It disappeared now. A clock on the wall showed that it was more than an hour since he had left the Black Ship.
He had given the word too late. The police could not arrive in time to save The Shadow!
CHAPTER XII
DEATH TO THE SHADOW!
THE hordes of gangdom were out for blood. Old feuds had been abandoned tonight. There was but one objective toward which every mobsman was working.
“Death to The Shadow!”
That was the whispered battle slogan. It had begun at the Black Ship shortly after Homer Briggs had gone. It had spread as though carried by the wind.
While Harry had been calling Burbank, to tell of Homer’s hideout, evil tongues had been uttering the same message in every quarter of the underworld!
Hidden dives had disgorged their quota of mobsters. Hard-visaged, snarling demons of the bad lands were gathering, intent upon a single purpose.
Tonight, some one would gain the highest fame that the underworld could offer. The man who killed The Shadow could ask his own reward!
The archenemy of evil was doomed. The trap had been laid.
Somehow, every gat wielder knew, word must have gone to the mysterious man in black, whose eyes and ears were everywhere. But this snare had been timed. Word had been withheld until the proper moment.
The Shadow, it was known, went to his objectives as soon as he had learned of their location.
The knowledge that Moose Glutz’s old pawnshop was where he could find the cringing Homer Briggs was something The Shadow would never ignore.
Even though he might exercise caution, it was conceded that he would prowl in that neighborhood soon after Briggs had returned to the hideout.
The scheme had come from Hank Farley — one of the craftiest of all gangsters, a man whose games were so big that his activities were invariably few and far between.
Homer Briggs, picayune crook, was not waiting there alone. Hank Farley would be with him!
Even should The Shadow reach his objective, Hank would be sure to put up a fight. Gangsters galore were assembling, working as though in unison, stationing themselves at intervals.
If they missed The Shadow going in — they would get him coming out!
Every alleyway hid snipers. Every parked car concealed sinister mobsmen. Every obscure doorway held its guntoter.
The area surrounding the abandoned pawnshop was like a huge net. No man could have walked through that mesh and lived.
Many fingers rested on hair triggers. Should any one appear who might be taken for The Shadow, death would be his!
The entrance to the basement of the old pawnshop was at the end of a short blind alley. It was a tiny cul-de-sac, no deeper than twenty feet. No one was in that spot.
All were wise enough to avoid it. For that — in all probability — would be The Shadow’s place of death. The single opening in the brick-walled alcove was a door, which was locked.
Beneath that door was the room where Farley waited with Homer Briggs.
No less than twenty revolvers and automatics were trained upon that black space. The Shadow could enter it only from the street. Then the gats would blaze.
Should he manage to open the locked door, and pass within, he would not only encounter the indomitable Hank Farley — he would have no other means of escape except by the door through which he had come! For the hideout was a stonewalled chamber!
None were too close to the alley. All gangdom wanted The Shadow to enter it.
There were powerful electric torches among the waiting gangsters who covered the vital spot. These were to reveal the scene when the gunfire began.
There was a street light just away from the entrance of the cul-de-sac; that, too, was of value. It revealed clearly the brick walls of the building, where they fronted on the street. If The Shadow once stepped into that light, he would be visible.
Even as a shadow, he would not be immune, for revolvers would spit flame at the slightest sign.
Many gunmen were in the offing. Those who had first arrived had taken the most desirable spots. The others had scattered through the surrounding neighborhood.
Why wait for The Shadow to reach his destination? Bump him off as soon as he had entered within the outer cordon!
There was one faint hope for the man in black. Should he sense danger on the way, he might abandon his excursion.
All experienced mobsters, however, were sure that their enemy would get within the danger zone. The Shadow was no mean antagonist.
The sight of a few waiting gangsters would spur him onward, rather than deter him. He could not possibly know the size of the tremendous trap that awaited him. It had exceeded, many times, even the expectations of those who sponsored it.
Both bold and stealthy, The Shadow would dare the risky undertaking. But he was due for a surprise. Never, in the history of the underworld, had such a mob assembled!
Men who were sworn enemies — members of rival gangs — rubbed elbows and exchanged whispered greeting.
“Death to The Shadow!”
The sentence had a double meaning. Its declarers might well have added:
“Life to crime.”
For The Shadow was crime’s worst enemy. He was its most feared antagonist. The mighty turnout told those facts more graphically than descriptive words or slogans.
“Death to The Shadow!”
THE main portion of the old pawnshop was located on a corner. The little alleyway was twenty paces down the side street.
That one thoroughfare massed gangsters. All points of the crossing were covered. So was the other street.
The outer cordon took in four complete blocks. There were scattered gangsters beyond it, but they were not regularly posted.
At the portion of the block most distant from the expected scene of action, a pair of gangsters waited in a narrow alley on the far side of the street.
They were in pitch blackness, talking in low whispers.
“Maybe he’ll come down this alley,” said one.
“There’s a guy up at the other end,” came the reply.
“He might slip by him.”
“O.K.! You watch in back. I’ll keep an eye on the street.”
The men resumed their conversation as they assumed this new watch.
“If he ever gets to Glutz’s place, it’s curtains for him,” was the comment.
“Sure thing. If he was in that little hole away from the corner, he’d be all right. But let him try to get in!”
“And let him try to get out!”
The men’s whispered voices, guarded though they were, sounded loud in the alley. Their noise was sufficient to drown near-by noises. Hence the men did not hear as something glided along the center of the alley, to stop between them.
Even had they been silent — as they now became — they could not have detected the presence of the form.
For the man who was concealed in the darkness crouched low. Not even his breathing was audible.
The entrance of the alley was particularly dark, because the nearest street light was on the other side of the corner of the near-by crossing.
A deserted house stood across the street. It was one house of a closely built block. The gloom of the alley seemed to project itself, like a flood of darkness; across the street.
The figure that had stopped by the gangsters was moving again. It was on its way, straight ahead.
It sought the path of darkness. Had it wavered from it, the figure would have been a target for half a dozen hidden watchers. But the slow, gliding motion of the jet-black form made it totally invisible. Free from observation, it reached the old house.
There it stopped by the low stone steps. A hand reached up and pressed against the door of the house.
The hand was as invisible as the man. It was covered with a thin, black glove. It was the hand of The Shadow!