What lay behind that door was a mystery to Claude Fellows. Once he had wondered about it — long ago. He had questioned tenants in the building, and had learned that no one ever entered the room — not even the janitor, for the tenants paid for cleaning service and Jonas had never requested it.
So Fellows had come to accept the strange, closed office as a very ordinary matter. To-day he walked away without even giving it a second thought.
It was simply the place to which he brought or sent reports and messages intended for The Shadow.
Once Fellows thought he had identified The Shadow, but he had found that he was mistaken. So he continued his routine work, satisfied with his reward, which came in the form of a monthly payment from some unknown source.
Who and what The Shadow was no longer concerned Claude Fellows’ mind.
The insurance broker remembered the envelope as he rode uptown. He thought of it lying beneath the mail chute; then he dismissed the matter.
But at the very moment that the thought of the envelope lingered in Fellows’ mind, that same envelope was lying open on a table, and two long-fingered hands were drawing the clippings from it.
THOSE hands were working in a circle of light that came from a shaded lamp, directly above the table. They were amazing hands, white and supple.
On one finger of the left hand gleamed a mysterious gem — a glowing fire opal that shone with crimson hue, and seemed like a living coal.
Beyond the hands was darkness, amid which invisible eyes watched and directed the hands in their work. A pointed finger ran along the lines of Fellows’ brief report.