The Shadow 305 Malmordo

MALMORDO was originally published in the July 1946 issue of "The Shadow Magazine." A sinister figure that haunts the sewers of New York, that is Malmordo. A crime figure of international repute has brought his hoards of ratlike minions to America to begin a new wave of crime. Thus, The Shadow will pursue the world's most desperate criminal. This story stands out among the other 1946 pulp mysteries of The Shadow. This and an earlier story, "Crime Out of Mind," stand as the top two Shadow stories of the year. Of course, 1946 wasn't known as a strong year for Shadow tales, so perhaps bestowing that title upon this story isn't all that much of an honor. Of the weaker tales for that year, there were "The Banshee Murders" in which no murders took place, "Crime Over Casco" in which The Shadow casually reveals his most closely guarded secret to near-strangers, and "The Curse of Thoth" which showed definite traces of heavy-handed editing. Things really went downhill in August of 1946, when long-time author Walter Gibson left the magazine series and Bruce Elliott took over the writing tasks for the next two years. The following month after "Malmordo" brought readers "The Blackest Mail," a Shadow story which Bruce Elliott butchered so badly that I can still barely consider reading it again. Yes, 1946 was not a good year for The Shadow. But "Malmordo" made things a bit brighter for the year as a whole. The story opens on a fog-covered pier along the North River. A banana boat, the Steamship Santander, lies at anchor. A gypsy named Panjo is seeking birds that have been smuggled in on the Santander. Parrots, macaws and similar birds are regularly being smuggled from South America into New York Harbor. But this time, there are no birds. The birds are all dead; killed by huge rats. Why does Panjo seek exotic birds? That's just one of the many things that is revealed later in the story. Inspector Joe Cardona is also down at the pier; he patrols the docks looking for stowaways that have been slipping into port. Little does he realize that this simple old hulk carries not only stowaways who are sneaking into the country from Europe, via South America, but it also contains other bizarre passengers, as well. There are the huge rats that are bigger than the cats set out to chase them; the rats are killing the cats! And there is one other bizarre passenger, which readers don't learn about until the amazing climax of the story. (No, I won't spoil it for you.) The Shadow shares the concern about the stowaways; they have been stealing into this country aboard tramp steamers. He is following one of the stowaways, figuring if one could be captured, he could tell much about the others. There is a shipboard chase, and the stowaway is chased into the hold of the ship where he is killed; crushed by a shifting pile of mahogany logs. His dying words: "Malmordo - morto - noktomezo -" The story is off to a good start. Action and mystery abound in a gloomy atmospheric setting. The Shadow makes an early appearance. Giant rats. Dead birds. Human stowaways from Europe. Death strikes. Cryptic dying words. And the name Malmordo. Who is this Malmordo? We find out in the next chapter, when Joe Cardona visits Cafe de la Morte in the heart of Greenwich Village. He has received a strange card, promising death at midnight at the Cafe de la Morte. And The Shadow is not far behind. In the outdoor garden of the small restaurant sits Janice Bradford with a yellow daffodil pinned to the lapel of her jacket. She is there to meet... someone. In the background, Harry Vincent, agent for The Shadow, watches as Gypsy palmist Madame Thalla sits down to tell her fortune. And that's when Malmordo makes his appearance. Malmordo appears through a hole in the fence. He is a disgusting creature; a thing that looks like a rat of man-sized proportions, wearing clothes to disguise the fact that it is a rodent, not a human. Bulging teeth, beady eyes below shaggy hair that strews down upon a heavily lined forehead. The creature's face is so ugly, so vicious, that its owner must have purposely misshapen it or practiced facial contortions to the limit, in order to acquire such grotesque, inhuman features. He whips out a long, thin-bladed knife and buries it in the back of Gregor, the waiter. Cardona and Harry Vincent spring to action. Guns roar and chaos breaks out. In the ensuing melee, Malmordo makes good his escape and Janice Bradford flees the scene of the crime. Yes, as promised, death has struck at midnight. But why? Why was Gregor killed? Who is Malmordo? Who was Janice Bradford going to meet? And why? The story is off to a whirlwind start, and rarely slows down enough for the reader to pause and catch his breath. The story is jam-packed with action, especially for a shorter-than-normal Shadow story that is just over 36,000 words. And by the climax everything is properly explained (well, almost everything) and the evil ratlike Malmordo has received his just rewards. The Shadow does all this mostly on his own, although there are a few agents who appear briefly in the story. None of them carries much of the action, however. Harry Vincent appears in the opening restaurant scene at the Cafe de la Morte. Hawkeye appears briefly in two scenes. Moe Shrevnitz appears a couple different times, but he's only referred to as "Shrevvy" here, not by his given name. And contact-man Burbank is mentioned once in passing. The Shadow appears both as his black-cloaked self and as Lamont Cranston. He also gets to appears once in disguise. And it won't be giving anything away to reveal that he appears disguised