COPYRIGHT
Revenge of the Masked Ghost
By Kevin Paul Shaw Broden
"Revenge of the Masked Ghost" originally appeared serialized in blog form.
Copyright 2011 Kevin Paul Shaw Broden, revised and expanded
Copyright 2012 Kevin Paul Shaw Broden
"Bargain Basement Murder" Copyright 2012 Kevin Paul Shaw Broden
Smashwords Edition – First published February 2012
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Amazon.com or a vendor partner and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of the author.
Cover art and all interior illustrations by Kevin Paul Shaw Broden
All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
CHAPTER ONE – "A GHOST OUT OF THE STORM
CHAPTER TWO – "BLOOD OF A GHOST"
CHAPTER THREE – "FAMILY FOR A GHOST"
CHAPTER FOUR – "THE POLICE FOR A GHOST"
CHAPTER FIVE – "PHONE CALL FOR A GHOST"
CHAPTER SIX – "HOME FOR A GHOST"
CHAPTER SEVEN – "CLUES TO A GHOST"
CHAPTER EIGHT – "BIRTH OF A GHOST"
CHAPTER NINE – "A GHOST, THE DAY AFTER"
CHAPTER TEN – "A BODY FOR A GHOST"
CHAPTER ELEVEN – "A MAN FOR A GHOST"
CHAPTER TWELVE – "A GHOST ON THE STREET"
CHAPTER THIRTEEN – "A GHOST TAKES FLIGHT"
CHAPTER FOURTEEN – "A GHOST ESCAPES"
CHAPTER FIFTEEN – "A GHOST REJECTED"
CHAPTER SIXTEEN – "PACKAGE FOR A GHOST"
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN – "AWAY FOR A GHOST"
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN – "HAUNTING OF A GHOST"
CHAPTER NINETEEN – "FIGHT FOR A GHOST"
CHAPTER TWENTY – "HELP FOR A GHOST"
CHAPTER TWENTY ONE – "A GHOST FOR A GHOST"
CHAPTER TWENTY TWO – "TO RESCUE A GHOST"
CHAPTER TWENTY THREE – "A GHOST GOES TO WAR"
CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR – "FUNERAL FOR A GHOST"
CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE – "THE END FOR A GHOST"
SPECIAL – "BARGAIN BASEMENT MURDER" – A SCARLET SPIRIT TALE
ALSO BY KEVIN PAUL SHAW BRODEN
~ ~ ~
DEDICATION
To my parents
Paul Broden and Irene Shaw Broden
For putting up with so many years of me hanging around his masked heroes; I know they've been very proud of what I've been writing and working towards.
~ ~ ~
INTRODUCTION
The haunting began one bright September afternoon. I pulled myself away from the computer, and went out back to relax on the patio swing. I brought along a couple of comic books to read, as well as my ever-present note pad and pencil.
It was warm in the sun, but in the shade the breeze was nice and cool. As I casually swung back and forth, back and forth, sleep could have easily claimed me.
The ghost arrived and sat on the swing alongside me and whispered a question in my ear: "How does a family react to discovering that one of them is a costumed super hero?"
The comics I read are full of super heroes and people wearing masks, so the subject of the ethereal question isn't surprising. Am always looking for stories to tell about such characters. Whether it is about FLYING GLORY AND THE HOUNDS OF GLORY, a teenage super hero and her team that Shannon Muir and I have been writing and drawing for over ten years, or about a dozen other projects I have in development.
The ghost made certain that I wouldn't forget the question, pulling it back to the forefront of my mind every time I started to think of something else. So I pulled out my note pad to jot down the question.
I didn't know anything more, or what the ghost wanted me to do. With paper now in hand I kept on writing, as if the ghost was guiding the pencil's movements. More questions lined up next to the first.
"What if the family discovered the truth of their loved one after the hero has been killed in battle?"
That's an important question, because many heroes, both major and minor, are killed in comics, but we rarely see anyone mourn from them.
