Isabel Pyne swallowed convulsively. Then she swayed.
"No electric chair for me, thank you!" she jeered from pale lips.
Her legs gave way. Her body thumped against the floor. There was no need to bend over her; the subtle poison she had swallowed had locked her in rigid death.
The Shadow uttered no sound. He had expected her to do this thing. He had not interfered. Bending, he picked up the torn gown of the dead girl. He dropped it across her body, hiding the golden gleam of the most dangerous woman criminal he had ever encountered in his career.
He showed Cardona and Vincent something he had taken from a pocket sewed in the lining of Isabel"s gown. It was a chamois bag - the same one that David Frick had stolen from Muller. Opening it, he disclosed a handful of shimmering sapphires.
"But how -" Cardona was stuttering in his excitement. "How was she able to -".
"Wait!"
The Shadow turned. He strode toward the closet. Squeezing inside, his deft fingers moved. Vincent, peering over Cardona"s shoulder, uttered a cry of enlightenment. The rear of the closet was swinging open on a pivot! It had a false back! Beyond it was a dark pa.s.sage into which The Shadow disappeared.
WHEN he returned, he was carrying some rather sinister objects.
The first was the counterfeit head of a dog. The thing was made of light papier-mache. It was daubed with the same gold paint that had covered the silken fleshings Isabel Pyne had worn. It was curved slightly at the bottom, so that it could fit snugly against the girl"s shoulders when she slipped the ugly thing over her head.
The Shadow also carried a pair of golden gloves.
Cardona understood. Having donned helmet and gloves, and removed her slippers and stockings, Isabel Pyne could become swiftly, murderously - the DogG.o.ddess of Rajk.u.mana!
The final proof produced by The Shadow were the ugly mechanical claws that had been delivered to Muller"s delicatessen by special messenger. Isabel Pyne had sent them to her disguised uncle. And she had known how to use them herself! The claws were still crimson with the blood of David Frick.
The Shadow"s voice was calm. Cardona listened intently. So did Harry Vincent. Slumped weakly near the bullet-scarred desk of Muller, Rodney Mason and the Maharajah of Rajk.u.mana sat in dulled horror. Their faces looked sick and frightened. Both had played with fire; both had been treated as fools by an unscrupulous woman with a genius for crime.
The Shadow explained.
Frick had stolen the blood sapphires and escaped with them from India. He had sold eleven of them to wealthy collectors in New York. The rest he kept.
Otto Muller found out what was afoot when a member of the underworld brought "Ramon Ortega" to him for a secret conference. Out of that conference, a pact was born. Otto Muller promised to recover the missing jewels for the sum of
two.
million dollars.
Muller and Julius Hankey were, of course, the same man. The Fifth Avenue jeweler had been acting as a criminal fence. Isabel Pyne had given him the idea. Hers was the brain that directed Hankey. Trying murder for a thrill, Isabel soon discovered she had flair for it.
Rodney Mason was an innocent tool. Isabel deliberately sought his friendship the moment she learned that Mason was a chemist who had succeeded in manufacturing synthetic sapphires. Mason"s attack on The Shadow and Marsland was because he thought they were crooks in another gang opposed to Baron"s.
THE SHADOW pointed to the cords that had seemingly been twisted tight around Isabel Pyne when she had been shoved in the closet by her confederate, Hankey. The cords were cunningly fitted with elastic, so that Isabel was able to slip them off at will. While she was supposed to be a helpless prisoner in the closet, she was actually working her horrible murder game in gold-painted tights.
Her perfect alibi had fooled everyone - except The Shadow!
Joe Cardona nodded grimly as the amazing truth became clear to him. He turned, glaring angrily at the East Indian maharajah, who called himself Ortega.
"I wish I could send you to jail for a long time!" he snapped. "It was you who started this whole conspiracy of death. You lied to me! You tried to play both with the police and with the underworld!"
Ortega was frightened. He kept prudently silent.
"Unfortunately, I can"t send you to jail," Joe Cardona continued, harshly.
"Your rank as an Indian prince would cause international complications with Great Britain. But I can do one thing, by the Lord! I"m giving you twenty-four hours to get out of this country. If you don"t - I"ll have you deported!"
"I"ll leave," Ortega promised in a shaking voice. "Don"t - don"t expose me!"
Cardona turned toward The Shadow. He gave a quick cry. So did the others.
The Shadow was gone!
Unnoticed, he had vanished from that sinister room. His work was done. He had smashed a powerful group of organized criminals and exposed its real leader. When he had ripped the gown from Isabel"s gold-smeared body and watchedher die by her own hand, The Shadow had ended forever the menace of the Blood Sapphires. The criminals were dead. Cardona had all the facts. The credit for solving the mystery would go to Joe.
The Shadow wanted no credit. That was why he had so silently vanished. He would remain invisible and unknown until a new challenge to the law brought him again out of shrouding darkness.
Like a black symbol of justice, The Shadow would be waiting - ready for the endless war on crime!
THE END.