Tales of the Red Panda: The Mind Master Read online

  Tales of the Red Panda:

  The Mind Master

  by Gregg Taylor

  Copyright 2012 Gregg Taylor

  Kindle Edition

  All Rights Reserved.

  For Max

  The Boy of Adventure

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Chapter Forty

  One

  Toronto: 1934

  Night was seldom silent in the city. Even in the quietest of spaces, the clamor of a million souls packed together beyond reason found its way through the cracks and crevices to fill every moment with a hum of life and death.

  The long cold hallway in the Empire Bank seemed as quiet a place as one was likely to find. The narrow path that led to the building’s main doors stood darkened and deserted. The buzz of a single bulb rang from somewhere high above, its quiet sizzle of white noise reaching farther than its wholly inadequate light ever could. From somewhere far down the hall the steady stomp of heavy boots could be heard. Feet that fell with a strong but purposeless step let their careless echoes ring down to the levels beyond. They were the footfalls of a forgotten man. A guard left on duty long after such vigilance had ceased to mean anything. A hundred feet away, deep in the shadows, a fleeting form heard those echoes ring and knew well what they meant. He was far, far too late.

  From where he stood, the shape in the darkness could just make out the deep and growing voice of the throng gathering outside the bank. He could hear the great flashbulbs in the cameras popping. Police had the building cordoned off, and had guards on the rooftops three buildings in every direction to keep photographers at bay. Departmental spokesmen would manage the growing army of news-hawks as best they could, doing their utmost to reveal nothing, if for no other reason than that their obfuscation might convince the press that they had a single lead to work with.

  For the moment, the man in the shadows was less than concerned with the police, or the press, or what any of them thought they might know. The guard at the far end of the hall lumbered briefly into view and turned back to the foyer again, his thoughts far away. For an instant, the shadowy form resolved itself into a tall man in a long grey coat as he flitted through the narrow space of semi-light and vanished again into the deeper shadows on the far side of the great hallway.

  From doorway to doorway he moved quickly and silently until he found himself deep within the great building’s heart at the lip of a mighty steel door, now standing open and unguarded. The air was still thick with the aroma of a dozen police officers and their superiors that had been, until moments earlier, crammed in this small vault space. The cigar smoke that yet clung to the air told the form in the darkness that Police Chief O’Mally had been here himself. If one knew to listen, one could just have heard a small sigh. There would be little evidence left by that many officers, each trying to catch the Chief’s eye.

  The man moved his hand, and a deep red gauntlet touched itself briefly to the edge of a matching domino mask. For an instant the blank eyes set within the mask seemed to blaze with an unearthly light that quickly faded from view. The masked man pushed his fedora back on his head as he surveyed the room, now rendered bright as day by the remarkable night-vision lenses in his mask.

  The door of the vault was pristine. No mark upon it suggested that either force or cunning had opened the door. The masked man smiled slightly at the volumes of fingerprint powder that blazed before the unique illumination of his mask. As if any intruder capable of such a feat would be careless enough to leave fingerprints.

  He stepped within the vault room. Against each of the walls hung a half dozen small doors, each with a space for their own heavy key. These were the most secretive of the many safety deposit boxes within the main branch of the Empire Bank. They were reserved for the exclusive use of some of the bank’s most elite clientèle, and few but those who held them even knew of their existence. But someone clearly had, for each of the small doors hung open in mocking defiance of all this careful preparation.

  The masked man threw a quick look over his shoulder and swung one of the doors open a little wider. There were three small shelves within each little chamber, each lined with a soft material, as if the family treasures of dozens of fine old families needed to be encased in the same sort of comfort to which their masters were accustomed. Each of the shelves stood empty, and a quick survey of the room revealed that every chamber was in the same state. Someone had walked away with untold thousands – perhaps millions – and had done so under the very noses of some of the city’s best security, and before the sun was long down by the look of it.

  He came at last to a door that bore a number that was familiar to him. He raised an eyebrow above the edge of his mask as he slid the thick steel door open wider. The chamber was as empty as the others. And with that, the smile on the face of the Red Panda burst into a mocking grin, and laughter escaped from his lips in spite of himself. The laughter might well bring the guard, and the police behind him, but they would find no trace of this second intruder. By the time they reached the vault he would have long ago retreated into the darkness.

  It was nine o’clock. Within a half an hour the streets of Toronto would be full of barking newsies selling special editions, with banner headlines blazing about the daring robbery at the Empire Bank. The perpetrator of this crime might well believe themselves to be beyond the power of the law. But he now faced a sterner justice. One that fought tirelessly and possessed powers beyond which he could have ever known.

  He now faced the justice of the Red Panda!