The questions kept coming.
"What if the hero came in through the window, startling his family, only to die at their feet?"
"How does the family react? What do they do? Do they call the police?"
And so on, I kept writing the questions as fast as the ghost would whisper them to me.
With in twenty minutes I had a rough start to what would become the serialized novel you now hold in your hand.
###
As great and powerful as the modern super heroes are, there is something about those original mystery men of the 1930s and '40s, the Golden Age of Comics, that really speaks to my heart and imagination. Back before the term 'super hero' became the norm. Back when a Mystery Man truly is a man of mystery.
There was a point to why they wore masks, not to draw attention to themselves, but so they wouldn't be known.
My comic book reading began with Roy Thomas' ALL-STAR SQUADRON, and so I was inundated with all the great 'four color for a dime' heroes. Though I read more modern books, like Marv Wolfman's THE NEW TEEN TITANS, I felt more at home in the past with those original domino masks wearers.
I still do.
Even before the comics came along, I enjoyed listening to 'old time radio' late at night on a local station. Characters from out of the past, The Lone Ranger, Green Hornet, and the Shadow, came to life in ways that television could never make them.
The webcomic FYING GLORY AND THE HOUNDS OF GLORY originally grew out of characters I first created in honor and respect to those of the 'Golden Age.'
Now with all those notes the ghost had made me write on the patio swing, I was returning once more to that 'Golden Age,' all the way back to the beginning of it, if not before.
Before Superman and his brethren in tights came along, there were already mystery men. These pulp heroes were extremely interesting to me, now more than ever, because most of them didn't have super powers, or if they did it was one that was used sparingly for the purpose of the story.
###
So with the ghost still sitting at my shoulder, I wrote a rough outline of his story. The story I titled:
REVENGE OF THE MASKED GHOST
When I began this story I knew it would not be easy to expect a publisher to pick up a book of a hero no one knows, by a writer know by even less. I was already attempting to sell my first novel when all this began, and that wasn't going well. So I made a decision to release the ghost in a different way.
I decided to release it as a serial online, writing a new chapter every other week until it was finished. Surprisingly, I began to get a regular following and notice of what I was doing. I got some positive responses from time to time.
When twenty-five chapters were completed I was ready to put it aside and work on something else. The ghost had other plans for me. He introduced me into the world of New Pulp where old and new heroes thrive for a completely new audience.
So I went through my serial, proofreading, and filling in more details to the story to improve and enhance its accuracy and pulp flavor.
For my loyal readers who stuck with me and the Masked Ghost, I have written an all new story at the end of the book, as well as provided illustrations spread throughout.
The ghost with his scarlet mask fitting properly now is whispering in your ear:
"Read my story, and seek The Revenge of the Masked Ghost."
CHAPTER ONE – "A GHOST OUT OF THE STORM"
Margaret Randolph had to reconsider which dress to wear out to dinner this evening. A fierce storm rolled in off the Atlantic, consuming the Manhattan skyline, and a torrent of rain had been falling for the last hour. Thunder repeatedly shook the high-rise apartment building.
Laying aside the light pink silk evening gown, Margaret chose a heavy wool dark brown skirt and blouse. She rolled her blonde hair up into a bun, pinned it beneath her hat, and then pulled on a pair of short gloves. She would grab her full-length fur coat from the hall closet when they were ready to leave.
Finishing, she reached for a golden necklace as an accent. Even in the rain, there was no reason why a girl should not look her best.
"Where is that good for nothing brother of yours?" her husband Donald said as he came around the bed, fighting with his tie.
"Oh, don’t be so hard on him. Here, let me do that for you," she said taking hold of his tie and wrapping it around itself until it fit snuggly and straight.
"Sometimes I think you’re trying to choke me to death with that thing."
"If that was my intent, I would have done it long ago," she joked and tugged a little tighter. "Adrian probably got caught in the storm. He’ll be here soon enough."
