THE REDS MEET
THE next afternoon, Claude Fellows received a report from Bruce Duncan. He did not read it; he inclosed it in another envelope and sent it to the office on Twenty-third Street.
Early in the evening, Duncan’s report came beneath the glare of the shaded light, and the fire opal gleamed like the eye of a monster while the slender hands held the written page.
The information which Harry Vincent had forwarded through Bruce Duncan was not highly illuminating. Had the message been sent a few hours later, it might have included the amazing revelations made by Vic Marquette. As it was, Harry Vincent’s impressions were of ghosts — not aerial torpedoes.
But in his report, Duncan had included his own experience — how he had recognized the dead body of Berchik. A hand that held a pencil underscored this passage.
Then the light was extinguished. Silence reigned in the darkened room. The presence that had inhabited the place was gone. The Shadow had left on some new mission.
An hour later, the watching sedan was parked across the street from Prince Zuvor’s residence. One of the men stepped from the car, and walked up toward the corner of the avenue. A taxi chanced to come along the street; the man hailed it, and gave his destination.
He left the cab later, walked a block, and took a second cab. This cab was immediately followed by the one which the rider had deserted.
The pursuing vehicle kept well behind, but the driver did not lose his trail. When the leading cab stopped in the middle of a dark block, the second cab also stopped.
The passenger in the first cab walked a few paces; then suddenly turned into a passage between two warehouses. Still, the second cab remained, inconspicuous on the street.