  Two

  Joshua Cain was not a pleasant man to look at. His face was not actually ugly – indeed, it was well formed. But his dark eyes had a habit of looking a person up and down with a cold stare, as if he were appraising them. He would unexpectedly hold a gaze too long for comfort, as if testing the resolve of each and every person that he met beyond any reasonable need. Having done so, his eyes would then shift back and forth, impossible to pin down, impossible to read the opinion he had just formed.

  He was forty-five, with a body running slightly to seed. Immaculately dressed as always, he lounged in a black leather chair behind a mahogany desk. He looked comfortable to the point of indolence, but to even the most casual observer, even one who had come to him for aid as so many did, he gave the same emotive reaction as one of the more deadly serpents. Joshua Cain was aware of this reaction, but he did nothing to try and change it. After all,
it was true.

  Cain was known in circles of crime as a master fixer. Whatever problems a person could create for themselves, Cain could make them go away, for a price. Need a new face? Ask Cain. A rock-solid alibi? Ask Cain. Need to break up a rally by your political rivals? Need a small army of enforcers that can’t be traced to you? Want to buy a judge, a crown prosecutor or still worse? Want to eliminate the competition once and for all? Cain provided every service crime could imagine, except the actual execution of the crime itself. Every member of the underworld knew him, and no one got close to him. Everyone paid him, and everyone still owed him. He was untouchable.

  He lived in a fine house, in a respectable neighborhood. His neighbors may not have liked Cain, but they never would have guessed what he did for a living. His record was clean, partly through his own efforts, partly because even when his clients lost their battles with the law, they were too afraid to implicate Cain in any way. He had the goods on every crook in the city, big or small. To bring down Cain would invite a storm of reprisals that no one could have survived.

  For this reason, Cain was able to keep his household staff discrete. He kept a manservant, whom few would have guessed was a lethal shot; a driver, who was as skilled with a knife as any assassin; and a male secretary who formed the nexus of Cain’s connections to the underworld and had untold volumes of blood on his own hands from the days before Cain found him. The staff was small but lethal, and in the end it didn’t matter. Cain knew himself to be untouchable.

  Which was why it was currently so difficult for him to keep an inscrutable expression on his face as he sat in his black leather chair behind his great mahogany desk. His driver lay crumpled on the floor by the French doors into his study. His secretary sat in the corner and stared at the gaslight that lit the room, seemingly entranced, horrified by whatever he saw. And his manservant stood stock still, eyes straight ahead, unblinking. As if he were a tuxedoed terracotta warrior made flesh.

  “I suppose you think I ought to be impressed,” Cain said at last.

  “You ought to be,” hissed a voice from the shadows. “But I am not certain that you have the brains for it.”

  “All right,” Cain said, the serpent’s smile creeping back onto his face. “You clearly have skills. I’m sure I can find uses for you.”

  A tall form inched forward from the darkness. Cain could just see the smile playing around his guest’s face. “Is that what you think this was?” The intruder made no effort to conceal his amusement. “An audition?”

  “Yes,” Cain deadpanned. “And you’re hired.”

  “No, Mister Cain. You are.”

  Cain arched an eyebrow in spite of himself. “I have a very exclusive clientèle,” he said. “Talented you might be, but I doubt very much you can afford me. And I don’t work for people that I don’t know.”

  “Very well.” The voice from the darkness became less of a sinister whisper and resolved itself into a clear, well-spoken tone, with just a trace of an accent that defied analysis. The darkness that surrounded him seemed to fade away, to fall back into the corners of the room where the gaslight could not reach and shadows might be expected to live.

  Cain shook his head a little, as if trying to convince his eyes that they had to be mistaken. The tall, thin man who stood before him must have stepped forward into the flickering light. He gauged the distance to his visitor once again. The man had not moved. He glanced nervously at the gas lamp mounted on the wall. If it was burning brighter than it had a moment ago, Cain could not understand how, as neither he nor his catatonic secretary had touched the controls.

  “You seem nervous, Mister Cain,” the man said at last. “That is not your reputation.” The man was narrow without being gaunt, with a predatory set to his eyes and the impassive stare of a hawk. His attire was simple, nothing that might attract attention, but unusual in its cut and design. There was a look to him, perhaps it was just a manner, that seemed foreign. Elements of his countenance seemed Asiatic, but Cain found it impossible to pinpoint. Perhaps he was of mixed ancestry, but if so it was a breed that Cain had never encountered. It was one more thing that made his guest seem so unnerving. Joshua Cain had made his way in the world by being able to break a man down with a glance. To tell just who he was, where he had come from and what he was capable of doing. And now an enigma stood before him, proud and inscrutable.

  “Allow me to introduce myself,” he said. “My name is Ajay Shah.”

  Cain’s brows furrowed still deeper. “What kind of name is that?”

  Shah frowned. “It is mine own,” he said gravely. “And you would do well to hold it in the greatest possible respect.”

  “Or what?” Cain snapped, tiring of this posturing.