"Perhaps," Donald said as they entered the main living space of the penthouse apartment. The storm really was bad, he could see the rain striking the balcony windows in sheets, and the wind rattled the glass of the French doors, "but that brother of yours always has his head in the clouds, flying off on one crazy whim to the next."
"That brother of mine helped convince mummy and daddy that I should be allowed to marry someone like you."
That was true, and Donald knew it. To her parents he was from the wrong side of the tracks and had too many calluses on his hands to become part of their high-class family. However, Adrian had seen how much they were in love and stood up for them. It did require that Donald had to quit his construction job and come work for their father’s company. He felt guilty walking past building sites in these expensive suits instead of up there in a hard hat and boots with the rest of his fellow workers.
"Adrian’s a writer, dear you know how imaginative and flighty they can be. I am certain his mind is must be full of wondrous thoughts he has to put down on paper. The magazines are sending him all over the world to interview this celebrity or that politician. He has even met with scientists; the last article he wrote was about some new energy source. Atom something or other, I didn’t understand a word of it, but I really enjoy reading Adrian’s words. He sent me his latest novel a week ago."
"Another novel now? Does that boy ever give himself a moment of rest?"
"Well, I think he threw himself into writing this one after the terrible car accident that killed his fiancée Sheila."
"Oh, right. That was over a year ago, wasn’t it?"
"He took it really hard. Blamed himself for a while, but seems to have pulled out okay. Which is why I was looking forward to having this dinner with him."
"You’re right of course, dear," Donald glanced at the grandfather clock, "but with this rain we will certainly miss our reservations. And you know how Alfonse hates late arrivals."
He didn’t need to tell Margaret about how rude the maître d’ got when they annoyed him. Being late to him was an unforgivable sin.
Donald dropped into a wing back chair and snatched up the newspaper from the side table. In an exaggerated flurry, he opened the paper to no page in particular.
Margaret walked over and looked out through the windows at the storm. Honestly, she really was worried about her brother. The streets of Manhattan were not the safest on any night, but with a storm like this, it became down right dangerous. She prayed he found a taxi, but knew her brother well enough he might attempt to walk the entire way. The boy would catch his death.
Margaret sat on the couch across from her husband and was about to say something, to further defend Adrian, when she noticed the headline on the front page of the paper. Along with stories about how President Roosevelt was handling the economy, and troubles quietly brewing in Europe, the banner headline read:
POLICE MANHUNT CONTINUES FOR MASKED VIGILANTE
"Why haven’t they captured that horrible man? I don’t feel safe at night with someone like that out there."
Donald folded back the paper and glanced at the headline that was bothering his wife.
"That so called ‘Masked Ghost’? The police will get him eventually. He cannot really disappear into shadows like they say. That’s all hype to sell newspapers."
"I know that," Margaret replied, "but what if he broke in here some night? When we’re asleep?"
"I doubt he’d bother with us. We’re not important enough," he tried to reassure her.
"He broke into Mrs. O’Brien’s building."
"The newspaper said he was in the apartment of a city councilman five floors above the O’Brien’s. A week later that councilman was arrested for taking bribes."
"Did this ‘Masked Ghost’ plant false evidence?"
"Doesn’t look like it. The councilman pled guilty and gave the names of three businessman who had paid him the bribes to get city contracts."
Donald went on, "This ‘Masked Ghost’ appears to only go after mobsters and corrupt political officials and we’re neither. At least I’m not, are you a mobster?"
"Oh, you!" She tossed a pillow at him. They both laughed.
Suddenly a flash of lighting and a clap of thunder made them jump. The balcony’s French doors blew open and a torrent of rain poured in onto the ornate marble flooring. Turning at the crashing sound, they were horrified to see someone standing in the rain, a menacing apparition created by the storm. The figure took a step forward into the light and they knew at once the very vigilante they had been talking about, and Donald had reassured his wife wasn't a threat, now stood in their midst.
Donald pulled Margaret into his arms, he did not know how but he would protect her with his last breath.
