"020 (B026) - Death in Silver (1934-10) - Lester Dent" - читать интересную книгу автора (Robeson Kenneth)

Ham shook his head slowly and turned his sword cane in his hands, for their quarry was nowhere in the room. Both the outer windows were down, and the lawyer knew that this skyscraper had a wall sheer and smooth, impossible for even a so-called "human fly" to scale by ordinary methods.





MONK, charging around the room, jerked a rectangle of expensive tapestry from the wall, scowled when he saw there was no aperture back of it, and flipped the carpet up. Nowhere was there a trapdoor.



"The windows are unlocked," Ham pointed out.



"But that bird in silver couldn't have - " Monk swallowed the rest, ran to a window and wrenched it up. He looked out, seemed stunned, but said nothing.



Ham leaped to his side. Together they peered down.



"We must be getting very dumb," Ham said disgustedly.



"Speak for yourself," Monk growled, then placed a hand on the 'window sill and vaulted through the opening, out into space.



Without hesitating, Ham followed, instinctively using care not to disrupt the neat hang of his garments. It was a rare occasion when Ham forgot his clothing.



Perhaps six feet below the window was a wide ledge. For the moment, the two men had forgotten that the skyscraper was set back, pyramid fashion, at intervals, and that one of these setbacks was at the level of the Seven Seas offices. The killer must have fled by this route, after closing the window behind him to confuse his pursuers.



Monk pointed, "He went this way!"



City grime was smeared on the roof of the set-back, soot and dust which retained footprints plainly. The two men followed the tracks around the skyscraper. They disappeared into a window on the opposite side.



Monk and Ham clambered through the window and found themselves among mops, buckets and window-washing paraphernalia; the room was obviously one used by janitors. There was no trace of the weirdly garbed slayer.