"Maxwell Grant - The Shadow - 064 - The Death Sleep" - читать интересную книгу автора (Grant Maxwell)

Cardona, the players looked like a group of figures chiseled by some madcap sculptor; or, even more,
they resembled a bizarre exhibit in a waxwork museum.

No terror - no surprise - no expressions of excitement were reflected on those countenances. Yet
something had chilled the entire group into their present state of being. Whatever the cause, the result had
been simultaneous. It was this that made Cardona sense that danger had passed.
Boldly, the acting inspector advanced to the card table, while those who had followed him remained
clustered at the entry. With furrowed brows, Cardona stared at the immobile faces of the group. He
stepped back, more awed than ever. He heard an inquiry - in Clark Doring's voice - that came from the
entry. The question was a hoarse one:

"Are - are they dead?"

"No." Cardona's response was oddly firm. "I do not think so. It can't be a state of paralysis - at least I
don't believe so. It looks like death - but it can't be death. They look like they were asleep - yet no one
could sleep like that and -"

"Then what is it?" gasped Doring. "Not dead - not asleep - what has struck them?"

Staring, the acting inspector pondered. Not dead - not asleep - yet both. Such was the thought that
passed through his mind as he gazed upon the frozen victims of an unknown force. As Doring's hoarse
question came again, Cardona - almost mechanically - formed the phrase that was to make tomorrow's
headlines.

"What is it?" asked Doring. "What has struck them?"

"A death sleep," replied Joe Cardona.

CHAPTER II. A GENTLEMAN IN BLACK
BRIDGE, as played at Seth Tanning's, was different from the game that was relished at the Cobalt Club.
The members of that exclusive organization had no time for conviviality. They took their game seriously;
and the struggle of wits invariably reached its height after the hour of midnight.

Yet on this particular night, a game had ended abruptly, shortly before one. Three players were seated
about a table in a tobacco-laden card room, indulging in a post mortem. Suddenly deprived of a fourth
player, they had been forced to end their game.

The door of the card room opened. The three men looked up to see a tall arrival dressed in evening
clothes. They viewed a firm, steady-faced countenance that they all recognized. That hawkish visage was
well-known at the Cobalt Club. The arrival was Lamont Cranston, the celebrated globe-trotter who
frequented the club whenever he was in New York.

"Here's our fourth!" exclaimed a player. "Come on Cranston! Sit in the game. You'll be a worthy
successor to the chap who just left."

"Who was that?" The question came evenly from Cranston's lips.

"Wainwright Barth," chuckled the player who had spoken. "Playing in good luck, too, but he had to
quit."