The Story so far:

     The Shadow uneasily decided to leave the killer Frank "the Snake" Earl to a police trap and turned his attention to the case of “Mavis, the Mystic”, a spiritualist cheating the rich. But Earl, true to his name, wriggled free of the trap, massacring both the police and his own men who he blamed for his near capture. The Shadow now felt compelled to hunt down Earl and turned the case of Mavis over to another.

      The Shadow, as Lamont Cranston, with the help of Margot Lane,  introduced young socialite Morgan Willis to a strange little man named “Mr. Maxwell”, who was actually the Magician “the Mysterious Audini” incognito. At the height of a Seance Maxwell tripped a “ghost” and revealed to Morgan’s gullible Aunt Agatha the truth.

      But as fate would have it, Seagate House, which Mavis had just been foiled in her attempts to seize, was itself Earl’s hideout. Mavis told Earl, hiding unseen in the servant quarters, of her being exposed, expecting him to find a new hiding place. But instead Earl declared he was not leaving, he had arranged for a bootlegger’s ship to use the cove behind the house to gain both capital and an escape route to Canada.

      Mavis, trapped into helping Earl but trying to avoid more bloodshed, set up a ghostly scene designed to scare off Morgan and his Aunt. But it backfired, the House ghost “Captain Black” was played by Earl himself and when faced by Morgan brandishing a gun he killed him with a Cutlass.

      At the Funeral for Morgan, the true nature of whose wounds had been hidden in a trumped up car accident, Margot and Lamont were reunited and Margot wondered openly what had gone wrong, Mavis was back in with Aunt Agatha and Morgan, her old college friend, was dead. Lamont, who as the Shadow felt he was closing in on Earl and couldn’t yet break free of the chase, advised Margot to accept Agatha’s invitation to stay a weekend and to help them find out.

      But that night in a warehouse used by the underworld, the Shadow with the aide of Cliff Marsland got the last piece to the puzzle -- only to realize it meant that Margot had been unknowingly sent alone directly into the Killer’s hideout.

      Margot, not knowing the danger she was in, did her best to make good her visit, when the night brought mysterious doings down by the cove she went to investigate, only to find Agatha sitting in the dark hallway obsessed with seeing the Ghost. Agatha saw something and chased it out to the cove only to collapse with exhaustion on the beach. There, to Margot’s surprise, the Shadow appeared to get her out of danger, but Margot couldn’t leave Agatha. The Shadow understood her commitment but couldn’t get them both out then without risking open warfare. They had to settle for a plan of Margot getting Agatha out the next morning.

      Only, by next Morning Mavis had finally won over Agatha’s dwindling resistance and had Margot escorted out. Margot, unhappy with being marched out, and with hoped for support from Moe Shrevnitz the New York Cabby and fellow Agent of the Shadow, returned to try to spirit Agatha out, only to find her lying drugged unconscious. Margot then turned to find a grinning Frank Earl holding a gun on her.

      The Capture of Margot was a heavy blow but the Shadow still waited. As the sun set The Shadow sent Cliff Marsland in alone, and in a trumped up seeming failed burglary attempt Cliff was captured and faced Earl demanding explanations. Earl got a simple one from Cliff that he believed but being blood-thirsty disregarded it and intended to exececute Cliff anyway. Cliff knowing he’d played this last hand, that he’d accepted his assignment willingly and knew the risks, saw his death as enevitable and took it Stoically as not to crawl to Earl. This inner strength was all that saved Cliff, Earl knew a brave man when he saw one and spared Cliff hoping to add him to a gang he would form later when he got to Canada.

      But the good graces between them didn’t last. Cliff once having established Margot still lived, saw his chance aboard the Bootleg ship and acted to save her. But instead a seaman above him in the rigging dropped a belaying pin on his head, it knocked him sprawling, helpless at the killer’s feet.

Now it was up to the Shadow.

8.
The Shadow Strikes

      What happened next would seem startling and unbelievable if you did not know what struggles lead up to it.

