The Silver Owl Part 1

THE SILVER OWL.

by FRANK GRUBER

The steam room of n Turkish bath was the strange setting for a murder--and the disappearance of o coin worth o fortune.

Perspiration was streaming down John Steele's forehead. His body was wringing wet, and he gasped in mouthfuls of air that seemed to sear his lungs. He looked at the thermometer on the wall. It read one hundred and seventy degrees. He walked to the door, opened it and stepped out of the hot-air chamber.

Steele walked along the side of the crystal-clear swimming pool and pushed through a door which had a sign on it: "Pine-tar Steam Room."

The pungent vapor was so thick he could not see three inches ahead of him. Steele breathed deep of the pine-tar steam and shuffled along to where he knew the cold shower should be.

Halfway across the room he stubbed his toe on something and fell to his knees. He groped around on the concrete floor with his hands and touched something large and yielding, Then he dropped his face down closer to the floor and then saw the body!

Someone had fainted.

Steele caught hold of the unconscious man with both hands and lifted him up, with the idea of carrying him out of the steam room. As he straightened a catapulting body rammed into him! He stumbled backward, the unconscious body falling to the floor. The next thing Steele knew a hard fist lashed out at him through the steam and smashed him on the jaw!

He staggered back, growled deep in his throat, then lunged forward. The almost invisible man yelped and struck at Steele with both fists. He scarcely felt them.

A ripple of pleasure ran through Steele. So the man wanted to fight, did he?

There was nothing Steele enjoyed more than a battle. There was strength in Steele's lean body--unbelievable strength. He weighed one hundred and seventy pounds and stood five ten in his bare feet, but every ounce of his weight was sheer muscle and bone. Steele was easily the strongest man on the entire police force--of any weight.

How strong he was he did not really know.

And this man in the steam room wanted to fight! Steele leaped forward suddenly, heading the man off from the door. Feet planted wide apart, he stood on the tiles and awaited the charge. It came instantly.

With head lowered and fists swinging, the man hit him in the stomach. It scarcely moved him. The fists smashed against his jaws, his forehead and his body. Steele grunted. His hands were groping out, seeking a good hold on the man. He touched the dripping wet body, ran his hands along it and finally touched the arms. They were big, heavily corded. Steele's cablelike fingers wrapped themselves around the man's wrists. He jerked suddenly and pulled the man forward.

The move was his undoing. He had counted on the man's being a fair fighter. He wasn't! As he collided with Steele, the man kicked upward with his knee and hit Steele in the groin. Flas.h.i.+ng pain shot through Steele's body. He cried out in pain and fell to the floor.

He did not go out; but he lay on the wet tiles, gasping in great lung-fulls of pine-tar steam. He saw a flash of light and knew that his a.s.sailant had darted out through the door; but he could not move.

More than thirty seconds went by before he was able to climb to his knees. Then he brushed against the body of the man who had fainted and was reminded that he should get him out of this room.

Still gritting his teeth from pain, he scooped up the unconscious man and pushed through the swinging door. The cold air of the pool room cleared the pain from his body. He put the man down on the tiles, then waved to an attendant.

"Here," he said, "this man's fainted--" And then he stopped.

The man had not fainted. He was dead! His broken neck was twisted queerly to one side.

The attendant padded up; then he gasped: "Mr. Bishop--what's happened to him?"

"He's dead!" Steele said. "Where's the man who came charging out of the pine room a minute ago?"

The attendant shook his head, bewildered. "I didn't see anyone. I was over at the rubbing tables."

Steele swore under his breath. He grabbed a sheet from a neatly folded pile, swung it around his nude body and rushed for a door at the other side of the pool.

Steele burst into a narrow, tiled corridor that led to the locker rooms. The place was full of beds, standing in two rows with a three-foot part.i.tion between each bed.

On four or five of them lay men, some of them completely nude, some covered with a sheet.

"Where's the man that just came in here?" Steele cried.

A man on a nearby cot, lifted up his head lazily. "What man?"

Steele scowled. He had been in too many Turkish baths himself not to know that most of these men were pleasantly dozing after the refres.h.i.+ng steam baths in the other room. They wouldn't pay much attention to a man who came in.

He pushed through the locker room to the office beyond. A middle-aged man, wearing a white linen jacket, jumped up from behind a desk. "Hey!" he cried. "You can't come in here, like that!"

"The man who just came out,' cried Steele. "Who was he?"

The manager of the Turkish bath shrugged eloquently. "How do I know ?"

Steele swore under his breath. "What'd he look like? Didn't he leave any valuables here for safekeeping?"

The manager of the Turkish bath picked up a thin stack of cards. "Hm-m-m," he grunted. "He gave the name of Wagendorf. Oscar Wagendorf. He has a wallet and a watch here, that's all."

Wagendorf, the name meant nothing to Steele. He turned uncertainly to the outer door. He couldn't barge out, dressed in a bed sheet.

The bath attendant burst into the office behind Steele. "Dr. Metzger," he cried, "Mr. Bishop--he's been killed!"

The manager pushed back his swivel chair so violently it crashed to the floor.

"Killed--Mr. Bishop?"

The attendant saw Steele and backed away. "And this man brought him out of the pine room!"

Dr. Metzger recovered. He started reaching for a drawer at his right. Steele leaped to the desk, caught the man's wrist even as the fingers closed around a revolver.

"Don't be a fool. I'm a policeman--Sergeant Steele of the Howe Street Station."

Dr. Metzger blinked. "You . . . you're a policeman? And you killed Bishop ?"

"Of course not!" snapped Steele. "Why do you suppose I'm asking about the man who just left? He did it. Aw, h.e.l.l, we'll go into that later. Pick up the phone and call the station while I go back and get dressed. Tell Captain Marsden what happened."

Steele pushed back into the locker rooms, He was slipping into his street coat when the police arrived; three of them led by Captain Marsden.

"What's this, sergeant?" the captain demanded as he came in.

Steele explained. "After being on duty twenty hours I stopped in here for a Turkish bath on my way home--and ran smack into a murder." He told quickly what had happened.

As he talked, he led the group into the room where the body of Bishop still lay next to the swimming pool.

Steele took time now to examine the dead man. Bishop had been a man of about forty.

He was utterly nude except for a rubber ring around his ankle, on which was his locker key.

"What a place to kill a man!" exclaimed the captain.

"It'll ruin my business!" moaned Dr. Metzger, who had followed the police.

Steele looked up at the doctor. "Your attendant knew this man by name. Was he a regular patron?"

Dr. Meteger nodded. "Yes. He came here every Thursday at this time. Been doing it for two or three years."

"And this man who gave his name as Wagendorf--was he a transient?"