The Cup of Confucious s-125 Read online

  it.

  The motor stopped. The speedboat drifted slightly. Then there was a faint,

  scraping bump. The Shadow had no idea of what was going on. He could see nothing, hidden by the bow of the boat and the enveloping covering of the water-drenched tarpaulin.

  "What'll we do with the boat, Paul?" Squint whispered.

  "Sink it, you fool! I'm gonna scuttle it, right now! We can't afford to be

  traced to this cove. Out with you - jump!"

  The boat heaved as a body jumped from the gunwale. The Shadow knew the craft was a long way from the shore of the cove. Nevertheless, there was no splash when Squint - if it was Squint - jumped.

  Then there was another heave of The Shadow's marine prison. The Shadow lay

  quietly where he was. Water began to run along his legs. He felt the boat fill rapidly. It began to settle.

  Rodney had kept his word. He was scuttling the craft in the middle of the cove.

  Still The Shadow remained quiet. He felt the water rise above his chin, his mouth. He tightened his lips, his lungs filled with air, and he waited coolly to go down with the sinking boat.

  It happened almost instantly. There was a curious forward lurch, then a sickening plunge backward. The stern with its heavy engine slid below the surface. Water gurgled and roared in The Shadow's ears.

  He whipped the tarpaulin away and stroked free of the sinking craft. His head broke the surface in the darkness. He could see a huge birdlike shape on the water and two men scrambling like ants along a broad wing. He knew now why Paul Rodney had been so confident of his ability to cross the Sound.

  The thing was a seaplane!

  Once more, The Shadow dived. His appearance on the surface had been only a

  second's duration. He swam below the shadow of the seaplane; allowed himself to

  drift upward between the flat, air-buoyed floats.

  He was just in time. The plane's motor began to cough.

  It deepened to a sullen roar. Like a darting bird, the seaplane swept in foam along the dark surface of the sheltered cove. It lifted with a swift jounce - then it was aloft, circling higher and higher in the air.

  Underneath, clinging desperately to the taut supports that connected the wet pontoons, hung the twisting figure of The Shadow.

  He had no time to jam his body into a secure spot. He was hanging straight

  downward by only the power of his wrists and clenched hands. His legs described

  a jerky arc in the air as he fought to keep himself from falling hundreds of feet to the lashing surface of the gale-torn water.

  He managed to draw up one dangling leg and hook it precariously around the

  slant of the support. Yet he was still in a dangerous position. He was hanging too far to the left of the center. The weight of his dangling body would become

  noticeable to the murderers in the cockpit above him. The starboard wing was dipping. He'd have to move inch by inch toward the center - or have the crooks discover that they were carrying an extra passenger.

  The Shadow's sliding right hand moved along the wet wire. It slipped, clutched wildly - closed on empty air!

  CHAPTER XI

  LUCKY KITTEN

  IT seemed as if The Shadow were doomed. The only link between his dangling

  body and the strut that joined the floats was the remaining grip of one desperately slipping hand. The sweep of the gale heeled the seaplane far over on a wing-tip.

  The Shadow's body jerked dizzily back and forth over empty space. The gale

  threatened to tear him loose and send him hurtling downward to death in the foaming water far below.

  But the very fury of the gale was The Shadow's salvation. It threw him almost horizontally against the undercarriage, as he clung by one slipping hand

  to the cross-support. His legs wound around a knobby strut. He held himself there, breathless, both hands clinging now with a death grip.

  He was almost in the exact center of his dangerous hiding place. The tortured plane now roared straight through the windy darkness on an even keel.

  The only threat to The Shadow's life was the occasional up and down plunge that

  signalized the presence of air pockets. He withstood these sickening jerks, although once or twice it seemed as if his arms might be wrenched out of their sockets.

  Both legs were firmly anchored. The Shadow managed to twist so that most of his body was above, and not below, the slippery length of the horizontal strut.

  He felt the seaplane's speed slacken after a few minutes more of this nerve-racking skyride, and he stared watchfully ahead. The outline of the Long Island shore was dimly visible, rushing closer and closer with frightful speed.