A mask covered half the man’s face, and a wide brimmed hat shaded it even further. His double-breasted suit was dark; yet, a darker stain soaked the front of it. A large black overcoat billowed in the wind around him.
‘So… sor…" the stranger spoke, but it sounded more like a gurgle as if his mouth was filled with liquid. The intruder stepped forward and collapsed, landing face down with a wet thud at their feet.
Margaret could not stop herself from screaming.
~ ~ ~
CHAPTER TWO – "BLOOD OF A GHOST"
After screaming for nearly thirty seconds, Margaret Randolph realized how foolish she sounded and stopped. However, she was still terrified and pulled herself into her husband’s arms all the more.
Only moments ago they had been getting ready to have dinner with her brother and then the storm that was swallowing Manhattan blew open the balcony doors of the Randolph’s penthouse. With the pouring rain, in stepped the mysterious vigilante the newspapers were calling ‘The Masked Ghost’ and then collapsed to their floor.
"You said he’d never break into our home!" she cried, pounding his chest.
"I didn’t think…"
"Obviously," she pulled away from him and headed for the front hallway, "I’m calling the police." She kept marching, knowing that if she stopped the scream would return. Margaret had always been a strong-headed girl, her parents didn’t always know what to do with her, but now had to keep herself focused or she would be lost to her fears.
Donald was proud of his wife as he watched her walk off. He knew she was scared, so was he, but she fought it. They would get through this together, whatever this was. He realized that if everything had gone as originally planned, they would have been off to dinner with Margaret’s brother Adrian and this masked man would have broken into their home to do who knows what.
So why had he collapsed once inside?
Internally Donald was yelling at himself to get away from the invader, but he carefully knelt next to the figure. As he touched the stranger he realized that the dark stains on the man’s coat were not from the rain. His hand came away covered in blood.
Donald stared at the blood for a moment and back down at the motionless form. He had no medical training, but tried to feel for a pulse and found none. Turning the body over, more blood was visible as it pooled on the floor beneath.
The stranger’s hat had fallen away when he hit the floor. The scarlet covered mask that hid half his face matched the color that was seeping out onto the marble floor. The ginger colored locks of hair looked far too familiar.
Donald reached down and removed the mask.
"Police?" Margaret spoke into the phone trying her best not to sound panicked. "I want to report a break in."
"Calm down ma’am, tell me what you wish to report." Came the response from the other end. Margaret hoped it really was a police officer and not just the phone operator.
"Don’t tell me to calm down! You’ve got to hurry and get over here now."
"What seems to be the problem ma’am?"
"Don’t ma’am me, I’m only twenty two. Send as many of your men as you can. That terrible man is in my home!"
"Alright ma-- Who’s in your home?"
"You know who I mean! That ‘Masked Ghost’ fellow the newspapers are always talking about. He’s in my living room as we speak."
There was a pause before the voice came again.
"Have you had anything to drink?"
"I am not drunk! Why are you wasting time? Is this how the New York police treat everyone who needs your help? Please, get over here at once! My husband is watching over him, but I don’t know what this ‘Masked Ghost’ is capable of."
There was another pause, and over the phone she could hear people shouting back and forth in the distance; orders were being given.
"You said your husband is watching him. Does he have gun?"
"My husband doesn’t have a gun, why would he? Oh, no I hadn’t seen any weapons, but don’t take any chances."
"What’s the stranger doing?"
"He’s just laying there on the floor."
"What? He’s on the floor? Did your husband hit him?"
"No, of course not."
"I’d suggest you and your husband leave the premises and don’t go near the man."
"Yes, yes, we won’t go near him. Now please hurry and take this terrible man away."
Exasperated, Margaret hung up the phone. She must have sounded like an utter fool the way she was going on. Getting upset with the police officer on the phone had kept her mind occupied, but now she had to face her fears and that awful thing in the other room.
Coming down the hall she realized that everything was just too quiet, even the rain from the open doors had slowed.