      By the time Cliff Marsland had entered Seagate House the Shadow had already moved his men up into position around the house beyond the gate. The Shadow had brought in Jericho Druke, Harlem agent, and some of his Lodge brothers to provide strength of numbers if needed. All the ways around the house were tied up tight, but even still nothing showed when the truckers from the City arrived.

      It had been the truck that was the final piece, the clue for where Earl was hiding. Earl had contacted the underworld for taking the shipment of bootleg and thus marked his whereabouts. Now the truck’s arrival was the opening act for this night’s drama. As soon as the truck had cleared the outside gate, the Shadow’s men moved in to surround the house and cove. But in advance of his men came the Shadow himself. His black-cloaked form springing ahead and his disappearing into the darkness. 

      At the time when Earl had commandeered the Long boat and was going to the ship to cement his arrangements with the Bootlegging ship’s Captain, those on the shore were brought under the Shadow’s control.

      First, the leader ashore, Mavis, found herself suddenly alone.

      She had trusted Earl to come back for her, to take her with him to Canada, but she had looked at the diminishing Long boat and felt a chill. Was it a premonition felt by a person adept in mystic vibrations? No, it was the cold wind pushed ashore by the oncoming storm. When she turned back to shore she gasped in surprise as she saw the head of the Truckers raising his hands under the cover of guns held by three black men. She turned and had a bigger shock, by her side was a tall figure hawk-faced figure dressed all in black.

      The Shadow had come up on her almost in silence, directly through her own people. He had lain them out cold with quick strikes of the flat side of his twin .45 automatics. She turned to see the Shadow, standing over her fallen underlings and looking down on her. She gasped and cringed back in incredulous horror. She who had traded in other people’s fears and whose wares were ghostly apparitions, now cringed before the awesome, unearthly figure of The Shadow. He grasped her wrist so she couldn’t run and before she could scream the giant black man Jericho Druke had her by the shoulders while another of his Lodge brothers stuffed her mouth with cloth.

      She was sat down, wild-eyed, bound and gagged, onto the sand as the band of Agents and the Shadow prepared for their next move.

      All this had happened before Earl had even boarded the ship, and as Earl moved to persuade the Captain to finish their business the Shadow acted out the next step.

      The Shadow did not wait for the long boat to return, he acted first.

      First, he removed the great cloak and slouch hat he always wore and under it was revealed a simple black jumpsuit such as aviator’s wore and covering the lower portion of his face what looked to be an aviator’s high altitude face mask and oxygen bottle. He removed his double shoulder holsters and put the guns into a pouch that hung behind him over his shoulders. The Shadow looked out across the sprite of land and rocks that jutted toward the sea at one side of the cove and with a quick word to his Agents the Shadow sprinted out over the stones with surprising speed and agility.

      Mavis sat straining to see what would happen next, but she lost sight of the figure in the rocks. She never saw the Shadow dive and swim with remarkable power through the rising and falling sea. But she knew as surely as she felt the cold wind of the storm moving in on them that this weird figure in black was headed for a reckoning with the Killer Frank Earl.

      The Shadow’s plan was simple, executing it wouldn’t be.

      While the ship was still anchored at the mouth of the cove, the shadow would swim up to the side of the ship and put explosive charges with radio keyed detonators at the anchor chain and water line. When the charges blew, the ship would lose control of it’s position and founder. It would likely drift in toward the rocks. But before that, what had happened to Margot and Cliff must be known first.

      The Shadow cut through the cold blackness of the sea with grim determination. It was unlikely anyone would see a single swimmer in the sea this dark, but what was hardest was not to allow oneself to be just another object tossed around by the sea. He had to get the needed work done and do it in time while fighting the rise and fall of the water. And what was worse, swimming in the cold sea deadens one’s muscles, straining to work at the ship’s side in the chill, with leaden muscles that fought one’s every move, might have exhausted and done in a man of less training and endurance, but even the Shadow suffered mightily with the straining efforts. His arms especially ached with the simplest efforts to keep himself from drowning.

