"Maxwell Grant - The Shadow - 114 - The Strange Disappearance Of Joe Cardona" - читать интересную книгу автора (Grant Maxwell)

JOE'S first impression was one of complete disarray. The studio that he
viewed was lighted only by a large lamp that stood in a corner, shining upon a
table that supported a draftsman's board. A T-square, angles, protractors,
drawing instruments and slide-rule, were lying on the floor. Beyond, Cardona
saw the gaping front of a metal file cabinet, from which the drawers had been
yanked and left on the floor. Papers and building plans were strewn on the
floor. Scanning that area, Cardona spied a rack in a far corner, saw a coat
hanging there. A man's still form showed bulkily on the darkened floor below.
With a grim exclamation, Cardona sprang to the corner. Cardona knew that
this hunched man who lay face downward must be the architect, Frederick Tabor.
The man's dark trousers matched the coat upon the rack.
Gripping Tabor's shoulders, Cardona rolled the man toward himself.
Tabor's
head tilted face upward. From past Cardona's shoulder came the revealing
light.
With a blurt, Cardona dropped the inert shoulders, let the body sag as he
dropped back to stare.
Frederick Tabor was stone dead. It was not that fact, however, that had
appalled Joe Cardona. The ace inspector was accustomed to viewing death; he
had
guessed that Tabor was dead from the moment that he had begun to roll the
body.
It was sight of Tabor's face that made Cardona spring away as instinctively as
if he had just escaped stepping on a rattlesnake.
Never had Joe Cardona seen a face so contorted. Whatever handsomeness
Tabor might have once possessed, his dead features showed no trace of it.
Cheeks were puffy, swollen. Lips were twisted and bloated. Eyes were bulging
orbs that looked like imitation chunks of glass, ready to drop from the
sockets
that held them. Below them was a nose, with wide-spread nostrils like those of
a
primitive savage.
It was a feature that completely banished all semblance of a human
countenance. Doom had left a mark that could never be erased, for it dominated
every inch of Tabor's face.
 The dead man's visage was dyed a deep purple; a color deeper than a
stain.
That lurid hue seemed to have crept from within, to reach the outer flesh and
tinge it with the evil dye. Hands, crossed on the dead man's chest, were
puffed
and purple. The penetrating stain had even purpled the finger nails.
Cardona had learned the truth of Weston's words, the moment that he had
viewed the dead face of Frederick Tabor. Embarked upon a seemingly unimportant
errand, Joe Cardona had stepped squarely into the chain of crime that he had
been ordered to investigate.
The ace sleuth had found Frederick Tabor, the latest victim of the purple
death!