Urlich's eyes went from the lights toward the detectives. The men did not move. They could not
understand the situation. Cardona gave no order to attack; he did not realize the danger. He saw only a
fiendish maniac beside a strange machine a raving, laughing man who was powerless before the revolvers
that now covered him.
Cackling wildly, Urlich stared once more at the lights. The white one went out. The red came on. The
reason burst through the evil scientist's brain. The Shadow's agents were escaping! They had fled to the
portico immediately after the advent of the police squadron.
Heedless of a whispered echo that came from the spot where The Shadow crouched, contemptuous of
the detectives who gawked without suspecting the trap that they had entered, Professor Urlich tightened
his hold upon the switch. He expected a shot from The Shadow. He grinned as he prepared for it.
At that instant, the fiend's eyes lowered to the floor. They saw that the heavy insulated wire from the
machine had been spliced. A sudden tremor shook the villain's body.
In that terrible instant, his eyes realized a fearful truth; but his hand, inspired by instinctive determination,
did not falter in its work or heed the warning from the staring eyes.
Down came the switch. No report from The Shadow's automatic accompanied it. The staring, wondering
detectives leaped back toward the door as a terrific sound came from the huge machine.
Long crackles of lightning leaped from pole to pole. Disks whirred and wheels revolved. But another and
more terrible phenomenon accompanied that mighty outburst. From every section of the metal floor
within the pit leaped blazing, snapping sparks.
A terrific flash enveloped the form of Professor Folcroft Urlich. With it came a swift, sweeping puff of
whitish smoke that seemed to burst like a cloud from nether regions.
The white fumes swirled away. The machine crackled on, and sparks sallied about the floor.
At the spot where the fiend had stood, a man remained no longer. Instead of a human, form, a mass of
smoldering bone and ashes were piled in a grotesque pyramid. These were all that remained of Professor
Folcroft Urlich, scientist and fiend of evil.
Well had The Shadow planned this dynamic finish, during his sojourn in the pit beneath the laboratory.
His keen mind had seen the purpose of this terrible machine. By sure but simple process, The Shadow
had disconnected the huge feed wire that led to the three outer zones, and had attached it to the floor of
the pit — that metal base upon which Urlich had first conducted his electrical experiments.
The master of silent death was no more. The Shadow had given him true warning. The pressure of the
switch had brought a deserved end to the murderer who had sullied science to serve his evil designs.
CHAPTER XXIII. THE STORY
CLYDE BURKE wrote the story for the Classic. The reporter received it in detail from Detective Joe
Cardona. The so-called suicide of Professor Folcroft Urlich created a great sensation in the columns of
the New York newspaper.
The public learned that schemes of terrible death had failed except on one occasion — that was when
Thomas Jocelyn had died. Thrice had planted snares gone wrong: with Alfred Sartain, Wesley
Barnsworth, and Gardner Joyce.
When Thomas Jocelyn had died by subtle poisoning, with his servant, Grewson, by his side, Joe
Cardona had already been upon the trail of the murderers. Slips Harbeck, quizzed, had named Larry
Ricordo. The gang lord, shot down in the Grand Central Terminal, had squealed on Professor Folcroft
Urlich.
Pictures portrayed the laboratory where Cardona and his men had gone. There, the scientist, apparently
choosing his own killing current in preference to that of the electric chair, had swung a suicide switch to
take his own life before the very eyes of the men who had come to capture him.
It had taken some time to find the outside wire that had supplied the power for the big machine. When
that had been cut off, the detectives had invaded the floor above the pit. There they had encountered two
foreigners evidently aids of the dead professor. The battle that had followed brought death to Sanoja and
Rasch, and wounds to two detectives.
A point over which Cardona passed lightly was the fact that the servants of Professor Urlich must have
been bound at the time the police had arrived. Possibly the scientist had overpowered them so that they
would not deter his suicide escape.
The trapped men had managed to loose their bonds before the detectives had accosted them. Remnants
of cords upon the floor accounted for the fact. But they had been unable to escape because the
detectives had barred the one way to safety.
Clyde Burke smiled as he wrote the story. Nothing was known of two prisoners whom the fiendish
scientist had doomed to die. No mention had been made of the part played by an unknown visitor from
the night.
There were other facts that Clyde did not know, yet which he, with his extra knowledge, suspected. All
these were summed in one tremendous point that the public would never know — a scoop that the Classic
would never print.
The hand of The Shadow! Hidden, invisible, but never failing, it was the power that had struck down the
master of silent death.
The Shadow had turned the tide of doom to sweep aside the villainous fiend, Professor Folcroft Urlich.
Unseen by the detectives, he had silently followed his rescued agents into the darkness of the night.
The truth of the monster's end must remain unknown to the world. But the story would be found,
preserved for posterity, in the secret archives of The Shadow!
THE END
