But when the astonished man strained his eyes to examine the phenomenon, the moving shadow lost itself in the inkyness that obscured the lower stories of the edifice.
He had no time to leave his cab and make a closer inspection. For while he still gazed at the building across the street, a tall man with a large felt hat tapped at the window of the cab and demanded transportation.
Driving his fare to the address given, he still wondered about that mysterious shadow.
CHAPTER VI
THE SECOND MESSAGE
Harry Vincent awoke the next morning with a troubled mind. His sleep had been disturbed by unwelcome dreams, in which the frightened face of Scanlon and the sinister features of Steve Cronin had haunted him.
In the light of morning he chided himself because he had not anticipated and prevented the murder of the night before. His instructions had been to “watch the man in the next room,” and perhaps that might have meant to see that no harm came to the man. If such had been his mission, he had failed.
The morning newspaper was at his door, and he scanned the front page for news of the murder. The story was there; but its details were very few. The police, ran the account, were rounding up suspicious characters, but so far no clews had been discovered in the room where the murder had taken place.
Vincent dressed slowly, while he was reading and rereading the newspaper account. He was in a quandary. He knew that he possessed information that would be valuable to the police, yet he felt that he could say nothing until he received instructions from the sinister stranger who had become what amounted to his master, and whom he had promised to obey.
Vincent thrust his hand in his trousers pocket, and brought out the strange, grayish disk that bore the dull-red Chinese character. Here was a tangible clew. So far as he could see, it was the only clew that existed. What should he do with it?
He shrugged his shoulders. There was nothing to do but wait, for he knew of no way in which he could reach his mysterious benefactor and give him this bit of important evidence.
Vincent speculated upon his own position with a vague feeling of insecurity. Suppose the police should decide to quiz him? What could he tell them?
If they should decide to cross-examine him on the chance that he might know more than he had told, what would be the result? Vincent might be forced to tell his whole story; and who would believe him if he related the strange adventure of the mysterious man on the bridge?
He felt nervous, and tried to calm his mind by reading other items in the paper. The principal story was another murder - a much more important one than that of Scanlon.
A masked man had entered the home of Geoffrey Laidlow, a millionaire who lived in a palatial residence on Long Island. While opening the Laidlow safe, the criminal had been surprised by the millionaire and his secretary.
There had been an exchange of shots; Laidlow had been killed and his secretary wounded. The man had escaped with thousands of dollars in loot - composed chiefly of valuable gems which the millionaire had collected.
There was another story of violent death on the same page, but it was scarcely more than a brief item. The residents of an uptown apartment house had been awakened by pistol shots on the third floor. The police had found a man murdered. They had identified him as a gangster, who was known by the name of Croaker. The police suspected that he had been killed by other denizens of the underworld for some undetermined reason.
“Three murders in one night,” mused Vincent. “All on the front page. This Croaker case looks fairly obvious - a crook bumped off for double-crossing his gang. Geoffrey Laidlow murdered because he tried to thwart a robbery. Scanlon killed - and no one knows why. That is, except for the precious little I know.”
Vincent looked at the Chinese disk, examining it carefully. The same mystic character appeared on both sides. He wondered wherein lay the value of the disk. It must certainly be important and greatly desired; for a daring murder had been committed for no other apparent motive.
The telephone bell broke in on his thoughts, and he trembled nervously. Who could be calling him? Vincent hesitated while the bell sounded a second time; then, steadying himself, he lifted the receiver and answered with a firm voice.
“Mr. Vincent?” came the voice of the operator.
“Yes.”
“I wanted to make sure I had your new room number right. Fourteen fifty-two. That’s correct, isn’t it?”
“Yes.”
“Wait a moment, please. Some one is calling you.”
Vincent trembled nervously while he waited for the connection.
“Here’s your party,” came the operator’s voice.
“Mr. Vincent?”
It was a man’s voice, smooth and modulated. Vincent acknowledged it with a feeble “Yes.”
“This is Detective Harrison, of headquarters.”
Vincent’s heart leaped to his throat.
“Sorry to disturb you, Mr. Vincent,” continued the voice. “We are simply checking up on statements that were given last night by guests of the hotel. I am going to read the data that we have placed on the record concerning you. Will you please listen carefully?”
“Yes,” said Vincent.
The voice over the telephone came very slowly. Despite his nervousness and alarm, Vincent detected an emphasis on certain words.
“You did not hear the REPORT of a pistol. You were called TO the corridor. There were three or four FELLOWS there. The house detective was in the COMPANY.”
The voice ceased speaking. Vincent did not reply. He was thinking of the message, in which four words stood out so prominently: “Report to fellows company.”
“Is that correct, Mr. Vincent?” came the voice of the man who had called himself Detective Harrison.
“That’s right,” answered Vincent.
The receiver clicked at the other end.
“Just a moment,” called Vincent. The message had suddenly seemed insufficient. He wanted to hear the statement again.
“Sorry,” said the operator. “Your party has hung up.”
Vincent placed the receiver on the hook and began to repeat the words he had just heard:
“Report to fellows company.”
What could be the meaning of this terse, cryptic statement? Vincent wrote the words on a piece of hotel stationery, then tore the paper into tiny shreds and threw them in the wastebasket. The message was not clear; yet he was expected to understand it, and it must certainly be important. For it was a message from the man he called The Shadow.
Vincent paced up and down the room, mentally repeating the four words he had learned. “Report to” - that part of it was plain. He was to go somewhere and tell what he knew about the affair in Room 1417 that had led to the murder of Scanlon, the shoe salesman from San Francisco.
But what was “fellows company”? What could the words mean? He was to report to “fellows company.” He looked at the telephone, and his eye chanced to observe the gray-covered telephone directory.
Perhaps the clew lay there. He was to report to “fellows.” What was “fellows”? A name perhaps. If it happened to be a name, it might be in the telephone book. That was it! Fellows! A man named Fellows!
He hurriedly thumbed the pages of the directory under the letter F. He found the name “Fellows.” There were not many persons of that name. He read each listing carefully, and a cry of exultation escaped his lips, as he read this line:
“Fellows Co., Grandville Bldg.”
He paid no attention to the telephone number that followed the name. He was to report, and that would mean a personal call. He knew the location of the Grandville Building, which was one of upper Manhattan’s newest
