“I - I’d rather not, sir,” protested the servant. “I don’t believe a flashlight is available, sir. You might take one of the candles if you wish to go -“
“I want you to go with me.”
Wellington glanced in protest toward Marcia Wardrop. The girl explained the reason for the servant’s unwillingness.
“Grandfather never let anyone go in the gallery,” she said. “That included Wellington. I don’t think - that even now - Wellington would want to disobey grandfather’s orders. You may go, Wellington.”
Jasper Delthern thrust his hands in his pockets. He laughed as he saw Wellington departing. He started to stroll away; then turned and spoke parting words to Horatio Farman and Marcia Wardrop.
“Have your ghosts!” he growled. “Believe in them if you want - like those goofy brothers of mine. You’re welcome to the whole house. Why should I worry? I’m getting my cut out of the estate - even though Barringer is grabbing a slice that should belong to me.
“I’ll take the club - that’s where I’m going now. Place where I can get a drink when I want it - and after this crazy house, I’ll need a couple pretty quick.
“Since you’re the lawyer for the whole shebang, Farman, I’ll leave it to you to remind me of the meeting a month from tonight. I might forget it even if I was due for the big money that Winstead is getting.”
With these remarks, Jasper Delthern left. A few minutes later, Horatio Farman bade good night to Marcia Wardrop. The girl went upstairs.
ONE door of the great reception room remained open. A vague motion occurred upon the balcony. The slight swish of a garment sounded from the spot at which Horatio Farman had imagined he had seen burning eyes.
As the swish moved along the rail, each of the candles flickered, one by one. More than forty of the glowing flames responded in this singular fashion.
Shortly afterward, blackness loomed at the foot of the circular staircase. It became a solid mass. It developed into the figure of a living being.
Had any of the persons who had heard the ghostly laugh been there to see this strange phenomenon, they would have believed that a ghost of Delthern Manor was materializing itself into substance!
The strange shape took on the form of a man clad entirely in black. From his shoulders draped the folds of a cloak; over his eyes was the brim of a slouch hat. The headpiece concealed the stranger’s features; but they did not hide the glow of the eyes that looked about the room.
Even the hands of the strange visitant were garbed in black. Gloves showed as those hands rested upon the table where the conference had been held.
Now, from hidden lips, came a strange echo of the weird laugh that had been heard before. Low and sibilant, it was a fanciful reminder of that terrible sound. It wafted through the room; its tones reached the gallery above. There, they were sent back in shuddering whispers that came to a repeated, sighing close.
Here, in the great reception hall of Delthern Manor, stood the amazing being whose laugh had been taken for a ghostly manifestation. He was a personage of whom neither Horatio Farman nor the Delthern heirs had heard, yet whose name was well known and highly feared by denizens of New York’s underworld.
The Shadow!
Master of darkness, a supersleuth who fought with crime! He had been here tonight. His eyes had watched the assemblage. His lips had uttered that astounding mockery that had made Winstead Delthern quail.
Within the range of the flickering light that came from the candelabrum on the table, The Shadow’s silhouette made a long, sinister blotch of darkness upon the door. A weird setting for so mysterious a personage - this antiquated room in Delthern Manor!
FOOTSTEPS sounded beyond the open door. The Shadow moved silently and swiftly to the side of the reception hall. His figure merged with gloom, as Wellington entered the room, carrying a long candle-snuffer.
Using this antiquated implement, the servant walked around the hall, extinguishing the lights one by one. Wellington’s gaze was always upward.
The servant passed within three feet of the spot where The Shadow had merged with the blackness beneath the balcony. But Wellington kept on, ignorant of the fact that a living presence was concealed within the apartment.
With the hundred-odd candles extinguished, Wellington went to the center of the room and snuffed out the lights of the candelabrum. A few seconds later, the door of the reception hall slid shut. Total darkness remained.
Again, the laugh of The Shadow sighed softly through the room and woke echoes that whispered back ghoulish sounds to the summons of their master. Before the weird reverberations had completely died, the door of the room again slid open. The hall beyond was darkened now, for Wellington had gone upstairs. The Shadow, invisible, moved through the blackness.
The door was closed behind his departing presence. The old reception hall of Delthern Manor remained silent and grim, filled with memories alone. But in all the history of this strange apartment, nothing had ever rivaled the occurrence of this eventful night, when the ghostly cry had echoed through the huge room.
There, with his terrible laugh which had brought fear to Winstead Delthern, The Shadow had decided in favor of Warren Barringer. No ghost from the past, but a living presence, had caused the eerie echoes that had made Winstead agree with Horatio Farman’s plea for justice.
The Shadow was gone, but his mission at Delthern Manor had been accomplished. Hidden in the blackened confines of the whispering gallery, The Shadow had served as proxy for Warren Barringer!
Soon the absent heir would reach America. Then he would meet the personage who had acted in his behalf. But Warren Barringer, like the other legatees to the Delthern millions, would remain in ignorance of The Shadow’s presence on this night.
Delthern Manor loomed gray in the dark night. The living presence that had been ghost as well as proxy was no longer within the mansion’s stony walls!
CHAPTER IV
A TRAVELER RETURNS
THREE days later, Warren Barringer, the one absent heir to the Delthern millions, found himself riding along a thronged New Jersey highway in the back seat of a luxurious limousine. Idly puffing a cigarette, the returned traveler considered the sequence of events that had brought him to this state of glory.
It was two years since Warren Barringer had left the United States, as the representative of an American oil concern.
In Java, he had made the acquaintance of an American traveler named Lamont Cranston. In the course of their friendship, Cranston had warmly requested Warren to call on him, should the young man reach New York.
Warren had smiled at the invitation then. He had not expected to come back to America for several years at least. But fate had decreed differently.
In Hongkong, not long ago, Warren Barringer had been notified that he was the heir to a considerable portion of his grandfather’s fortune. Planning to return, he had cabled Lamont Cranston, requesting the friendly American to take charge until he could reach New York.
At the pier, in New York, Warren had been met by a man in uniform, who had introduced himself as Lamont Cranston’s chauffeur. Customs formalities over, Warren had entered the waiting limousine, and was now on his way to Cranston’s New Jersey home. Through the Holland Tunnel, across the heavy-traffic highways - now they were in the country, nearing the destination.
Stanley, the chauffeur, suddenly turned from a main road and drove along a narrow highway. It was late afternoon; in the fading light, Warren Barringer caught sight of a large house set back from the road. The chauffeur turned the car into a driveway, and pulled up before Cranston’s abode.
Warren Barringer knew that Lamont Cranston was a wealthy man; nevertheless, he was amazed by the splendor of this edifice. A brilliant light shone above the front steps. There, on the porch, Warren spied his friend. The young man leaped from the car and advanced to shake hands with Lamont Cranston.
BEFORE him, Warren saw a man who had not changed a whit since that meeting in Java, more than a year
