balcony? From here I can see below - to all sides— everywhere. Fourteen stories to the street below.
Who can come here to find me, in this room of the Goliath Hotel? I am safe, yes—but not alone because
I am secluded. I am safe because I am wise and make no mistakes except”—his tone was
ironical—“except when I choose men who have no brains.”
Zelva ceased speaking and leaned from the edge of the balcony. Ballou noted that there were other
balconies below, located on alternate floors, with twenty-foot spaces between them. He looked upward
and saw the bottom of another projecting balcony, twenty feet above.
The white bottom of the upper projection gleamed dimly in the night. Above, all was darkness. Zelva
turned and stepped back into the room. Pete Ballou followed.
THE moment that the two men had left the balcony, a splotch of darkness moved from above. A
shadowy shape obscured a portion of the white projection that Ballou had observed.
That mysterious blot swung toward the wall of the hotel. It traveled downward and a huddled figure
rested beside the open window. Then the black form flattened itself along the rail.
In the room, Rodriguez Zelva was walking slowly back and forth, glaring at Pete Ballou, who had
resumed his seat. The chunky man stopped beside the window and stared forth into the night.
His gaze passed beyond the silent form which had again become a mass of unmoving blackness. Little
did Zelva suspect that The Shadow, strange being of the night, had ferreted his way to this inaccessible
spot, coming stealthily from the balcony above!
Pete Ballou was waiting until Zelva's despising anger had cooled. He knew that his chief would soon curb
his ire and settle down to constructive ideas. The change was already making itself evident.
“Ballou,” said Zelva, in a different tone than before, “you have made a great mistake. But like all
mistakes, this one may work for the best. I formulate my plans as I see them come. Now, let me tell you
first how simple were the schemes that you may have injured so badly to-night.”
Ballou settled back to listen.
“Ten million dollars,” proceeded Zelva, “is very much money. I am an important man from South
America—here in New York. That is why I learned easily that Alvarez Legira was to receive that great
sum. Why should I worry about Legira? If he should take the money to Santander, it would be simple
there to seize it. One snap of my finger”—Zelva performed the action—“and the hotbed of revolution
would break out. The money would be ours. Why then do you think I have dealt with Legira?”
“To play it safe,” suggested Ballou. “Save a lot of trouble down to Santander.”
“You are wrong, Ballou,” returned Zelva. “I have threatened Legira because I have suspected that he will
not go to Santander with the money. Ten million dollars! Why should he return to Santander? Europe,
perhaps—but not Santander.”
“Is he double-crossing his pals?”
Zelva smiled and shrugged his shoulders.
“With ten million dollars?” he asked. “That is enough to make him do so.”
“He convinced people up here that he was on the level.”
“Ah, yes, he may be on the level, now. But let him have the ten million dollars. Then—”
Another shrug of Zelva's shoulders indicated once again that he considered ten million dollars to be a
stake that no man could resist.
“All right,” said Ballou, bluntly. “Figure it that way, then. The first thing was for Legira to get the money.
That's what you told me. Then for us to get it from him—giving him a chance for a fifty-fifty break as a
come-on.”