      Finally, the charges were set, the work done, but still he had to work his cold muscles again to climb the rope ladder. Rising heavily from the black sea he shook himself to get back circulation and warmth. Each loop in the ladder was a new fire of agony but he took it and regained some more of his strength. He had to  climb near enough to the deck to appraise the situation aboard. As he made progress nearer the deck, he groped into his shoulder pack for a .45 automatic.    Amazingly, it had been less than an hour before, just as night had begun to fall, that he had sent Marsland to the house. It was an attempt to place someone within the criminal forces in the hopes of exercising more control of the opposition when the last moments of action came. But until now he had no knowledge if the ruse had worked. Cliff had volunteered for the job but he could be lying back in the house dead in payment for his courage.

      And Margot Lane? They had waited all day with no word. She too could by now have been discovered by Jericho ashore, lying where Mavis had killed her. And so, it was with a deep sense of relief mixed with apprehension that the Shadow overheard the drama of Cliff standing up to Frank Earl for the sake of Margot.

      When it ended abruptly with the leaden sound of a belaying pin hitting the deck and Cliff falling, the Shadow gritted his teeth and prepared for action.

      In the moments before Cliff was taken down the sailors had unhooked the long boat and it fell from the side of the ship to the sea, as it plummeted it nearly took the Shadow with it. He strained to hold on to the rope ladder as he dodged it and then desperately struggled to regain his footing once it had passed and splashed to the water.

      All this was the difficult and harrowing prelude that ended with the shadow’s seemingly miraculous arrival.

      In a burst of strength the Shadow vaulted over the railing of the ship. All eyes turned back to the rail and the black creature who suddenly stood before them.

      Everyone on deck was frozen in position, amazed, the form before them was unreal, it wasn’t the form we know as The Shadow, dressed in black cloak and hat, but it was a strange, cold black form with a mask across his lower face. It was still an ominous apparition that found their awe and wonder a cause for sardonic levity. The Shadow laughed a cold laugh as he leveled his .45 on Frank Earl.

      The man above who had dropped the pin on Marsland moved at an unfortunate moment, the Shadow’s attention wavered as he quickly put a bullet in the shape and and a sailor crashed down to the deck.

      In the confrontation it was as if the Shadow had blinked first and Earl moved on the Shadow without hesitation, he raised his Tommy gun with both hands to blow away this avenging black apparition to bits in a burst of flame and bullets.

      But as the Tommygun raised, in a quick surpising motion with his free hand, out the pocket on the chest of his black jumpsuit the Shadow pulled a flare that burst into bright life. The Sailors shielded their eyes from the glare.

      This was the signal to Moe Shrevnitz at a radio set in the back of his cab to key the radio signal detonators and before the Tommy gun erupted two explosive charges rocked the ship. Earl nearly lost his footing and the burst of gunfire went wild, chewing across the railing.

      The next Tommy gun burst would surely focus in on it’s target and riddle the Shadow with lead, but the shadow had expected the blasts and kept his footing, and with that advantage he coldly pumped two shots into Frank Earl. Like a fatted Ox, Earl staggered with the impact of the shots, then he shuddered and collapsed heavily to the deck.

      The Shadow gave no further thought to Frank Earl, he had the lives of two of his best agents to save.

      Lightning chose that moment to flash across the black-clouded sky. The light rain that had only chilled up until now now beat at the ship. The sailors were whipped into alertness as the ship groaned and listed. The ship was moving but moving the wrong way, toward the shore. A sailor ran to the wheel to avert disaster only to cry out in panic to his comrades that the wheel was swinging free, there was no helm, no rudder, they’d be dashed to the rocks.

      The sailors and truckers from the shore realized they were being swallowed by a storm while riding a lame and dying ship and true panic spread across them. The only focused and methodical actor in the confusion was the man in black, who did his best to revive the injured Cliff and failing that, grimly put the wrapped body of Margot Lane over his shoulder and went over the rail.

      The decision to leave Cliff behind on the staggering ship, was a decision born of combat, it was not a choice in the usual sense of the word. Because if the Shadow had had a choice he would’ve stayed with Cliff to try to save his life, even if meant riding the ship into the rocks to do it. But instead the Shadow managed Margot down to the long boat below, took up the oars and pushed it away from the ship.

