Review: "The Banshee Murders" (The Shadow)
John Olsen
of The Shadow Magazine. A seance, a vanishing blonde, and a nymph-like
creature involves The Shadow with a desperate band of adventurers, two
kidnappings, and hidden treasure.
If you're going to read this Shadow story, it's best to read it all in
one sitting. And it won't be all that hard to do, since this is a fairly
short adventure that comes in at under 34,000 words. If you stretch it
out over several sessions, you'll probably start to lose track of what's
going on, making the story a bit confusing. If you read it all at once,
it is still a bit confusing, but hopefully you'll be able to keep track
of most of the threads of the involved plot.
The year 1946 was not a good one for The Shadow Magazine. About halfway
though the year, the magazine started publishing Shadow stories written
by Bruce Elliott. Those stories were decidedly the low point of the
nineteen year run of the magazine. But for the first seven months, the
stories were written by the creator of the character, Walter Gibson. But
even that wasn't enough to give them much energy. Many of the stories
were lackluster, to be kind. This particular story, "The Banshee
Murders" and perhaps "Malmordo" were the top stories of the year.
Unfortunately, that's faint praise.
This story has a lot going for it, but it just never seems to come
together in a very coherent fashion. The story opens with a seance, and
that would seem to be a auspicious sign. Then there's the mysterious
appearance of a banshee in Central Park, and that's pretty cool, too.
But wait! There's more; lots more. This is also a tale of sunken pirate
treasure. A strange thuggee cult of leopard-skin wearers. Oh yeah, and
let's not forget a gigantic vampire bat. Now with all those things
stuffed into the story, you'd think it would have turned out a lot more
exciting that it is.
This story has the feeling of a longer story that was severely cut,
which may indeed be the case. Walter Gibson was used to writing longer
Shadow stories. For years, his featured stories in the magazines were
about 45,000 words in length. But by 1946 the magazine had been reduced
in size to the smaller "digest" dimensions. And the typical word count
of the main story was between 30,000 and 35,000 words.
It wouldn't surprise me if Gibson wrote the stories with more words, and
the editors at Street & Smith did some cutting so the story could fit in
the new smaller size. I swear there were a couple missing scenes which
were only made reference to at the story's end to help tie up the loose
ends. And mysterious happenings which should have been explained away at
the end, remain unexplained. It's things like these which make reading
this story a bit confusing, and that's why I recommend reading the
entire story straight through. It tends to help keep things clearer that
way.
The story opens in a pitch-black seance room where Madame Mathilda is
holding audience for her paying customers. She claims to see a banshee.
But not the typical hideous old hag with an unearthly wail. No, this one
is very spritely and beautiful. And apparently the banshee likes lilacs,
for she breaks a sprig from a lilac tree.
When Madame Mathilda comes out of her trance, there on the table before
her is a sprig of lilac and a sharp dagger. Two spirit manifestations
proving her vision. And in the audience, watching it all are Lamont
Cranston, Margo Lane, Police Commissioner Weston and Inspector Joe
Cardona. Cardona takes possession of the two items that appeared in the
seance room. Evidence, you know.
They are interrupted by a call to Central Park where Officer Riley, one
of Manhattan's most trusted officers, has witnessed the appearance of a
strange, beautiful young woman on top of a large rock above a pool of
water in the park. At the same time the seance took place in Madame
Mathilda's parlor, he was watching the ghostly figure reach up and pull
a portion of a lilac branch from the bush. She broke a small twig from
it, then disappeared into the night. When Cardona and Weston show up in
the park, Cardona examines the lilac branch along with the twig that
appeared in the seance room. The jagged mark where the twig had been
broken, matches the twig from Madame Mathilda's exactly. That twig
somehow dematerialized from the park and rematerialized only moments
later in the seance room!
Yes, the story is off to a great start. Unfortunately, the plot starts
jumping around crazily, and it becomes hard to keep track of what's
going on. We meed an ex-Army man named Philip Harley. We don't really
know why he's in the story, but he meets an ex-Wave named Arlene
Forster. She's carrying a tiny sprig of lilac, so the reader assumes she
must figure into the story somehow. The two seem to think that they were
supposed to meet, but we aren't told why. Then she disappears and later
shows up riding in a horse-drawn cab in Central Park. It's all a little
vague, but the reader slogs on, trying to make sense of it all.
We also meet Captain Dom Yuble, who works with an inventor named Niles
Ronjan. Ronjan has invented a new method of reaching sunken treasure.