"Donald, are you alright?" She spoke without shouting.
"Yes," came he flat reply.
"Is… Is he still there?"
"Yes, he’s still here, and it doesn’t look like he’ll be going anywhere," Donald said to her as she entered the room.
"The police are on their way, but I don’t think they believed me," she said. Her anger was cooling, but that meant her fears were rising once more.
"I don’t know if calling the police was really a good idea after all," he said and held up the mask and looked at her in shock.
While working on a construction site, Donald had once witnessed a coworker fall to his death from a girder three hundred feet in the air. He had been too far away to help, and it was unfortunately an expectation while working on skyscrapers. It was terrible, but he didn’t even know the man’s name. The shock and horror eventually wore off. Death was inevitable, but this… this was a shock of an entirely different kind.
"What?" Margaret slowly approached, she didn’t want to be anywhere near this invader of her home. She looked over her husband’s shoulder at the man’s bloody face, and gasped.
It can’t be real, her mind screamed, the man lying dead upon her floor was her very own brother, Adrian.
~ ~ ~
CHAPTER THREE – "FAMILY FOR A GHOST"
"No, It can’t be," Margaret shook her head violently.
A masked man had broken into to her home only to die on the floor before her. Margaret struggled to be strong and call the police, and maybe she would have remained strong if her husband hadn’t removed the dead man’s mask.
"It can’t be," she repeated, now a whisper, as she looked down on the face of Adrian, her own brother.
"But it is," her husband said somberly and stood up from the side of the body. Donald took hold of his wife and pulled her to the far side of the room. They held onto each other afraid that if one let go the other would fall.
After several minutes passed by in silence Margaret finally spoke.
"What… what happened to him?" Her face remained buried against her husband’s chest.
"I don’t know, but it looks like he was shot at least twice."
She slowly lifted her head, and they looked across the room at the lifeless body.
"Who would have done such a thing to Adrian?"
"Maybe he upset someone with one of his magazine articles," Donald said just to say anything. What he was thinking bothered him far more.
Adrian was supposed to have dinner with them, but he was running late. Something the ‘Masked Ghost’ had been involved in may have delayed him. It must have been something unexpected and struck him on the way here. From the way he was bleeding out, it couldn’t have happened too far away or he would never have made it to their building, let alone somehow climb the outer wall to reach the balcony. It must have taken all his strength and last breath to get to them. That meant Adrian’s killer might still be close by. Donald couldn’t tell his wife that.
Margaret pulled away from her husband and ran back to her brother’s lifeless form. Dropping to the floor she wanted to wrap her arms around him. She reached out to grab Adrian’s arm when she brushed the edge of his over coat. It slipped to the side and fell to the floor with a heavy THUD.
"What was that?"
"I… I don’t know," she answered and pulled her hand away.
Donald came around the other side of his wife and lifted the edge the coat. Something in the pocket gave it extra weight. He reached inside and withdrew what he already knew would be there.
"What’s Adrian doing with a gun?" Margaret gasped looking at the ugly weapon.
Her husband just looked at her, the answer was terribly obvious. He opened the coat further and found another gun strapped in a holster on the other side of the body.
"But why," Margaret asked as she picked up the dark red mask. "Why would Adrian put on this horrible get up? What would make him do such terrible things?"
"I don’t know," he answered. "Your brother was always a little odd."
"Don’t say that about him!" she shouted in tears at her husband.
"Sorry, you’re right. That was rude, but Adrian always did have his head in the clouds. As you said, as a writer, he’s always been imaginative. Whenever we talked he always seemed not to be paying any attention to me."
Margaret wanted to defend her brother’s honor, but didn’t know how to defend someone who did what he clearly had been doing. She didn’t know him as well as she thought.
"He thought you were boring," she said matter-of-factly.
"What?"
"After we first met, Adrian thought you were a very boring man. Then after he got to know you he became completely supportive of my love for you."
Donald dropped his head, feeling guilty.