      There were two long boats, one in the water and one on the deck that the sailors had been stocking with boxes of bootleg liquor. Some aboard the lurching ship had panicked so badly as to jump to the sea to try to swim to shore. Others with only slightly calmer heads had jumped to the sea to try for the Long Boat already down, only to find it already moving out. But the calmest heads aboard the ship were those sailors with the Captain, who unloaded the second long boat. They weighed the odds of their efforts to get away from the ship before it foundered against the certainty of the ship hitting the rocks. The odds were with the calmest heads and the second boat, they would survive while those who had jumped to the cold sea mostly drowned.

      The Shadow with the murmuring half-conscious form of Margot Lane at his feet, made slow progress with the long boat. His body was rebelling against his renewed efforts to row ashore after the cold exertions of before. A few of the Swimmers tried to climb aboard. Many reached for the boat only to not have the strength to pull themselves aboard and the sea pulled them down. One made it aboard then took one look at the black apparition at the oars and jumped back into the sea. But another big brute came up dripping out of the sea and the shadow expected this would be trouble.

      The Shadow reached into his pack to get a gun while the brute was still gasping for air, lying soaked and near exhaustion at the bottom of the long boat. The Shadow aimed at the form for a moment, doubtful he could say anything to keep the big man in check. But then the tough looked up at him, dazed and confused, through blood matted hair, the blood trickling down his brutish face and into his eyes.

      The Shadow stopped short, and then laughed his mocking laugh. But it was not at the expense of the bleeding man on the deck but on the ever strangeness of fate’s turning. The big man gasping for air at the bottom of the boat was Cliff Marsland. The man the shadow had unwillingly left behind to likely die with the ship had revived and followed him out of danger despite all odds to the contrary.

      “Get up, Cliff.” came the powerful voice of the Shadow. “We could use you on these oars”

      Cliff rose to the oars with shambling difficulty, but the shadow knew that this was what Cliff needed most, to focus, to fight at doing something, for if he let himself drift into unconsciousness the concussion he’d certainly received from the belaying pin would probably worsen.

       Cliff slowly got his bearings and cried out. “Miss Lane ... is she ...”

      “She’s alive, more than that we won’t know until we make it to shore.” remarked the Shadow.

      Cliff looked in amazement at the weird black figure with the Shadow’s voice then the real current problem of rowing through the worsening storm came back to him and he went back to pulling on the oars.

      Long minutes later the boat was in the surf and Jericho and two of his compatriots were helping bring the boat onto the sand. The Shadow carried Margot to the sand as Jericho got the still shaky Cliff to solid ground.

      The Shadow had acted quickly and decisively and then moved on but all had not gone perfectly aboard the bootleg ship. Earl had been taken down by the Shadows shots but the twisted path of fate that Earl walked hadn’t lead him to death’s door just yet, he was wounded but still lived. He rose from the deck just in time to see the last of the seamen and the captain moving off from the crippled ship in the second long boat. The deck heaved under him and was slick from the pelting rain but he managed to pull himself to the rail and call to them to come back and save him. They only stared back in wonder at the man who could cheat death so easily.

      Earl cursed and shook his fist and then scrambled at the wet decks for the Tommygun that in the desperate scramble had been abandoned. It was wet but still had some bullets, Earl dragged it back to the rail and turned it on the moving long boat.

      The bullets danced and kicked up spray around the long boat but the awkwardness of the moving boats and the pain of his wounds spoiled what aim he could get and made even the Tommygun ineffectual. He cursed and finally tossed the Tommygun after them into the sea.

      Then suddenly Earl was knocked to the decks as the deck heaved under him. The ship was hitting the rocks of the sprite and the sound of the wooden boat crashing into the stones was like a bass note of doom, like a mortal moan coming from deep inside the ship itself.

      The mast snapped with the force. The rigging broke free, some of it falling to the deck. On the deck Earl struggled for footing and grasped at the lower ruins of the mast for support only to find he was grasping at something that had been tied to the mast. He didn’t quite understand what was happening at first, as the rigging fell around him he found he was holding onto the figurehead that the Captain had purchased. He found he was holding on for dear life to a carved wooden statue of Death itself, it’s carved skull face grinned back at him.

