Robert Wallace - The Black Ball Of Death

Passing leisurely, the Phantom gave the place an optical going-over. It was one of those ancient edifices from which the owner derived more rent from business than he could have obtained from furnished rooms or small apartments.

A music publisher held forth on the main floor, a furrier plied his trade in the basement. The windows on the second floor were gold-leafed, Horgan and Carter, Attorneys-at-Law, Bail Bonds. The last two words were in large, impressive script.

The Phantom mounted the short flight of front steps. The door the man had gone through was unlocked. Stepping into a dusty, uncarpeted foyer, the Phantom was greeted by a flurry of piano music swirling from the open transom of the music publisher’s office.

The Phantom frowned at the closed door below the transom. Had the man gone in there? Determined to find out, he opened the door and found himself scrutinizing a small anteroom where a tired brunette was busy counting out freshly printed copies of some musical composition. There was no one else visible.

“Did Mr. McGregor just come in?” the Phantom asked.

Without change of expression or a break in her counting, the girl answered, “No one came in – except you. And who’s Mr. McGregor?”

“My mistake.” The Phantom shut the door after him as he backed out.

There were no other doors along the entry hall. On the landing above, the Phantom considered the ground glass expanse of Horgan and Carter’s place of business. Then he shook his head and went on to a final flight of stairs. They took him to the third floor and brought a quick stir of interest when, emerging on that landing, he found himself face to face with a series of doors.

The piano music filtered faintly up to him. He hardly heard it. He tried the knob of the first door and looked into a storeroom. Files of music told him which tenant rented it. The second door was locked. The third, labeled PRIVATEshowed gloom behind its half-pushed-back transom.

The fourth door, when the Phantom reached it, produced better results. Beside it, head lowered, he caught a drift of conversation. Two men were talking.

As he listened, he heard one say, “So you let him get away again?” It was a cold, ironic voice. An unpleasant, gravelly tone, spiced with contempt.

Another voice said, “Listen, this party you put me on is a smart operator. He’s been two jumps ahead of me right along.”

“Sure, sure. But you’re expected to catch up with him after the first slip.”

“So I didn’t. So what?”

The frosty, unpleasant voice said, “Nothing. Tell that to Bernie when he drops around. Maybe he’ll buy it.”

The Phantom’s nerves went tight. This was better luck than he had expected or hoped for. Separated from him by the narrow width of the wooden door were two men who, in some way, were definitely concerned with Arthur Arden’s killing!

“When do you expect Bernie around?” the second speaker asked. The Phantom guessed he was the one with the twisted ear.

“Any time. He left Jersey around noon. Had to do some sharp finagling. The local gendarmes had a call out for him.”

The Phantom’s mind went back to the Lakeside Inn – to the Bernard Pennell who had checked out early that morning.

Bernard Pennell – ‘Bernie’?

The Phantom began to sketch out his next move. He had the choice of breaking in on them, or staying off and waiting for Pennell’s expected arrival. He decided on the latter course after a minute’s quick thought.

The gravelly, icicle-packed voice began to speak again. The Phantom wheeled around. His sharp ears had caught the sound of footsteps coming up the stairs. He took three steps away from the door, turning casually and staring down at the landing below.

There, in the murky light, he had a glimpse of a man who wore a pearl-gray felt hat, a dark suit. He glimpsed a shadowed, thin face, but had no time for more than a superficial glance.

The man in the gray felt opened the door of Horgan and Carter’s office on the floor below and went in.

The Phantom’s face grew thoughtful. He had an odd feeling that the man intended coming on up to the third floor, that he had selected the law office on the spur of the minute.

The Phantom’s eyes moved from the landing below to the door he had listened beside. A minute ticked away, several more, and then a telephone in room rang.

“Yes – speaking.” The cold voice was level and hurried. Its owner listened and said, “I get it. Thanks,” and hung up.

His companion said, “Was that Bernie?”

The other didn’t answer. Instead, he asked, “Seen this morning’s paper? There’s an article in it that might interest you – Let me get it for you.”

The legs of a chair scraped on the floor. Swiftly, the Phantom’s hand dipped in his coat, to reach for the gun in his shoulder holster. As his fingers closed over it, the door before him was swung open.

The Phantom stepped forward, his automatic leveled, his voice smooth and brittle: “Drop that gun!”

The man in the doorway didn’t argue. He stepped back into the office, and the blue-steel revolver in his hand clattered to the floor.

The Phantom kicked it aside and, with gun leveled, entered the room.

QUICKLY, the Phantom saw that the man who retreated before the threat of his automatic was a sandy haired, narrow-shouldered character in a plain brown suit, with a pair of eyes as cold and penetrating as his voice. They peered at the Phantom speculatively, hostilely, as the detective nudged the door shut and let his gun include Twisted Ear in its coverage.

The Phantom’s late tail sat stiff and straight in a backless wooden chair beside a porcelain-topped table. There was a bottle of brandy on top of that, some glasses. With his hat off, the one with the twisted ear had a saturnine, grotesque look that came from too much forehead and too little hair. Those features, combined with the maltreated ear and a darkly brooding expression, lent a sinister touch the Phantom hadn’t noticed when the other was staked across from the Clarion Building and drifting along behind him on Broadway.

He knew what had happened. He had been right about the man on the floor below. That party had intended coming up the last flight of stairs. But then he had glimpsed the Phantom beside the door and had drawn his own conclusions.

It had been a comparatively simple matter to use a telephone in the law office below for a warning to the pair the Phantom now held at gun’s point.

He understood another thing. The one who wore the pearl-gray hat must be Bernard Pennell – the ‘Bernie’ the two had spoken of and expected.

The Phantom didn’t like the switch that had forced his hand. These two men were hirelings of higher-ups – small fry, pawns in the riddle of the eight-ball murder. The Phantom’s interest lay with those who had plotted Arthur Arden’s killing, the unknown character, or characters, who had planned and executed the shooting at the lodge.

But, his hand forced, the Phantom had no choice but to see it through. It meant he had lost a chance to catch up with Pennell. By this time the man who had spent two days at the Lakeside Inn must have left the building and disappeared into thin air.

The Phantom’s mouth tightened. Not a word had been spoken since he had closed the door behind him. The piano music from the first floor made a fantastic background. Against it, the quickened breathing of the two was loud and rapid.

“You’ve not only let him duck you,” the frigid voice accused the man in the backless chair, indicating the Phantom, “but you’ve given him a free ride around here!”

Twisted Ear said nothing. Thoughts kaleidoscoped through the Phantom’s taut mind. He moved forward again while the man who had snapped out the last words backed up.