"A few months ago he came to me and asked if you’d be interested in having him do a article about you."
"A story about me, why? I’m nobody."
"He said he wanted to interview you about what it was like working on the top floors of the construction of the Empire State Building. What it was like walking on those thin iron beams thousands of feet in the air."
"Why didn’t you tell me?"
"I don’t know. Maybe I thought you’d say no. You always seem like you want to put that part of your life behind you, and keep it separate from our marriage and working for my father."
"That was never my intention. Adrian could have come to me anytime he wanted."
"I'm sorry," she said. "Maybe you were right. Adrian was always full of wild ideas and wilder stories. It’s just that I thought he was finally grounding himself when he met that nice girl Sheila – Oh!"
"Oh, what?"
"Could it be…? Adrian took it extremely hard when Sheila died last year. You don’t suppose that—"
Margaret’s thoughts were harshly interrupted when a heavy knocking came to the door of their penthouse apartment.
"Open up! This is the police. Let us in, now!"
~ ~ ~
CHAPTER FOUR – "THE POLICE FOR A GHOST"
"What do we do?"
"I don’t know," Donald Randolph answered his wife as he put the mask back on the face of his dead brother-in-law, and put the guns back where he found them. "But we better answer the door before the police break it down."
"Open up in there!"
Margaret was terrified, but her husband pushed her forward, and she opened the door.
A large round man, wearing a suit two sizes too small, held up his Detective’s badge. Six uniformed police officers stood in the hall behind them, each with their guns drawn.
"Detective Dobbs. You called?" He had a gruff voice.
"I… I did." Margaret answered now more scared of them then of the intruder.
"Well," the detective measured up the couple, wondering if they were worth interrupting his evening, "Where is this ‘Masked Ghost’? You better not be messing with me, because we’ve had enough calls from people claiming they had captured him ever since the papers announced that there was a reward."
"Reward?" Margaret glanced at her husband. Donald knew what she was thinking. Had someone shot Adrian in an attempt to capture the mysterious ‘Masked Ghost’ in hopes of claiming the reward?
"He came in from the balcony," Donald said trying to stay calm, "Don’t know how he got up here. He then collapsed on the living room floor."
Margaret grabbed his arm in fear as the police pushed passed them and into the other room.
"And this would be the room," the detective asked.
"Yes."
"Then where is he?"
"What?" The couple said in unison and pushed through the line of police officers and couldn’t believe their eyes.
The room was empty. The French doors still swung open as the wind blew in the rain.
"You said he was dead." Dobbs grumbled.
"I couldn’t find a pulse," Donald replied.
A look of joy and hope passed across Margaret’s face, but she had to suppress it in front of the police.
"We’ve got blood here," one of the uniformed officers examined the floor where Adrian had fallen only moments earlier, "lots of it. Trail leads in from the balcony and pools here."
"Looks like you weren’t lying after all," Dobbs said to the Randolphs through gritting teeth.
"Why would we lie?" Margaret said and realized too late there was a tone of guilt in her words.
"Good question," the detective answered.
An officer came in from the balcony, holding a long rope connected to a strange metal grappling hook. The rope was wet from the rain and blood. "Looks like this is how he got up here."
"Yes, but did he also leave that way?" Dobbs considered aloud. "Spread out, he’s probably still here." The order given and the officers moved through the penthouse apartment.
"He’s alive!" Margaret whispered to her husband, she tried not to hope. Donald looked grim, and didn’t reply.
"More blood over here," came another officer, "trail of it leading in here."
They all headed in that direction. Margaret and Donald could not stop themselves from following, but the detective put a hand up to halt them before they entering their own bedroom.
Margaret watched in horror as he raised his gun and followed the other officers. She was trying not to cry. Her brother was alive, and there were seven guns in there ready to kill him again.
"The window," she heard an officer say.
Donald and Margaret leaned to the side trying to look into the room as the detective approached the window on the opposite wall. They couldn’t see much except that the window was open and something large and dark was hung from it.