The watchful prisoner had found no need for further vigil. He knew that
Ferris Legrand would talk no more tonight. The riddle of the blackness in the
moonlight needed no further speculation.
All was quiet in the prison cell. On the morrow, Convict 9638 would be
removed. He, himself, had voiced the seriousness of his plight. His cellmate
had meant it when he had doubted that the man in the lower bunk would last
through the night.
Convict 9638 was dying. His dried lips had made their last utterances. His
end was near; and with his passing would go the secret that he had told only to
his cellmate.
The man called Sam Fulwell was nearing the end of his term. He could sleep
contentedly, for soon he would be free. When the doors of the penitentiary
clanged behind him he would depart, carrying with him the secret of Ferris
Legrand!
CHAPTER II
THE SHADOW PLANS
BLACKNESS moved in the patch of moonlight. The silhouette, hitherto
motionless, withdrew toward the darkness of the wall. The convict in the upper
bunk did not observe it. Even if he had still been awake, his eyes could not
have distinguished the shape that stood in the darkened corner of the cell.
Nor would his ears have heard the soft swish that came from that darkness.
A figure was moving there; so quietly that neither sight nor hearing would have
detected it. Blackness edged the moonlight and moved beyond. A firm hand
gripped the central bar of the cell door.
The light from the central room was blocked by a spectral shape. Gloved
fingers silently opened the barred door without a clang. A figure slipped
softly into the gloomy light beyond. A door closed and locked as quietly as it
had opened.
A phantom shape was gliding across the floor of the central room, moving
steadily toward a corridor beyond. Drowsy convicts, lying in their bunks,
neither heard nor saw the passing shade. Eyes would have bulged had they
observed this creature of the night. The weird being that had entered Ferris
Legrand's cell to station himself unseen was one whom all men of crime regarded
with terrified awe. Coming into the empty, lighted corridor, this personage was
revealed in full.
A tall figure clad entirely in black. Body shrouded beneath the folds of a
flowing cloak; visage hidden between upturned collar and the brim of a slouch
hat. Keen, blazing eyes alone in view. These were the characteristics of the
secret visitor who had entered the penitentiary and found his way within a
locked cell.
This being was The Shadow!
Master hand who battled crime, The Shadow traveled everywhere. Clews to
evils of the past; inklings of impending wrongs - these were the traces that he
sought with unerring skill. No barrier could balk The Shadow. He had proven that
fact tonight.
Click - click - click -
