Gringo was aiming again. He was in full view of the house. An automatic barked. Gringo sprawled. His finger slipped from the trigger. His revolver bounded in the dirt beside a bush.
Staring fangs had seen the lieutenant’s fall. With one accord they broke into frenzied flight. Cutting across the lawn, they fired hasty shots as they fled. They could no longer see the form at which they aimed. They could see only the bursts of flame from automatics.
Crouched behind a little wall that was beside stone steps, The Shadow was picking off the fleeing fangs. Responding bullets chipped off fragments from the wall; but the ricocheting shots missed the living target.
Fangs from the other side of the mansion were heading in a wide circle to escape The Shadow’s fire. The automatics stilled. A weird laugh broke as five escaping crooks drove madly toward the opening in the hedge.
A searchlight’s beam came flooding through the opening. The loud, eerie laugh had been a signal to men stationed in a car that had pulled up beyond the break in the hedge. Five fangs stopped blinded as they faced that glare. They raised revolvers.
Shots from beyond the hedge. They were delivered by The Shadow’s trusted men, Clyde Burke and Harry Vincent — with Cliff Marsland revived to aid them — and broke the headlong retreat of the survivors who had obeyed The Cobra as their master.
Two fangs fell. A third remained firing, while his companions cut at an angle toward the house. The lone man aimed for the searchlight and missed his target. A burst of return shots dropped him.
RISING from his protected spot, The Shadow took long-range aim. One shot clipped the foremost fang; the next bullet sent the second sprawling. The last of the fangs had fallen. The Shadow’s laugh rose triumphant; then faded as the master fighter — still garbed as The Cobra — turned to enter the house.
The Shadow’s agents drove away from beyond the hedge as men appeared from Myland’s. The fray outside had been furious, but fast. Not until its quick action had terminated did Joe Cardona appear, followed by the others from the study.
Moonlight showed sprawled and writhing forms upon the lawn. Cardona and Weston, carrying guns for protection, rushed forward to corral the dead and wounded mobsters. Aided by Myland and Babson, they carried in the bodies of those who were still alive.
Placing the crippled fangs in the front living room, Cardona and Weston hurried to the study to call for ambulances and reinforcements from headquarters. Joe Cardona was speaking as they moved along.
“These men will talk,” said the detective. “The Cobra is dead. The Shadow spotted his game and picked off his whole crew. We’ll find his hide-out.”
“How The Shadow did it is a mystery!” exclaimed Weston. “Commendable! Most commendable!”
Little did either realize the details of the work which The Shadow had accomplished as a sleuth in the underworld. They did not know how The Shadow had spied on Gringo Volks in the Blue Crow; how he had noted that while Crawler Gorgan was present, calls which henchmen sent could not reach The Cobra.
That was the clew which The Shadow had followed. He had trailed Crawler to his abode this very night. There, from Cliff Marsland’s disjointed phrases, he had divined The Cobra’s game. The Cobra had departed, attired as The Shadow! Cliff had taken it for a fantastic dream; The Shadow had understood all!
He had chosen the attire of The Cobra for himself. He had taken one of the additional garbs when he had left The Cobra’s lair. Moving to the Black Ship, he had heard Gringo’s final instructions to his men — corroborating facts which The Shadow had already fathomed.
It was The Shadow who had entered as The Cobra, passing through the lines of watching fangs; while The Cobra, wearing a cloak and hat to impersonate The Shadow, had been lurking within Caleb Myland’s home!
CARDONA guessed this part as he spoke to Weston just outside the study door.
“The Cobra would have slain Myland and Babson,” said the detective, solemnly. “Then, with the money, he was going to drop that cloak and hat to appear as The Cobra.”
“So his men would pass him,” asserted the commissioner.
“Yes,” agreed Cardona. “They would have held us back. We would have blamed The Shadow for the crime — we would have thought the mob was his.”
“We would have hounded The Shadow,” admitted Weston. “Captured him — or driven him to hiding — leaving The Cobra free to sweep with crime.”
“Those men of his,” assured Cardona, “were lieutenants of the big shots that The Cobra killed. Each would have had his own mob — his own racket — his own crimes.”
“With The Cobra master of them all!”
They had reached the study. Cardona uttered an exclamation as he pointed to the body of The Cobra, sprawled upon the floor. The black cloak and slouch hat were gone. Both Cardona and Weston knew the answer.
The Shadow had returned. He had taken away these garments in which The Cobra had masqueraded. Imitations of The Shadow’s own guise, they belonged to The Shadow now — not to Crawler Gorgan, the traitor who had used his knowledge of the underworld to double-cross the law.
Commissioner Weston stood still as Detective Cardona raised his hand for silence. Far away, barely audible in this rear room of Caleb Myland’s home, came the echo of a parting laugh.
Ghoulish, chilling mockery, it faded from its strange crescendo. Yet the recollection of that bursting cry could not be forgotten. It was the note that sounded final victory over The Cobra and his evil minions.
The triumph laugh of The Shadow!