  Shah said nothing, but merely extended his right hand to the side, to the limit of his reach, where his fingertips brushed lightly against the frozen form of Cain’s own manservant. The contact was slight, but it was enough. The man began to fall forward, making no motion or attempt to save himself from damage. He landed on the hardwood floor with an unhealthy sounding smack.

  Cain leaned forward in his black leather chair slightly. He could see a small pool of crimson forming around his manservant’s head, as though his nose had been badly broken in the fall. The man had not moved – his arms stayed frozen at his sides, like a wooden Indian in a cigar store.

  Cain leaned back and locked on to Ajay Shah with his serpent’s gaze. “It’s an interesting point,” he conceded. “Will you have a drink with me, Mister Shah?”

  “Perhaps,” a smile played about his guest’s thin, mustached lips, “when I have given you reason not to poison me.”

  “I am pleased to hear that such a reason is forthcoming.” Cain opened a box of cigars on his desk and pulled one out under Shah’s watchful gaze. He lit the cigar and puffed on it irritably as he gestured for his guest to begin.

  “You are, Mister Cain, a man who arranges things.”

  “Is that a question?”

  “It is not. You have many connections within the criminal underworld, and you will please not insult my intelligence or waste my time by bothering to deny it.”

  “I’ll just sit here quietly then, shall I?” Cain sneered.

  “That might be best,” Shah smiled graciously. “I am, what is the expression, not from around here, as you say.”

  “That’s one thing we say, yes.” Cain was feeling decidedly like the second banana in this routine, and it was a role with which he had little experience.

  “I mean for a time to make this city my base of operations. I have certain business to conduct, and find myself in need of… well, everything, frankly.”

  “Everything?”

  “Indeed. I have little patience for the games one plays when blending in with one’s surroundings. I need an identity that I might use during my stay. One which leaves me free to travel in certain rarefied circles, for that is part and parcel of my mission. I have also need of a suitable residence and clothes which might befit the man you will create for me.”

  Cain blinked in amazement. “Anything else?” he stammered.

  “I will need an able and adventurous crew which I feel certain you will be able to provide through your underworld connections,” Ajay Shah continued. “They must be well connected and versed in the operations of illegal activities within your city, and yet unaffiliated with any possibly competing interests. Including,” he smiled, “your own good self.”

  “That’s quite a bill of goods, Mister Shah,” Cain snapped. “Even if I could provide such a list of amenities, they would surely cost a pretty penny.”

  Shah smiled and turned to lift a large satchel which Cain had not noticed before. He strode forward confidently, opened the satchel and dumped its contents unceremoniously on the mahogany desktop as Cain looked on in wonder.

  Thousands of dollars in bills, rare coins of a dozen countries, jewels and gemstones all rushed forth, until a torrent of rich treasures and heirlooms from the finest of families al
l lay strewn before Joshua Cain.

  “Is that quite pretty enough?” smiled Ajay Shah.

  “Where did you–,” Cain began.

  “From the safety deposit vaults of your Empire Bank,” his guest said, the smile frozen on his lips.

  Cain was awestruck. “I heard about no such robbery.”

  “It was rather less than two hours ago,” Shah said, inclining his head slightly as if taking the bow he was due. “And I assure you, Mister Cain, it is only the beginning.”

  Joshua Cain blinked in wonder at the riches before him.

  “Mister Shah,” he beamed, “I think we can do business.”

  Three

  Kit Baxter bounced along the sidewalk like a truant schoolgirl. It was starting to get late and the shops were beginning to close, but the streets yet teemed with life. The night was still cool, but the air was full of springtime and the promise of the days to come. Every stoop, porch and open window buzzed with conversation. The folks in the old neighborhood had spent a long winter indoors and they were clearly making up for lost time with their favorite game: gossip.

  Kit had grown up in this neighborhood – spent her entire life here – and she knew every family, every building. From some stoops voices called to her, hands waved as she passed. From others there were no such greetings. But Kit Baxter knew that every gathering had a new subject to discuss after she was gone: her. How she was never around much any more. How her job as a chauffeur to the city’s most notorious playboy kept her out until all hours. How she would never be able to settle down at this rate.

  Some would come to her defense, of course. They would point out that at least she was working, and that these days people had to take what they could get and be glad of it. It was, to be sure, a better occupation for a pretty young thing than her old job driving a cab. Kit made a decent living and she took care of her mother like a good girl.

  No one would deny any of that, of course. There were those who thought that Kit spent too much time with that ne’er-do-well boss of hers to be any good. Still others thought she might carry a torch for the rich bird. But they wouldn’t dare voice those thoughts too loud. Even among gossips, there was such a thing as carrying matters too far. Besides, the fact that Kit kept her old apartment rather than moving into the servant’s quarters at his nibs’ mansion seemed to prove there was nothing unusual between them.