      Then all went black for Frank Earl, some of the falling mast had struck him as the rigging ensnared him. The last image Earl had on this earth was of a figure dressed in a black cloak and in the hood of that cloak was a fleshless grin. Death had claimed a killer.

      Inspector Joe Cardona of the New York City police had gotten a call while it was still dark to get out to Long Island on the double. He made it there only an hour past first light. The local authorities were swarming around where a bootleg ship had run aground in last night’s storm but now the day was bright and the air clean from the rain was fresh and the sea was downright beautiful.

      The words that had gotten him to run out there were the simple phrase “We’ve found Frank Earl.”

      The local police were there to take the credit and the reward and so the truth of what had happened was hard to sort out. Finally, he stopped trying.

      The local authorities themselves didn’t look a gift horse in the mouth. They never questioned the excuse that the big black man Jericho Druke had given them. He said he was driving out on the road, returning friends to their jobs as domestics at one of the big houses on the coast, and they acted alone to secure the stranded criminals. The local police just let them leave the criminals to them as they tried to hide from the city boys the dollar signs in their eyes.

      Inside the house it was another story. Cardona got an earful. It seems a phony Mystic known as Mavis had put something over on the old biddy who owned the house and had been harboring the fugitive Earl. The Law would go hard on this trickster.

      Luckily for the Law the residents of the house included one classy number named Margot Lane. She apparently had gotten wise to the con-woman but before she could call the police had been put out with drugs. She was a little worse for wear and hadn’t seen exactly what had happened in the storm, but she certainly nailed that crook Mavis to the wall.

      An ambulance had been called in for the old lady who owned the house but Miss Lane was staying at her side. The two had been through a lot together. Miss Lane left with the ambulance even though she seemed to have recovered just about completely herself. A right dame, Cardona thought. They’d get her full disposition at Headquarters when they all got back to the City.

      Yes, there were still some details that didn’t quite fit right here, but Cardona thought there was enough good results that he left the other inconsistencies well enough alone.

      After Margot and the ambulance had left Cardona and the local police were just on clean up duty. Cardona had to see to the disposition of Earl’s body which had washed up on shore virtually tied to the ships broken mast. It was a weird sight, the mass murderer Frank Earl dead and covered in rope from the rigging, looking as if he were in the hugging embrace of a skull faced wood carving. It was not a sight Cardona would forget soon.

      Cardona and the Chief of the Local police, Capt. Hodges, were just coming back up from the beach where the body had been cut from the rigging and discussing who’d get custody of Mavis and who’d get the crew from the bootleg ship, when who should show up but Lamont Cranston.

      Cardona knew Cranston but not well, he’d met him any number of times with Commissioner Weston. He’d always struck the no nonsense Cardona as sort of rich man version of an ambulance chaser. True, the crimes that Cranston would be curious about usually were tougher cases but Cardona couldn’t see why he had to tolerate this civilian’s nosy questions just because he was friends with the commissioner.

      “Good Morning, Inspector” said Cranston in a friendly tone.

      Cardona nearly grunted back, only indicating a hello.

      “I’m a long time friend of the late owner of this house.” Cranston explained awkwardly “I heard some talk, a rumor, while I was staying with friends up the road ... Well, naturally, I came to see if they were all right.”

      “You missed them.” Cardona grumbled. “The lady who owns this house and a younger woman friend of hers just was taken off in an ambulance.”

      Cranston’s eyebrows shot up “An ambulance ... they’re not badly hurt are they?”

      Cardona muttered “They’re fine”

      Just then Mavis with her hands in handcuffs behind her back was being escorted up the road toward a police car. She took one look at Cranston and her eyes went wild “YOU! You’re the cause of cause of all this!” she shrieked. The policemen with her had to grab her before she could push her way forward toward Cranston.

      Cranston only blinked in surprise at being singled out.

      “What is she on about?” asked Cardona of Hodges.

      “Damned if I know” said Hodges.

      Mavis was wild-eyed, nearly foaming with anger. “We were watching that day you put Audini onto us! We were fooled, we didn’t know who he was at the time, but when we did know we remembered you were the one who introduced Martin to him. And that Lane woman was there that day, too! You’re all in this! You’re all in this together!”

