the house.
The police would capture Reggie. She would recognize him afterward. The case
would be out of her hands, once the law trapped the culprit in the act of
crime.
Valencia picked up the slippers on the way. At the telephone table she
slipped them on, because the hall was drafty. The slight breeze puzzled her,
until she remembered the side door. Putting down the telephone, Valencia stole
in that direction, finding as she went that her skippers were almost silent.
The side door was usually bolted from the inside. Valencia found it open.
She remembered the trip that Reggie had made to the door. Probably he had
opened it to have a second route for hurried escape. Valencia closed the door,
letting the latch click carefully. She went back to the telephone.
Again something stopped her call.
This time, it was a noise - a faint echo of the latching sound that the
side door had given. Straining, Valencia waited. She felt another touch of
breeze against her ankles. Someone had heard her shut that door, and had
opened
it.
VALENCIA was too intent in one direction to hear a second sound that came
from another. Again, the sound was the click of a door latch, this time from
the front of the house.
The girl guessed the truth. Reggie wasn't alone on this expedition. He
had
posted some helper on guard outside the side door. Since Reggie had come
alone,
Valencia supposed that he would have a single aid.
Gamely, she decided that she could settle the pair of them.
There was a light switch in the front hall. Valencia headed for it, not
caring if she made a slight noise. That would lure the watcher into the house;
it might bring Reggie from the study. But neither could locate her in the
darkness. When the lights came on, Valencia would have the budge.
She reached the light switch, waited tensely while she heard a vague
creep
that had a slow approach. Back against the wall, her gun hand ready to turn,
Valencia pressed the switch.
Its snap was sharp; so was the girl's gasp.
Valencia faced odds that she had never expected. It wasn't one watcher
who
had entered. There were six! Three had closed in from the side door; another
trio had used the front entrance. Stealthily, they had formed a semicircle.
They were rough clad, masked, like Reggie. But these huskies were no
silk-hat crooks. They were a trigger squad; they showed it by the way they
handled their bristling revolvers. Hard lips leered beneath handkerchief masks
as the crew closed in upon the helpless girl.
The three from the side door had reached a spot beside the stairs. The
front squad was edging closer to Valencia. All seemed contemptuous of the
girl's revolver. One thug acted as spokesman for the lot. From near the center
of the circle, he rasped:
"A smart dame, huh?" Those lips were ugly. "Listen, babe, you better drop
that pea-shooter, if you don't want to get hurt!"
Valencia did not stir. Her gun was aimed straight for the spokesman. He
took it that she was scared.
"You heard me, cutey. Drop it! Then hoist them little lily-white mitts!"
He took a long step closer, jabbed his big revolver up beneath Valencia's
nose, as though mocking its stubby tilt. He stopped the gun short, aimed
squarely between the girl's eyes. With a side squint toward his pals, he
growled:
"Watch her go yellow!"
There was a quick flash from Valencia's gun. She could not have stopped
her trigger finger if she had wished. The last insult was enough. She would
show these yeggs who was yellow. That color was theirs!
They displayed it for the moment when they saw their spokesman wilt. His
ugly lips had soured. His gun had lowered and his other hand was clutching at
his chest.
Seconds must have passed while Valencia stood there bravely, darting her
gaze from mobster to mobster, to pick the next man who tried to use a gun.
For the girl was still in that position when Reggie appeared at the study
door.
IN his haste, Reggie had forgotten his mask. He met the gleam of
Valencia's eyes, realized that she had recognized him.
"Grab the girl!" voiced Reggie. "Don't let her fire again! We've got to
take her with us!"
Valencia sprang for the stairway, not through fright, but because she saw
safety there. She could ward off the crooks from that vantage point, while she
retreated upward. Reggie started another frantic order. It was interrupted by
a
harsh cough from the floor. The wounded spokesman was trying to rise with his
gun.
"Get the moll!" he coughed. "Croak her!"
The command suited the hardened crew. They wheeled; in another second,
bullets would have burned for Valencia despite Reggie's ardent protest. Only
other intervention could save the girl, and it needed to be of superhuman
sort.
Aid came, with split-second precision.
A fierce, compelling laugh broke from the short hallway near the side
door. With that chilling mockery came the burst of an automatic. A sizzling
slug dipped the gun hand of the thug who was leading the others in the aim
toward Valencia.
That mirth, that well-placed bullet, were all that the crooks needed to
know their adversary.
They wheeled to seek a new target, tugging their triggers as they swung.
The crook with the crippled gun arm couldn't join them, but the man that
Valencia had wounded was acting in his stead. That challenge was the sort that
could bring a mobster back from the edge of death, to fire a last vicious
round.
The whole tribe saw the arrival who had challenged them - a figure in
black. His cloaked shoulders, the slouch hat on his head, gave him a vagueness
in the half-gloom of the side hall.
