“You don’t know The Shadow, Inspector. If he happened to be in back of this — playing the part of Double Z — he’d be in the game as himself, just to make it more bewildering. No, The Shadow isn’t Double Z. I’ll stake my reputation on that!”
“You won’t be staking much,” asserted Klein grimly. “Not if this keeps on, you won’t!”
“Listen,” replied the detective. “I’ll make a prediction: We’ll hear from Double Z again. Soon. And his next job will be a flop!”
“I hope so.”
HAD Joe Cardona paid a visit to Room 909 in the Badger Building, he would have been surprised to observe the actions of an investment specialist named Rutledge Mann. For that quiet-faced individual was dealing in other papers than stocks and bonds.
He was clipping accounts of the Bodine killing and the rumors which had followed it. He was missing nothing. Among his tabulated statistics were the facts that Mike Lombrosi and Dave Markan were no longer important figures in the realms of gangdom.
His notations came from other sources than the actual newspapers. On his desk was an envelope delivered by Clyde Burke when the reporter had stopped by on his way to the Classic office. The Wise Owl had been getting material. He had been hearing more than rumors from the lips of mobsters.
Finishing his work, Rutledge Mann pasted up some clippings and stuffed them in an envelope. He dropped them in the office marked B. Jonas, while en route to the Cobalt Club. After a heavy dinner, Mann lighted a cigar and strolled about. Once again, the plutocrats were discussing Double Z.
“The man’s a maniac!” he heard Barnaby Hotchkiss say. “He’s dangerous! It is outrageous, the way the police continue to fail! Why, we’re all in danger! First Farmington was killed; now Bodine.”
“No analogy there,” declared Blaine Glover. “One was a banker — the other a crook.”