"Maxwell Grant - The Shadow - 243 - Room of Doom" - читать интересную книгу автора (Grant Maxwell)

Shadow earlier. She was confusing this invader with the masked man who had
made
the surprise entry into Aldriff's den. It required some stretch of the
imagination, but Joan was capable of it. Actually, the girl's thoughts were
confused by recent events.
To begin with, she mistrusted Nevlin for the same reasons that The Shadow
did, which was why she, too, had come upstairs.
Finding an invader at Nevlin's very door, Joan's ideas performed a
whirl-about, bringing her to the conclusion that Nevlin was really honest, and
therefore in danger. Nevlin had struggled with the masked man, so Joan's mind
jumped back to that event, and therefore gave her a wrong notion of The
Shadow.
As for The Shadow, he was chiding himself for having let a very essential
point escape him. He'd taken it for granted that Joan was in conference with
Weston and the Magnax executives, though he had not heard her voice. He should
have looked in on that conference; if he had, he would have learned that Joan
was absent from it, and therefore up to something else.
Regrets were useless. The present task was to nullify Joan's mistaken
guess
without letting Nevlin learn what was happening; a rather difficult
assignment,
considering The Shadow's predicament. However, The Shadow remembered something
that would help.
He spoke in a whisper that Joan did not recognize. He was picking up a
warning that Commissioner Weston had impressed upon the girl.
"Be careful with that gun," suggested The Shadow. "If you fire it, you
will
have to make more explanations to the police. They have been very tolerant
with
you so far, but they have their limits. It would be unfortunate if they even
knew you owned a gun."
The girl let her hand relax, only to tighten it again. Her grim smile
showed that The Shadow's ruse had not quite worked. Joan was thinking that
since
the police wanted the missing masked man, they would probably thank her for
trapping him. Nevertheless, The Shadow's words made Joan consider matters more
calmly; which was an important gain.
Over the top of the leveled gun, the girl tried to glimpse the face
beneath
the hat brim. The Shadow lifted his head slightly, letting her view his eyes.
A
good move, since it roused Joan's curiosity the more and enabled The Shadow to
shift farther back, giving the impression that Joan held him more helpless
than
before.
Burning eyes beneath the hat brim - Joan didn't recall that the masked
man
had such eyes. She could see the outline of a face, though she could not
identify its features. Not for a moment did she class The Shadow as Cranston,
for she thought that the commissioner's friend was in the conference