His form was plain enough, though, for them to know that they had guessed
his real identity. They could see the burn of avenging eyes beneath the slouch
hat brim. He was the master that all gangland feared.
Amid the roar of those first wild shots came snarls from the crooks who
fired them. Unmasked lips were unanimous as they spat the hated name:
"The Shadow!"
CHAPTER III
CHANCE MURDER
LIKE Valencia, The Shadow had met heavy odds by making the first thrust;
but where the girl had later been at loss, The Shadow had the needed method.
His cause, however, was far more difficult. More than his own life stood at
stake. He had Valencia to save.
The one way was to draw the fire of crooks until the girl had reached the
stairs. To accomplish it, The Shadow wheeled away, firing a wide shot as he
retreated into deeper darkness. That missed fire was the come-on that spurred
crooks to the course The Shadow wanted.
They thought they had their cloaked foe on the run. They piled in his
direction, firing as they came. This time, their aim was better. They couldn't
see The Shadow, for his fade-out had been a swift one. But they picked the
spot
where his supposed flight indicated that he would be.
Their target was the side door, the only route by which The Shadow could
escape. Bullets ripped the woodwork of the door, but found no human mark.
Sweeping suddenly from beside the telephone table, came an unexpected
avalanche
of blackness.
The Shadow had reversed his course. His feint had utterly deceived the
thugs.
He was hurtling straight into a mass of marksmen, his automatic spurting
ahead of him.
Gunmen dived. Of the four, two ended with a sprawl. Instead of halting,
The Shadow drove straight through. The crook with the cracked wrist sprang
across to stop him, aiming his revolver with his left hand. The fellow's
forefinger wasn't adept enough.
His automatic emptied, The Shadow used it as a cudgel. His swift
side-stroke bludgeoned the aiming thug's skull. While the fellow flattened,
senseless, The Shadow performed a complete whirl that carried him to a side
room, straight across from Gaylor's study. As he reached that safety spot, his
left hand whipped a fresh automatic from beneath his cloak.
In brief seconds, The Shadow had completely changed the scene.
FROM his new position, he could see across the big front hallway. The
slugged crook lay halfway to the stairs, where Valencia was safely crouched
upon the bottom step. The tiny .22 was still clenched tightly in her fist. She
was ready to aid The Shadow, should her help be needed.
The thug dropped by Valencia had lost his venom. The effects of her
close-range shot had finally subdued him.
Beside the stairs lay another pair: the rogues that The Shadow had
eliminated in his drive. They, too, were out of battle. The only gunmen who
still had fangs were the pair that he had passed. They were near the side
door,
in the gloom that had formerly shrouded The Shadow. They were too scared
either
to advance or try to slide out by the side door.
The Shadow knew their hope. He had trailed this mob from the underworld;
he had counted noses on the way. There was another pair of gunners who had
remained out front, in darkness on the other side of the street. The thugs
were
hoping that the outside pair would arrive on the scene.
In that case - so they thought - it would be possible to attack The
Shadow
from two directions. They never guessed that he was preparing for that very
situation. The Shadow was reloading his first automatic while he waited in the
side room.
Moreover, The Shadow was depending upon Valencia. The girl saw his nudge
toward the front door, and nodded. Her gun was trained in that direction. The
Shadow recognized her grit; knew that she could take out one man while he
handled the other. Alone, The Shadow could easily handle the pair from the
side
hall, immediately afterward.
All that would happen, if the thrust came at all. The Shadow doubted that
it would occur. He believed that the outside crooks would stage a run-out,
when
their pals failed to come from the house.
In this maze of situations, one point had eluded The Shadow. That was
Reggie's presence. Reggie had been here before The Shadow arrived. He was out
of sight, from The Shadow's angle, when battle began. He had promptly chosen a
cute course of his own. He had ducked back into the study, and had slammed the
door.
Valencia knew it, but gave no sign to The Shadow. She pictured Reggie as
cowering with fright. He was as crooked as the rats that The Shadow had so
neatly handled; but Reggie wasn't in the killer class. Valencia considered him
a forgotten factor.
BRIEF minutes passed. The gunmen in the side hall were stirring
restlessly. The Shadow heard their motions; he edged toward the doorway. It
was
time to take that pair in hand. He gave one last glance toward the front door,
to make sure that all was well there. With that, The Shadow paused.
The knob of the front door was turning slowly. The door itself edged
slowly inward, stopped, then swung wide. The Shadow had his automatics at an
angle - one covering the front door, the other the side hall.
Then came a surprise for every witness, The Shadow included. The man who
stepped into the hallway wasn't masked. Nor was he a mobster at all. His timid
face showed eyes that stared half terrified through thickglassed spectacles as
he viewed the figures that lay on the floor.
It was Valencia who recognized the man as her uncle's secretary.
Instantly, the girl called out:
"It's Bevlin!"