      Hodges cursed “Put a gag on her!” he told his men.

      But something about what Mavis was screaming got Cardona curious.”No, wait, what is she talking about? Who’s in this? What are they doing?”

      “You’re all working for HIM!” she said with dark emphasis.

      Hodges on the side of his head away from Mavis twirled his finger near his temple, in the universal sign language indicating he thought Mavis was nuts.”And who might this ‘HIM’ be, when he’s at home?”

      Mavis’s eyes were wide and level on Cranston. “The Shadow!”

      Cardona suddenly quieted.

      Hodges blinked “The who? The which?” Hodges put his nose to hers and laughed “Don’t you mean ‘the Boogey Man’ ?”

      Hodges waved to his men “Take her away.”

      “You won’t get away with this!” Mavis screamed at Cranston.”I’ll get back at you! I’ll get back at you all! Every one of you!”

      Hodges waved to her as she was being dragged off “You won’t see pavement for twenty years, if I know my judges. They’ll throw the book at you for harboring a mass-murderer like Earl.”

      Hodges looked back at Cardona with a big grin, like he’d enjoyed Mavis’ outburst. But Cardona watched her being taken off with cold detachment.

      “She’s Crazy.” said Hodges “She keeps that up and she’ll end up in the looney bin”

      “Which is probably just what she’s pulling for.” Cardona smirked “They don’t send people away for twenty years at the Looney bin.”

      Hodges pulled at his jaw in confusion “They don’t? I thought they threw away the key?”

      “Not always” pointed out Cardona. “If you act crazy for a while then act like you’re cured ... Why, they could release her in less than five.”

      “Is that a fact?!” said Hodges in consternation. “Well, we better make it damn clear we’re on to her and see she gets the maximum.”

      Cranston while the two police were talking faded into the background, but watched closely as Mavis was being taken away. Then he got back into his cab, the Cab driven by Moe Shrevnitz, agent of the Shadow.

      Moe was sometimes closer than many others of the Shadow’s agents. There were times Lamont Cranston had gotten into his cab and the Shadow emerged, but he had never asked about it. Today Moe was more talkative than usual. “I’m so relieved.” he said starting up the car. “When they had Miss Lane, I could’ve died of heart failure ... and then how you had us ... I mean ... how the Shadow had us ... I mean how we had to wait until night before we did anything about it!”

      The Shadow nodded not acknowledging Moe’s slip. “I know what you mean. This has to have been one of the most difficult cases we’ve ever worked on. Not that it was such a great mystery at its root. But sometimes you can’t always do the right thing at the right time. What you do may not be what you look back on and think you should have done ... and people suffer for it. Sometimes it seems fate is in control.” he mused “But if we could only see all and know all could we then end all suffering?”

      Moe blinked and scratched his head under his Cabbies’ cap perplexed. “I don’t get cha, Mr, Cranston.”

      “Don’t you? Well, tell me, Moe, who would you go to see if you wanted someone to see all and know all?”

      “Who me?” asked Moe puzzled.

      “Okay, let me put it this way. If someone, someone dramatic, were to come to you and tell you they could tell you things you thought you would never know, would you pay them your hard earned money for it?”

      Moe blinked again “Say, if someone could tell me straight which horse in the third race would win, place or show ... I’d cut them in for some of the green.” he smiled back into the car mirror. “Say, I get you, Mr. Cranston. That Mavis, she said she could know things nobody else could tell you and then she bilked people for plenty.”

      “That’s why people like her will never disappear. We all wish we knew the unknowable. Some of us wish it so bad we make it easy for the tricksters and do the job of fooling us ourselves.”

      Moe chuckled, “Ain’t that the truth.”

      “Take us back to the City, Moe” sighed Cranston. “I think I’m in the mood for a steak dinner at Delmonico’s”

      Moe Chuckled “Hey, why not go to Child’s, instead, they got waiters that do exactly what they say they’ll do”

      “What’s that?”

      “Make you wait.”

The End

Ghost Cove

This Story Copyright 2001 Joe Nemec