  The engine of the plane ceased its harsh droning. In long sweeping circles the plane descended.

  It's goal was a small landlocked harbor that looked like the water entrance to a private estate. Sandy hills swept out from the shore, almost meeting in a narrow inlet. Water boiled and thundered outside the opening, but within the harbor the water was calm except for the flat rollers that raced toward the sandy beach.

  The seaplane descended to the surface of this tiny harbor with a beautiful

  glide. Evidently, Paul Rodney was a calm and resourceful pilot. He landed with a

  smother of spray, swung the nose of the ship expertly around, and taxied toward

  a building that proved to be a private marine hangar.

  The seaplane drifted closer and closer to its entrance. Squint took a long

  leap from the bobbing top of one of the floats and scrambled ashore. A moment later, the huge door of the hangar slid open by concealed machinery. Lights were visible, staining the black water with a glow like yellow daylight.

  Rodney himself was furiously busy, working with tools on the wing-tips.

  Squint joined him and both wings were folded back into place. The ship was now like a bird with clipped plumage. It was ready to drift through the water entrance of the hangar and be securely lashed to its snug mooring.

  THE SHADOW saw only the latter part of these maneuvers. The landing of the

  ship on the tiny bay had plunged him completely under water. He held on, his lips grimly closed against the bubbling flow of salt water until he felt the vibration overhead cease and knew that the seaplane had come to a halt.

  Then he inverted his submerged body and made a deep surface dive.

  The dive took him far away from the black shadow of the plane. When The Shadow's head broke the surface, he was close to a corner of the hangar. He lay

  there in the glassy water, his face barely awash.

  He didn't move until the heavy door of the hangar clanged shut, hiding from view the squat shape of the seaplane with its folded wings.

  Then The Shadow swam slowly and noiselessly toward the shelving beach that

  curved inshore past the angle of the hangar's side. He divined that he had now reached Paul Rodney's private hangout.

  The Shadow was certain of it when he waded ashore. He surveyed the land and a distant house that showed faintly in the darkness atop a small sandy bluff. A path led upward, winding in and out among worn boulders.

  Rodney and Squint were just disappearing around the last bend in the ascent when The Shadow reached the beach. He didn't follow them. Instead, he retraced his steps along the shore to the rear door of the hangar.

  The door was shut, but it was not locked. The Shadow had counted on this lack of vigilance on the part of the weary crooks.

  The Shadow explored the hangar, found things he had hoped to find. A shallow closet yielded a jar of salve, which The Shadow rubbed into the aching flesh of his burned hands.

  In an open clothes locker, The Shadow saw a suit of dungarees hanging limp

  from a rusted hook. He slipped out of his own charred and water-soaked clothing

  and put on the dungarees. He smeared his face with grease.

  A bit of exercise sent a warm, reviving heat through his chilled b
ody.

  His

  teeth ceased to chatter. With a firm step, he left the hangar and ascended the winding path to the top of the sandy bluff.

  THE house was well in from the edge. It was built of fieldstone - heavy, irregular chunks of rock joined together with colored cement in the modern manner. A peaked roof covered with red and green slate completed the picture.

  Evidently Rodney had bought this new house of his recently, and had spent plenty of money for it.

  It was dark, except for the light that shone out the windows of the living

  room on the ground door. The Shadow glided closer, his footsteps masked by the moan of the wind. A spat of rain began to fall. Peering, The Shadow saw two men

  seated at a table, talking fiercely together, although it was impossible to hear

  a syllable of what either man was saying.

  Rodney looked grim and threatening. Squint was badly frightened. He kept moving a thin, clawlike hand in a nervous, placating gesture.

  The Shadow waited to see no more. He was turning away, prepared to find some quiet method of entering this house, when a freak action of the storm upset his calm plans.

  The Shadow had heard the low rumbling mutter of thunder, but had paid no attention to it. Thunder meant nothing important at this cold time of the year.