The Shadow was in action. Out from the side room, he was springing toward
the front door to warn the man who stood there.
In his swift sweep, he flourished one gun at the crooks in the side hall,
to hold them cowed. He hoped that Bevlin, startled by the sight of an unknown
being in black, would have sense enough to make a dive. Instead, the secretary
stood stupefied.
That was Bevlin's death warrant. He was where The Shadow could not save
him in the moments that immediately followed.
Revolvers barked outside the house. The mobsters across the street had
spotted Bevlin in the light of the hallway. They knew there had been trouble
inside the house, and Bevlin wasn't one of their own ilk.
Bevlin took the jolt of bullets and sagged forward. An instant later, The
Shadow was springing past the secretary's slumping body. He halted only for an
instant as he reached the outside step, while he jabbed quick shots into the
dark. Then The Shadow leaped sidewards to the sidewalk, to draw the fire of
the
crooks across the way.
REVOLVERS spat anew; this time, their shots were futile. The Shadow was
not the simple target that Bevlin had been. Bullets flattened against the
brownstone wall beside him. His return shots, with gun spurts as the only
objective, sent the murderers in a quick scurry for cover.
Again The Shadow did the unexpected, with double purpose. He sprang back
for the steps that he had left. The thugs on the other sidewalk had to change
their aim, for they were fooled by that reverse move. So were the two crooks
within the side door.
They were starting forward, when they saw The Shadow suddenly reappear.
They turned about, made out through the side door. The Shadow knew where they
would head next. Their only route was out to the front street to join their
pals.
Bevlin had staggered clear of the threshold. With a quick yank, The
Shadow
pulled the front door shut. He was diving forward down the steps, when bullets
sizzled past his ear, to stop in the thick door. Again The Shadow was in the
center of battle, but this time, he had scope.
Crisscrossing the street, he drove four mobsters ahead of him. The two on
the other side were taking it on the run. So were the pair who had dashed from
the side door. Their hasty shots were useless against The Shadow. His jabs had
a stinging surety.
One crook toppled, then another. The others paused no longer. They were
streaking far up the street, to escape the cloaked avenger whose immunity to
gunfire was as uncanny as his own amazing marksmanship. They heard The
Shadow's
gibing laugh, tuned by the shrill of police whistles.
Though thugs didn't guess it, The Shadow was driving them into the hands
of the law; at the same time, he was cutting off their return to Gaylor's
house. That was his protection for Valencia upon whom The Shadow counted as
the
law's star witness.
He expected that the girl would soon be giving a full account of the
thwarted robbery. He wanted her to be free to tell it.
Unfortunately, there was another person who had the opposite desire.
Chance had given that trouble-maker an advantage that The Shadow no longer
possessed. The man who favored crime was still within the walls of Gaylor's
mansion. He was prepared to make sure that Valencia did not talk.
He was inspired, too, by the greatest of all urges - his own self-
preservation.
That man of crime was Reggie Taunton.
CHAPTER IV
THE VANISHED WITNESS
VALENCIA had forgotten everyone but Bevlin. The moment that the slam of
the front door insured her safety, the girl sprang to the side of the fallen
secretary.
Bevlin was dead. Chance had produced his murder.
He had gone with Valencia's uncle to Cleveland. For some reason, Gaylor
had sent him back, to New York. Valencia saw the proof of that: her uncle's
own
door key was in Bevlin's loosened fist.
The secretary's arrival at the house had been ill-timed. He had stepped
in
as an unexpected factor, to become an immediate target for vicious killers.
Valencia's one hope was that Bevlin still had life. Leaning above his
body, she spoke frantically as she raised his head in her hands. Bevlin's face
was drawn. His lips were blood-flecked, and his eyes showed glazed through the
thick spectacles.
When Valencia released his head, it didn't settle easily. His neck
yielded; there was a thud as his head reached the floor.
All that while, there were footfalls from the study.
The treads were the ones that Valencia had heard earlier. This time, her
concern for Bevlin caused them to escape her notice. She didn't recognize an
approach until there was a deep-hissed breath beside her.
The girl sprang up from the floor; she grabbed for the pocket of her
dressing gown, where she had put the little automatic.
Her action was too slow. Hands clamped her wrists, drew her about, so an
arm could get a grip. Valencia was staring into the eyes of Reggie Taunton.
She
recognized them over the folds of the handkerchief mask that he had again put
across his face.
摘要：

DEATHJEWELSbyMaxwellGrantAsoriginallypublishedin"TheShadowMagazine,"onAugust1,1938Robbery,thendeath-andNewYorkwasstunnedwiththeswiftnessofcrime!ButfasterwasTheShadow,CrimeFighterExtraordinary!CHAPTERICRIME'SWARNINGItwasmidnight,andtheStarClubwascrowdedwithpatrons,packedatthetablesthatweresetaroundth...

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