"Maxwell Grant - The Shadow - 285 - Fountain of Death" - читать интересную книгу автора (Grant Maxwell)

Seeing Cranston, Claybourne stopped short, scarcely noting the members of his immediate family as they
poked their faces timidly from the curtains of surrounding rooms.

"Hello, Cranston," said Claybourne, abruptly. "Well, he did it."

"Who did what?"

"Craver, the ingrate," returned Claybourne. "He sneaked up to my private strong-box and robbed it. He
and some masquerader all in black, who managed to disappear."

Behind Cranston's back, Sheff and Hippo exchanged startled looks. Then, beginning with grins, they
worked their expressions back into the more respectable features of Sheffield Gilbin and Artemus
Borgand.

The exchange of smiles denoted mutual satisfaction over a task well done; the next move was to be
solemn, which they did. Cranston was looking the other way, and before Margo noticed them, these
swindlers who loved to be swindled were quite the sugary gentlemen once more.

Jerome Claybourne was snatching up the telephone, vowing vengeance and more.

"If Craver thinks he can consummate this outrage," stormed Claybourne, "I'll show him. I know where
he's stopping, at a cheap hotel called the Pilgrim. What a fool I was even to condone his visit here, but
he's the greater fool. He hasn't anywhere else to go except back to his hotel. I'll call the police and have
them apprehend him red-handed!"

While Claybourne was phoning the police and bellowing for rapid service, Cranston did the polite thing
under these embarrassing circumstances. He bowed a solemn good evening to the members of the
Claybourne family and suggested to Margo that they be on their way.

Family and servants were dispersing, except for the few who like Gilbin and Borgand were standing near
Claybourne on the far side of the very grand staircase. Nobody noticed the brief trip that Cranston made
to the near side of that same stairway to pick up what at a distance looked like an ordinary top coat that
he draped across his arm, hiding a slouch hat flattened underneath.

They were outside the front door when Margo said:

"Poor Johnny. Do you really think he'll go back to the Hotel Pilgrim?"

"I think so," replied Cranston with a nod. "What worries me is how long he will take to get there."

Odd that Lamont Cranston should be worrying over such a trifling matter at a time when Johnny Craver
wasn't. Or perhaps it was Margo Lane who should have been worrying because her feminine charm
wasn't sufficient to make Cranston forget crime and its possible consequences.

Such charm had certainly overwhelmed Johnny. He didn't care who caught up with him, provided that
they took a long time doing it.

At that moment, Johnny Craver was utterly oblivious to the fortune that was sprouting from his pockets,
utterly oblivious to the sumptuous trappings of the lavish limousine in which he was riding, utterly oblivious