  Yet, as he turned away from the window, he was startled by the totally unforeseen flash of a jagged streak of lightning. It darted without warning across the black sky, lighted up objects on the ground with dazzling suddenness.

  A cry came from within the house. Squint had uttered that yell of amazement. He had leaped to his feet. His finger pointed toward the window. It pointed toward the grease-smeared face and the overall clad body of The Shadow.

  Squint had recognized the powerful beaked nose of the man outside the window. He remembered the deep-set piercing eyes. It was a man that Squint was confident had been left to roast to death in a burning inferno on the other side of storm-tossed Long Island Sound.

  Yet here he was alive, menacing - staring through the rain-pelted window like the vague embodiment of a ghost.

  "The Shadow!"

  SQUINT'S scream was clearly audible above the moan of the gale. It was followed by an oath from Rodney and the smash of a bullet through the glass pane of the window.

  The Shadow ran into enveloping gloom. He reached the road outside the low-hedged lawn with swift ground-covering strides. As he turned into the road,

  be could see Squint and the brown-bearded Rodney spring from the porch.

  Bullets raked the hedge over which The Shadow had leaped. He ran swiftly down the black asphalt road, after a single glance east and west to determine his best course.

  For reasons of his own, The Shadow did not want to make a fight of it with

  them at this time. The Shadow had a plan that he hoped would be instrumental in

  disclosing the actual identity of this mysterious "Paul Rodney." He knew the brown beard was merely a useful disguise, covering a personality that had not yet been brought out into the open in this strange case of intrigue, theft and murder.

  The Shadow fled with one urgent thought in his brain. He had to elude these two men - and find the nearest real estate office!

  Rodney's howl was like a trumpet call of rage through the rain.

  "Where did he go? After him, Squint! Kill him!"

  "Get the car out!" Squint shouted. "He can't get far on foot! There's no place where he can hide!"

  "Right!" Rodney bellowed.

  The Shadow heard no more. Racing down the road, he managed to elude his pursuers by hiding in bushes off the road. When he finally saw them get off the

  trail by taking to a side road, The Shadow continued along the way he had headed

  originally.

  After The Shadow had covered better than two miles at a dogtrot, he passed

  a cluster of houses and stores. One store in particular drew his keen attention.

  He read the sign on the dark window with a sibilant laugh: "John Honeywell -

  Real Estate." The telephone number was also visible in white letters on the lower corner of the window.

  The Shadow wrote down both the name and the telephone number with a stub of pencil he found in the greasy pocket of his stolen overalls. His note paper was a scrap of newspaper he fished from an ash-barrel. Then he found a shallow doorway and waited, his eyes watching the road for signs of a speeding car.

  Presently, headlights glowed. The Shadow listened and watched for a moment, then he stepped boldly from concealment. He was certain that the lights

  were not those of Paul Rodney's murder car.

  It proved to be a milk truck. The Shadow made a thumbing motion and the truck stopped, gave him a lift. Then it ambled down the highway in the direction of New York City.

  CHAPTER XII

  ENTER, MR. PERDY

  THE SHADOW, again in the guise of Lamont Cranston, sat in a comfortable chair, smiling faintly as he glanced at the telephone on a small table.

  Morning

  sunlight flooded the room with cheerful splendor. The room was part of an expensive suite maintained by Lamont Cranston in New York's exclusive Cobalt Club.

  The Shadow had risen late after an exhausted, dreamless sleep. No one knew

  why Cranston had returned to the club at such an early hour in the morning.

  The

  attendant on duty at the club desk had noticed nothing strange in the behavior or appearance of the millionaire clubman when he arrived.

  The reason was simple. The Shadow had left the milk truck in Brooklyn and had returned to Manhattan by subway. Then he had made his way to his secret sanctum hidden away in an old building in midtown New York.

  The Shadow had immediately gotten in touch with Burbank his contact man, and had given brief clipped orders for all his agents. Then The Shadow had changed from his dirty dungarees into the well-tailored clothing that befitted the suave Lamont Cranston.

  It was as such that he had made his early morning entrance through the portals of the Cobalt Club.

