“Pursue your former policy,” added Brosset. “It worked before; it will work again. Rely upon my assistance, for I know the same facts that you know.”
The two men chatted for a quarter hour. The telephone bell announced another call. Clark Brosset answered it and spoke in an affable tone. His lips silently phrased a name that Warren observed as Brosset handed him the telephone.
“Jasper,” was Brosset’s statement.
The club president listened while Warren talked with his cousin. Brosset caught the trend of the conversation from Warren’s remarks.
“Hello, Jasper,” greeted Warren. “Certainly… Always glad to hear from you, old man… I told Mr. Farman so… Yes, tonight will be fine… Nine o’clock? Surely. I’ll be there… See you later.”
“Great work, Warren,” commented Brosset, after the call was concluded. “Suppose we go downstairs and have dinner. Then you can run up to Delthern Manor later.”
Warren agreed. He and Brosset descended. They dined in the grillroom, with other club members. They returned to Brosset’s office, chatted a while, and finally noted that it was nearly quarter of nine.
Clark Brosset shook hands warmly with Warren Barringer. He walked downstairs with the young man, and saw him through the front door of the lobby.
“No need for secrecy tonight,” whispered Brosset, as Warren stepped into a taxi. “Use your head, old fellow. Do nothing rash until you talk to me. I’ll be somewhere around the club when you get back.”
SOMETHING was gliding along the floor of the City Club lobby as Clark Brosset returned through the front door. The president did not see it. A shadowy, substanceless blotch of blackness, it moved steadily toward the stairs and ascended them ahead of the man who followed.
Before Brosset had reached the head of the stairs, the door of his office opened at the touch of an invisible hand. A stealthy figure glided through. When Brosset arrived and turned on the light, there was no sign of a living form. Only the solid blackness beyond the jutting bulk of a filing cabinet indicated the spot where a living person might be standing. Yet there was no motion visible there.
The telephone bell rang. Clark Brosset answered the call, held a brief conversation, and hung up. The club president opened the wall safe and busied himself there, his actions plainly visible from the corner. He finally took out the record books of the City Club, closed and locked the safe; then deposited the books upon the desk.
After a few moments of thoughtful table drumming, Clark Brosset became restless. With hands thrust deep in his pockets, he paced across the room, extinguished the lights, and went out, closing the door behind him.
Something swished from the corner beyond the filing cabinet. A living form stalked through the office. A tiny disk of light, no larger than a half dollar, cast its gleam about the room.
The glow traveled along the desk. It paused upon the telephone; it rested on the unopened record books. It flickered across the room, and cast a shimmering beam upon the door of the wall safe from which those volumes had been taken.
A low laugh broke the silence of the office. That tone of mirth came as the climax of The Shadow’s efforts. Its boding notes told of previous investigation; of a purpose behind the presence which had stalked the corridors of the City Club as secretly as it had moved within the gloomy walls of Delthern Manor.
The knowledge of The Shadow was apparent in that laugh. This phantom of darkness knew the turn that present events had taken. He had lingered in this office before; he had learned the plans that Warren Barringer had made with Clark Brosset.
Jasper Delthern was awaiting the visit of his cousin, Warren Barringer. Soon the two would meet at Delthern Manor. It was too late for The Shadow to be there at the beginning of their interview.
This office was the place where Warren had promised to communicate later with Clark Brosset. It, like the Manor, was important. Before The Shadow started on his mission at the Delthern Manor, he had work to do here, while Brosset was absent from the City Club office.
The shuddering laugh of The Shadow was repeated. It came as a final token of the secret knowledge which guided his plans upon this fateful night!
CHAPTER XX
THE WARNING
JASPER DELTHERN was standing at the open doorway of the great reception hall. The huge apartment was illuminated by its long rows of flickering candles that extended from the bottom of the balcony. The candelabrum on the table was also aglow.
Holley, the ex-chauffeur, approached the master of the Manor. He announced a visitor.
“Police Chief Gorson, sir.”
“Show him in,” ordered Jasper.
Holley went away and returned in company with Sidney Gorson. He brought the police chief to the spot where Jasper was standing. Jasper turned, shook hands with Gorson, and swept his other arm toward the room.
“Splendid sight, isn’t it?” he questioned.
“Yes,” agreed Gorson. “What’s the idea of all the lights?”
“Family conference,” explained Jasper. “Our old Delthern tradition, chief. You know what I told you last night. Ghosts of our ancestors -“
Jasper laughed as he broke the sentence, thus intimating his disbelief in supernatural forces. He spoke again, in a matter-of-fact tone, while he watched the flickering candles in feigned fascination.
“I called you about Terwiliger,” he said. “Have you heard from him today?”
“No,” returned Gorson. “That’s why I was anxious to get here after I learned that you wanted to see me. What’s it about? Where is he?”
“He left this morning,” said Jasper calmly. “He didn’t tell me where he was going. He merely said that he had gained a very definite clew. He asked me to call you and arrange an appointment in the study after he came back here tonight.”
“That’s odd,” observed Gorson.
“Not at all,” returned Jasper. “You remember what he said last night? That he would come into that room while both of us were together there, to lay the evidence before us?”
“Yes. He said he would get the goods on the man behind these murders.”
“Exactly. Well, that was why he was so mysterious this morning. He wants to finish the job in a dramatic fashion. He seemed very confident when he left.
“I had planned a family conference for tonight. My cousin, Marcia Wardrop, is at home. My other cousin, Warren Barringer, will be here shortly. I expect our lawyer, Farman, at nine thirty.
“Inasmuch as we will be engaged in this room, discussing affairs of the estate, I thought it best for you to be here in case Terwiliger comes. You can wait for him in the living room. He stated that he would arrive around nine o’clock.”
As Jasper concluded his statement, there was a knock at the front door. Both men stepped into the hallway, Jasper remarking that Horatio Farman usually came by that little-used route. Instead of the attorney, however, Holley admitted Warren Barringer.
“Ah! My cousin!” greeted Jasper, stepping forward eagerly to meet the visitor.
HE introduced Warren to Police Chief Gorson, and the three went back into the huge reception hall. Warren expressed his admiration of the great apartment.
“That’s right,” recalled Jasper. “You were never in here before, were you, Warren? This was grandfather’s show place - this room. We held a meeting here shortly after his death; before you arrived home from abroad.”
Warren nodded. Without looking toward his cousin, he was noting the change evidenced by Jasper’s voice. The black sheep of the Deltherns was making a great effort to display a white fleece, Warren decided.
Police Chief Gorson was walking about the reception hall, studying the furnishings and looking up toward the whispering gallery. Jasper called to him from the door.
“Warren and I are going up to the study,” he informed the police chief. “We will come down when Mr. Farman arrives. If Terwiliger shows up in the meantime, come on up to the study.”
In the hallway, Jasper Delthern beckoned to Warren, and started up the stairway. Before Warren could follow