as Malmordo, himself. And he does it without makeup! The Shadow is able to distort his features so as to become the twisted man-sized rat. That's a pretty effective disguise! Also in this story are New York Police Commissioner Ralph Weston and his ace detective, Inspector Joe Cardona. And a new character is introduced, Trent Stacey from Scotland Yard. He's part of the C.I.D., or Criminal Investigation Department, and has come to America following the trail of Malmordo. The Commissioner Weston of this story conforms to the characterization typical of the 1946 stories. He continues to officially deny the existence of The Shadow. The Shadow is not supposed to be mentioned in police reports because an identity such as his, based on the evidence of a cloak and hat, might technically be assumed by anyone. But he has personally met The Shadow often enough to unofficially recognize him. And the commissioner still doesn't believe in Joe Cardona's hunches. But he begrudgingly allows Cardona to follow those hunches, since they so often pay off. So what's the story on this Malmordo character? Well, it won't be giving anything away to describe his background a bit. Malmordo is currently the most notorious criminal on the European scene. His name is a corruption of Esperanto, that international language used so often by spies. It refers to something that gnaws. Before the war (that would be World War II), Malmordo had built up quite a criminal empire. When the Nazis came into power, he hired out to them, squirming his way into every occupied country with his fellow-rats. They looted treasures for the Nazis; rare paintings, famous jewels, and whatever else they could lay their hands upon. And in the process, they took vital records whenever they could. These records could be used to their advantage, if the war didn't go as the Nazi's had planned. And, of course, by 1946 the war was over and Germany had lost. But Malmordo and his other rats were still in business. Now they have arrived in America, looking for more loot. This time, they are going to use the records they stole. These records prove that certain men had been engaged in subversive dealings with the Nazis. And as such, they will make valuable fodder for blackmail. A crime wave of blackmail and murder is about to begin, with Malmordo and his squirmy league of henchmen leading the way. The language known as Esperanto plays an important part in this story. Author Walter Gibson seemed to be quite intrigued with this artificial language that had been created in 1887. He introduced it early in 1934's "The Embassy Murders." It also played a part in the plot of "Crime Under Cover" from 1941. This is the third time that Gibson wrote Esperanto into his Shadow stories. He would go on to use it in "Return of The Shadow" which was his 1963 attempt to revive the series. Readers learn two new names for The Shadow, in this pulp tale. The most famous and oft-used of those "alternate" names is "Ying Ko;" that is how he is known to the Chinese. In this story we learn that "Yek Ushalyin" is Romany (the Gypsy language) for The Shadow. And "La Ombrajo" is Esperanto for The Shadow. One note of interest is that passing reference to whom I can only assume to be Fritz, the janitor at Police Headquarters. In the early years of The Shadow Magazine, The Shadow would occasionally disguise himself as the real janitor Fritz, so he could overhear police conversations while supposedly mopping the floors. Fritz, whose only dialog usually consisted of the single word "Yah," appeared in twenty-one of The Shadow stories. He was in the very first Shadow pulp novel, "The Living Shadow." The final mention of Fritz by name was in 1944's "The Crystal Skull." He isn't specifically mentioned in "Malmordo" but author Gibson does say: "Cranston had rarely visited the inspector's office, at least not as himself." This seems to be a reference to the times when he visited the office in the guise of janitor Fritz. It's good to see that Fritz was not forgotten. There are a couple loose ends in this story. What happened to Janice Bradford? The last time we see her, she is hidden in a closet before a gun-battle with Malmordo. Then, she is mentioned no more. It was a bit untidy of Walter Gibson not to clean up that loose end, especially since it would have been so easy to make some passing comment on the last page. The other loose end is the question of why Malmordo killed Gregor, the waiter at the Cafe de la Morte. There is some vague talk about his possible motivation, but it's never clearly resolved. This is another topic which could easily have been settled by Gibson, if he had so chosen. If you can overlook a few minor flaws, this is a pretty good Shadow story, especially considering it was from 1946. Maybe Gibson knew it would be his last one, perhaps forever, before Bruce Elliott took over the series, and Gibson decided to go out with a bang. Of course, as it turned out, Gibson did return to writing the final Shadow stories after a two-year absence. But he wouldn't have known that at the time. If for no other reason, read this story for the ending. The way in which Malmordo meets his doom is quite exciting. It's one that the reader won't see coming, even though hints were given in several spots previously. It's a bit grisly, but the evil Malmordo deserves it! If you want to read a 1946 Shadow story, this would be a good one to read. And it's relatively short, too. There's no way it would make it into my top twenty-five Shadow stories of all-time, but it definitely makes it into the top two of 1946. A pretty good Shadow story that I think you would enjoy.