  Again The Shadow smiled toward the telephone, then lifted it to his ear, called a number in suburban Long Island. His voice was changed so that it resembled none a club attendant might have identified. He was calling the real estate man whose name and telephone number he had scrawled on a scrap of newspaper.

  "Mr. John Honeywell?... This is Peter Stedman. I'm interested in buying a home on Long Island."

  "Yes, sir." Honeywell's tone was pleasant crisp. "We have many such houses

  -"

  "I'm interested in a particular house. I saw it a week ago, when I was driving past on the shore road. It's called Cliff Villa. Is it for sale?"

  Honeywell's voice became apologetic. "I'm sorry, sir. I know the house you

  mean. I sold it, only recently. I'm afraid the owner wouldn't consent to sell."

  "Who owns it? Perhaps I can offer him a good profit on the deal."

  "It's owned by a Mr. Donald Perdy. Profit wouldn't interest him, I'm afraid. He's quite wealthy. Has a photographic art studio on Fifth Avenue.

  Owns

  his own plane. I'm sorry, Mr. Stedman, but I assure you I have other houses equally as lovely."

  "I dare say," The Shadow murmured in his disguised voice. "Perhaps I'll drop in your office some time and investigate. Good day, sir."

  He hung up. His laughter eddied ominously in the sunlit room.

  TWENTY minutes later, The Shadow entered the photographic studio of Donald

  Perdy. He gave Lamont Cranston's card to a girl at a desk and desired to see Mr.

  Perdy personally.

  Lamont Cranston's wealth and social prestige brought Perdy out of his private office instantly, with a polite smile and an extended hand.

  The Shadow expressed in Cranston's suave voice a desire to have his portrait taken at some later date. He was deliberate in his talk, vague about just what type of portrait he desired. All the while he talked,
he was studying

  this Mr. Perdy unobtrusively.

  A clean-shaven man, the photographer was, with a strong, square face and high cheek bones. The cheek bones and the eyes were proof enough to The Shadow that his visit had been successful. The eyes were hard, black, rather coldly sullen, in spite of the fact that Donald Perdy was putting on a beautiful, well-bred act for the benefit of his wealthy visitor.

  But The Shadow was not deceived. Mentally, he placed a brown beard on that

  smooth, hard countenance. He added a rasp to the cold voice, placed mentally a gun in that muscular hand.

  Donald Perdy and Paul Rodney were one and the same!

  The Shadow turned, pretended to see for the first time a large photograph in one of the display cases. It was a portrait of Bruce Dixon.

  "I see Arnold Dixon's son is one of your clients," he murmured. "His father is an old friend of mine."

  "Really?" Perdy's eyes narrowed by the merest flick.

  "Yes. He and I are both interested in the same things. He has a wonderful collection of ancient Chinese pottery. I've been to his home to see it."

  Perdy had recovered his poise that had vanished momentarily at the mention

  of Bruce Dixon and his father.

  "Of course," he said smilingly. "I remember now. Bruce told me you had been there. As you say, his father has a most wonderful collection." He laughed

  and his voice became very casual. "Too bad he hasn't the prize item of the lot.

  If only he had the Cup of Confucius, eh?"

  His dark eyes were like gimlets, boring into Lamont Cranston as though seeking to read the thoughts behind his visitor's mind. But The Shadow merely yawned.

  He said in a bored tone: "The Cup of Confucius? I don't believe I've ever heard of it. But then, I'm merely an amateur at this collecting hobby. It sounds like a rare and very old piece."

  "It is," Perdy said, his eyes still alert.

  "About the photograph," The Shadow said with a shrug. "I'm sure you can arrange to take one that will please me. Suppose I call back in a week or so and arrange for a sitting. Would that be satisfactory?"

  "Anything you say, Mr. Cranston," Perdy said. His grin expanded suddenly so that his teeth flashed for an instant. The teeth were small, regular, very white - almost like a woman's. The same teeth that had grinned at The Shadow when he had been attacked so savagely outside the library window of Arnold Dixon's mansion.