"Maxwell Grant - The Shadow - 116 - Intimidation,Inc" - читать интересную книгу автора (Grant Maxwell)

your holdings in the Dorchester Light & Power Company, by selling them in
blocks of fifty shares until the price has dropped below $30 a share.
You will then sell the remainder of your holdings as rapidly as possible.
No delay will be tolerated; nor will you be permitted to retain a single share
of that utility.
Others have followed instructions of this sort; and in so doing, have
shown their wisdom. The penalty for disregarding this warning, or mentioning
this correspondence to any one, will be your immediate death.
Destroy this letter. Remember that you are watched. Any false move will
be
immediately reported.
Yours very truly,
INTIMIDATION, INCORPORATED.

The letter showed that others in Dorchester had been threatened. Various
business men had acted against their own interests, under the urge of
"Intimidation, Incorporated." Like others, Meldon had followed instructions.
He
had sacrificed five thousand shares of stock, with par value of one hundred
dollars, at prices ranging down to thirty and below.
Dorchester Power & Light was a strong company. With pressure ended, the
stock would rise. Meldon had lost fully a quarter million; someone else would
gain that sum. If Meldon preserved silence it would be impossible to trace the
gainer. That was why Meldon had not followed the final instructions.
To offset the supercrook who represented Intimidation, Incorporated,
Meldon had retained the letter that he had been told to destroy. He had
dictated notes to Lenning; he had planned to make affidavits, and leave the
letter with the notary also. Meldon had expected to be far from Dorchester
when
the news was printed.


THE SHADOW was familiar with shorthand. He scanned Lenning's notebook and
found reference to previous cases. He read how Julian Reth, a big chemical
manufacturer, had sold out a subsidiary concern, the Apex Dye Works. The
purchaser, James Blosser, had gained three hundred thousand dollars' worth of
dyes for fifty thousand.
Soon afterward, Martin Lambroke, owner of the Lambroke Silk Mills, had
bought the dyestuffs at their full price. Blosser had made a quarter million.
A
week later, he announced that he had bought a huge art collection for the
Dorchester museum.
To Ludwig Meldon, once he had received his letter from Intimidation,
Incorporated, the story behind those deals was plain. Reth, Lambroke and
Blosser had all been threatened. They had followed orders. The real pay-off
would go to the unknown seller of the art collection. The treasures gained by
the museum would be exaggerated ones, worth but a fraction of the price paid
by
Blosser.
The Shadow had already heard of that deal. He had analyzed the possible