He's trying to interest new investors, including Lamont Cranston, so he
can raise the treasure somewhere off Skipper's Rock. So what's with the
blinking lights that can be seen from his penthouse window? Lights
coming from the other side of Central Park? The Shadow determines it's a
code. But who is sending it? Who is the intended recipient? What do the
messages say?
The story continues in a somewhat rambling fashion. We meet characters
like the sleek-haired brunette Thara Lamoyne. She seemingly has designs
on Phil Harley, but takes to appearing and disappearing at the most
inopportune times. Then there's Winslow Ames who we don't really know,
but who disappears for some reason. And another person we barely know
named Claude Older is also apparently kidnapped.
The story spends much of its time in Central Park. Characters ride into
Central Park, fight in Central Park and disappear in Central Park. We
visit the Central Park Zoo. We encounter a rundown old merry-go-round in
Central Park. The banshee appears several times in Central Park.
As in many of the later Shadow stories, The Shadow's usual roster of
agents make a brief appearance. In this one, we see hackie Moe Shrevnitz
(but he's only called Shrevvy, here), Cliff Marsland, Hawkeye, Harry
Vincent, Burbank and Clyde Burke. All have very minor roles. The largest
role goes to Margo Lane. Burbank does get a chance to leave his small
room with the switchboard and get some night air. He drives a hansom cab
in Central Park, his face hidden beneath the driver's plug hat. Oh, and
Stanley also appears, but he isn't referred to by name; he's just "the
chauffeur." Of course, we also see The Shadow in his Lamont Cranston
disguise, Commissioner Weston and Inspector Cardona.
In this story, we are told that The Shadow prefers to become unseen by
blending into the darkness with his garb of black. But, it's admitted,
The Shadow can actually become invisible, just as his radio counterpart
could. "Of course there were times and occasions when The Shadow could
cloud men's minds, as was done in Tibet where he had learned hypnotic
methods from the Lamas, but in usual practice, The Shadow's way was to
simply blend with blackness." We never actually see The Shadow disappear
from view by clouding men's minds. Not in this story; not in any other,
either. But it's stated, here, that he can do it, and has done it on
occasion. To me, it seems as if author Walter Gibson was giving in to
the pressure of the radio show to allow his hero the actual power of
invisibility.
A couple interesting things in this Shadow mystery deserve note. There's
mention of a special code machine that The Shadow has developed for the
use of his agents. It's a mechanical decoder with an illuminated dial
with buttons which when pushed aligned certain letters and solves the
code. In this story, it's used by Burbank to break a code being sent by
mysterious forces. It's the first I've seen mention of a decoder device,
and is worth mention here.
Another unique device is a telephone booth in the Chateau Parkview
hotel. It has a special revolving wall that ejects the occupant of the
booth out into a corridor in an adjoining building. It's unique in that
this telephone booth plays a small role in the following month's story,
"Crime Out of Mind," as well. The telephone booth is an invention of the
hidden gang in this story. But The Shadow discovers its working, and
uses the telephone booth for his own purposes in the next month's story.
A most unusual happening.
This story could have been much better if Walter Gibson had been given
another ten-thousand words to flesh out the story. It would have allowed
him to explain things in more detail, rather than to just give them
passing mention. As it is, we are never given an explanation for the
strange materialization of the lilac twig. How did the twig get from
Central Park to Madame Mathilda's seance room? We are assured it is the
same twig, because the break matches perfectly. We know the two events
happened simultaneously, so there was no time to deliver it from one
location to the other. And we know that Inspector Cardona kept it
securely in his custody ever since it appeared, so there was no chance
for a switch. How was it done? We are never told. And the reader
justifiably feels cheated. Gibson sets up a fantastic opening mystery,
and then fails to follow through by giving readers the explanation.
Gibson also fails to include any murders in this story. The title
"Banshee Murders" notwithstanding, there are no murders in this story.
The banshee murders no one. No one murders anyone. In fact, the only
death in this story occurs when the giant vampire bat attacks the minor
character of Captain Dom Yuble. But it's not a murder. Gibson should
have stuck with the original title, "Crime Over Central Park." It wasn't
as lurid, but it was more honest. I'm assuming it was the editors at
Street & Smith that dictated the change, but that's no excuse.
This is not a great Shadow story. It's not even a good one. It's a short
and confusing one. Even the title of this Shadow mystery is a letdown.
It offers a lot of promise, but doesn't deliver. Of course, as
disappointing as it is, there would be worse to come in future months.
If you decide to read this Shadow adventure, read it in a single
sitting, as recommended earlier, and don't go in with very high
expectations. Then you won't be too disappointed. Banshee murders,
indeed... harumph!
John
--
"Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men? The Shadow knows!"
The wonderful old pulp mystery stories are all reviewed at: