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

Cardona grimaced, knowing that his hunch would be criticized if proven
incorrect. Cardona felt resentful. Ever since he had broken in as a detective,
he had played his hunches. Yet Joe had never been able to convince the
commissioner as to their accuracy.
Weston saw that he had touched a sore spot. He tried to mollify Cardona
as
they went out through the anteroom. Clapping Joe on the back, Weston gave a
grave reminder:
"Don't forget what happened to the detectives on these cases, Cardona.
You
are too valuable a man to have disappear. I'm counting on you to smash the
purple death."


WITH that, Weston was gone, followed by the remaining detective. Cardona
was closing the door between the studio and the anteroom. Slow footfalls on
the
stairs indicated that Weston expected Joe to join him below. For the moment,
however, Cardona paused. A hunch had gripped him.
"Clues," muttered Cardona, half-aloud. "That's why they've dropped out of
sight. They picked up clues -"
Joe had remembered the fountain pen found by Jenkins, the shirt button
uncovered by Doolan. There was a chance that Kirk and Lacey might have
discovered some items also. At least, it was certain that in the last two
cases
of the purple death, prior to Tabor's murder, some trace to the killer had
been
found.
Why was there none here? Had the murderers been more careful, after
reading of previous clues in the newspapers? As Cardona considered this
factor,
he stared across the anteroom. His gaze stopped upon a tiny object just within
the door.
Popping over, Joe picked up a square-shaped newspaper clipping. Unfolding
it, he saw the diagram of a chessboard, with chessmen indicated on squares.
Below the diagram was the statement: "White to Mate in three moves."
Though Cardona was no chess player, he was familiar with the regular
contents of most New York dailies; and there was only one newspaper - a
morning
one - in which he had seen daily chess problems. Noting the position at which
the clipping had fallen, Cardona wondered if only the murderer could
accidentally have dropped the clipping at that spot?
Cardona hurried to the outer door. In the hallway, he stopped, the
clipping still between his fingers. He could hear Weston's footsteps.
With a grim smile, Cardona pocketed the clipping.
Others had made the mistake of proclaiming their clues to the police
commissioner. Weston, anxious to convince the newspapers that results were
being gained, had let the news reach the press.
But Cardona, for once, was decided on an independent policy. Dragged back
from a vacation, thrown on to an assignment that promised danger, he felt that