The Masked Woman by Johnston McCulley

Book Details

The Masked Woman (1920) – Professor James Xenophon Salwick, holding the chair of physics in the university, and an authority on anthropology decides that he wishes to leave the groves of academia and has determined to become a professional criminal.

By happenstance, he jumps into the middle of a gang fight and is rescued by the (soon to be) infamous masked woman, Madam Madcap, “one of those clever Continental women of whom I have read.”

The Masked Woman
Chapter I A Sort Of Rubicon
Chapter II The Blind Alley
Chapter III Recruits For A Cause
Chapter IV A New Sensation
Chapter V A Queer Statement
Chapter VI A Mysterious Disappearance
Chapter VII Riley Succumbs
Chapter VIII Waldron Makes A Mistake
Chapter IX Things Peculiar
Chapter X Brone Awakes
Chapter XI A Visit To Slade
Chapter XII A Promise Of Treachery
Chapter XIII Waldron Takes The Trail
Chapter XIV The Professor Lies
Chapter XV Robbery And Violence
Chapter XVI Public Disgrace
Chapter XVII Almost A Gang War
Chapter XVIII Tangled Threads
Chapter XIX Caught Unmasked
Chapter XX A Puzzle
Chapter XXI Tangled Threads
Chapter XXII Brone Learns The Truth
Chapter XXIII Love Stuff
Chapter XXIV The Professor Is Caught
Chapter XXV A Missing Prisoner
Chapter XXVI An Unexpected Rescue
Chapter XXVII The Betrayal
Chapter XXVIII A Test Of Faith
Chapter XXIX The Getaway
Chapter XXX Brone Is Found
Chapter XXXI The Empty Nest
Chapter XXXII “No Matter!”

Johnston McCulley (1883-1958) was born in Ottawa, Illinois, and raised in Chillicothe, Illinois. He died in 1958 in Los Angeles, California, aged 75.

McCulley was the author of hundreds of stories, fifty novels, numerous screenplays for film and television, and was the creator of the character Zorro.

The Masked Woman originally appeared as a six part serial story in the September 16, thru October 21, 1919 issues of Detective Story Magazine as written by Harrington Strong, one of McCulley’s pseudonyms. It was then reprinted in hardcover in 1920 as The Masked Woman by W.J. Watt & Co. In 1921 it was edited down and syndicated as a newspaper serial in numerous papers. This shorter version was the basis of later reprints of the novel. This edition is from the full length 1920 W.J. Watt & Co. edition. The frontispiece is by Paul Stahr.

The Masked Woman has 1 illustration.

Files:

1. TheMaskedWoman.epub

Excerpt: The Masked Woman

Chapter I

A Sort Of Rubicon

THERE it was again—that faint scraping sound so foreign to the neighborhood; a sound pregnant with possibilities, including mystery unfathomable, violence, tragedy, experience, the lure of the unknown. Professor James Xenophon Salwick sat up straight in his chair and allowed his imagination to soar. Troubled with insomnia continually, Professor Salwick knew all the nocturnal sounds of the locality, and this he recognized as utterly new. Sounds interested The Professor, for he dealt in physics and made a specialty of acoustics. True, he specialized in anthropology, too, if it be permitted a man to have two specialties, but acoustics in particular brought in bread and butter and a bit of jam now and then.

“It is probable,” The Professor mused, “that a board has become dislodged at the corner of the building, thus allowing the night wind to strike the edge of one of the windows at an entirely new angle. I must make some experiments regarding the angle of wind pressure as regards tone.”

He sighed and dismissed the subject for the time being, picked up his book again, and settled himself deeper in his chair. Professor James Xenophon Salwick was dressed in flannel pajamas. It was two o’clock in the morning. He sat in the tiny den of his bedchamber, beneath a single reading light. He had retired at the hour of ten, had been unable to sleep, and had got up again to read.

The book he was reading was a work on hydraulics, and The Professor could not get interested in it. In truth, he regarded it as rather a dull work—which it was to say the least. Once more he put it down on the table, removed his spectacles and rubbed at them furiously with his handkerchief, and wished that he was not a college professor—that he could sleep like a butcher, for instance. And then he heard the peculiar sound again.

Professor Salwick rubbed at the thin hair on the top of his head, made a futile attempt to straighten his stooped shoulders, and squinted at his spectacles to make sure they were polished properly.

“On second thought,” he told himself, “it is not the wind blowing against the window. It is the result of violence being applied to the casement.”

He did not turn out the light. He put on his spectacles, made sure that they rested lightly on the sore spot on his nose, and then arose and stretched out his arms. He was not a large man—perhaps five feet six inches tall—and his general appearance indicated brains rather than brawn. But, early in his college days, Professor James Xenophon Salwick had been assured by an elderly lecturer, who looked as if he had both feet in the grave up to his knees, that a brain worker could achieve great heights only by keeping his body in suitable condition—and Professor Salwick had done just that. One corner of his bedchamber was a miniature gymnasium.

So he stretched his arms and flexed his muscles, and then adjusted his spectacles again and stepped to the door, pulled back one of the curtains and made his way into the bedroom, and there he stopped to listen.

“It is evident,” he told himself, “that some misguided individual has invaded my poor apartment.”

A moment longer he hesitated, and then he reached out and turned the knob of the door that opened into his living-room. The door itself was opened an inch at a time, and cautiously, until there was space enough for The Professor to slip through. This he did, silently, his senses alert. He continued along the wall until he reached the light switch. And he snapped on the lights.

‘Brute’ Wilger whirled from the desk he had been investigating with the aid of an electric torch. He snarled like a rat at bay. He wore no mask, and The Professor got an instant look at his face. It was a brutal face; the eyes were small and black and glittering, and set too close together, the ears extended from the head, and the head itself was shaped something like a bullet. Black hair adorned it, but the hair was closely cropped.

Professor Salwick rubbed his chin thoughtfully with one hand, and bent forward to regard the intruder carefully.

“Um! An interesting specimen!” he declared, aloud. “I always have maintained that violence is an attribute of a certain type of the human, as craftiness is of another. The characteristics are really as inseparable as—”

“Well?” ‘Brute’ Wilger snarled.

The Professor cleared his throat.

“Why did you not ring the bell?” he asked.

“Is that stuff supposed to be comedy?”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Aw, can the chatter!”

“Um!” The Professor grunted. “Your idiomatic language no doubt is interesting in a great degree, but let us confine ourselves to pure English, thereby maintaining a quicker conversation.”

“Say—”

“I take it that you are a—er—criminal?”

Excerpt From: Johnston McCulley. “The Masked Woman.”