"Maxwell Grant - The Shadow - 016 - The Ghost Makers" - читать интересную книгу автора (Grant Maxwell)

"Then came the laughs again. Some one yelled; they switched on the lights. There was Harvey,
deadтАФand the laugh was still coming from somewhere. It stopped right after the lights went on."

"Is that where they evolved the ghost theory?"

"Yes. The professor says that two spirits were in conflict, the good and the bad. He claims that Harvey
mixed in the mess, and got the worst of it."

"Preposterous!" exclaimed Weston. "A knife can't come out of nothingness, Cardona!"

"I AM telling you what the professor said, commissioner. I started a cross-examination on the spot.
When you quiz excitable women, they don't begin to cook up stories. I talked to them. Nine people
besides the professor all had the same story. They lay it on the ghost."

"The professor told his story first?"

"Yes, commissioner," said Cardona wisely. "That's the wrinkle. I figured just as you are figuringтАФthat he
was keeping something back. If this spook stuff is a fake, he would be the one to know it. So he would
be the bird to lay it on. But that part doesn't hold."

"Why?"

"The professor couldn't have done it. He was tied to a fare-you-well. Get this, commissioner. Some one
gave the alarm. There were two house detectives there inside of three minutesтАФgood men, both of them.
They pay for good men at the Dalban.

"Nobody went out of that room after they got there. They watched the professor. He was tied in his
chairтАФand when I examined the knots, they were plenty tight. He didn't have a chance to get out of
themтАФlet alone get back in again."
"You're sure of that, Cardona?" the commissioner queried.

"Positive. It took us five minutes to get him loose. Even a wizard like Houdini was couldn't have got out
of that chair, let alone this professor. He's no weakling, but he isn't husky."

"I don't like his story," persisted Weston.

"Neither do I," returned Cardona. "I think he's stalling. But it's not because he did anythingтАФas I said
before, he couldn't have."

"What is his purpose, then?"

"That spirit racket is his living, commissioner. With nine other people laying it on the spirits, is he going to
say different?

"The point is this, commissioner. He knows some real person did that jobтАФ not a ghost. But he doesn't
know who the party is. Get the angle? What happens to his reputation if he lets that out?"

"I understand," said Weston, nodding. "You have landed something there, Cardona. The man must be a
fraudтАФI believe most of these mediums are fakes. But with this murder happening right beside himтАФ