"Maxwell Grant - The Shadow - 226 - The Blur" - читать интересную книгу автора (Grant Maxwell)

Hooked to the main switch was a small metal block that looked like a toy transformer. It had wires
attached to the switch, and when Cardona yanked away the gadget and shoved the switch, the lights
came on, but no longer blinked.

Expecting trouble, Cardona dashed out into the main room, but nothing happened.

Commissioner Weston was standing in the center of a room which didn't look at all like a gambling
parlor. He was glaring about as though he, too, expected trouble, and was angry because there wasn't
any.

Detectives were standing by with guns and flashlights; club attendants were on their feet, looking very
shaky; while from corners of the room, patrons in rumpled but fashionable attire were crawling out, as if
coming from bomb shelters.

The scene had a comedy aspect, until Cardona spotted Tex's body, with the dead form of the lookout
lying beside it. Joe stepped over to look at the victims, and Weston started to follow, only to pause when
he noticed a stir at the outer door.

A detective was trying to keep someone out, and when Weston went to investigate the matter, he found
that the arrival was his friend Cranston.

"So you got here after all," said Weston testily. "I left word at the club, hoping you'd come along. But it
doesn't matter. We were late, too."

THEY joined Cardona beside the bodies, where the inspector was learning the details of Tex's death.
Considering the haze that the blinking lights had produced, Cardona was inclined to class the death as
partly accidental.

"Nobody can identify the killer," he said. "They all say his face was just a blur. If they couldn't see this
Blur, whoever he was, how could he have picked Tex out?"

Without realizing it, Cardona had given the unknown killer a name that was to stick. As a descriptive title,
the "Blur" fitted the murderer. But that point was passed by, for the time.
It was Cranston who suggested why Tex had become a prompt and certain victim. He pointed to the
gambler's bloodstained shirt front

"Notice the sparkle of that diamond," said The Shadow, in a calm tone that went with the personality of
Cranston. "It must have been a perfect target even while the lights were blinking in the fashion that the
commissioner just described."

"You've struck it, Cranston!" exclaimed Weston. "A perfect explanation!"

"Yeah?" grunted Cardona. He gestured to the dead lookout. "What about him? He isn't sporting a big
diamond."

Cranston turned his head toward the outer door and traced an imaginary line straight to the lookout's
body.

"They knew the direction this chap was coming from," he remarked. "They were waiting for him. They
didn't have to identify him any further."