There was only one route that offered them security. That path was through
the adjoining office from which The Shadow watched.
Promptly, The Shadow stepped back into darkness. Bold, sudden attack was unneeded. Not that he preferred to supply lurking tactics; on the contrary, he would rather have driven in upon the crooks.
Worried by the thought of their own time fuse; trapped between The Shadow and the law, they would have shown themselves as frantic rats, quite as helpless as others that The Shadow had adeptly handled in the past.
The Shadow's reason for sudden retirement concerned the Masked Playboy.
The Shadow knew that he could not depend upon the dupe's cooperation; not even to the point where the groggy man would scramble for safety. He couldn't risk the chance of that victim's death. It was obvious that the crooks wanted to keep the Playboy alive, and get him out of danger. The Shadow decided to let them accomplish that.
Close beside the window that led to the low roof, The Shadow heard the clatter of the connecting door. Mobsters were coming through, dragging the Masked Playboy with them. They didn't need their flashlights; they could make out the shape of the window. Thanks to the darkness of the office, they couldn't see The Shadow.
As The Shadow expected, three of the thugs went though the window first.
The others started to shove the groggy playboy to the men outside. Some seemed jittery, but the growl of their leader steadied them. He was telling them that there was another minute for the fuse; that the blast couldn't reach this room,
anyway.
As for the cops, they were still trying to break into the building, as muffled crashes proved.
THE Masked Playboy lay half across the sill when The Shadow acted. His move was a swoop from blackness, as powerful as it was unexpected. His hand thrust in unseen, to arrest the shoves that the crooks gave. His fingers clamped the dark cloth of the Playboy's attire.
The Shadow's other hand held an automatic. He didn't release the gun. He simply hooked his arm beneath the Playboy's body. Coming up from his crouch, The Shadow voiced a taunting shivery laugh squarely in the ears of the men that
flanked him.
With that burst of startling mirth, he whipped the Playboy from the rigid hands of the mobbies. With a hard back-fling, he launched his burden toward the
corner behind him. That shove was the sort that could have damaged the human who
took it, if it hadn't been for the retarding grip of The Shadow's free hand.
Crooks didn't see that part of it. One man - their leader - jabbed a flashlight. It showed only The Shadow, one hand behind him, the other fist thrusting forward. That leading hand was gloved, and it gripped a big-muzzled gun.
Thugs surged. A blast mouthed from the .45, dropping the first attacker to
reach The Shadow. From the recoil, The Shadow made a cross-slash that thwacked the flashlight from the fist of the man who held it.
In darkness, he was among his foemen, slugging for their heads, while the crooks outside the window huddled helpless, unable to pick The Shadow in the darkness.
With enemies sprawled about him, The Shadow swung for the window, his mocking laugh telling the outer trio that their turn was next. Shakily, they arose to flee; then, as one, they took a head-long sprawl.
The blast that produced that result was not from The Shadow's gun. It came
from the next office - a titanic burst when the safe blew open. That charge was
more powerful than intended. It shattered windows; shook the building.
Amid the rattle of loosened brick and spattered chunks of walls and ceilings, all fighters were flattened, The Shadow among them!
CHAPTER III
TRIPLE BATTLE
THE outside mobbies were the first to recuperate from the explosion's shock. Regaining their footing, they stared at the window, where a ghostlike wraith was creeping forth.
The shape wasn't The Shadow. It was white. As the crooks eyed the phenomenon, they saw that it was smoke trailing from a cloud of fumes that had poured through from the next office.
Partly startled by the sight, the thugs remembered The Shadow's weird laugh. They decided upon a parley before they invaded the battleground. That delay was fortunate. If crooks had attacked at that moment, it would have gone badly with The Shadow.
The cloaked fighter was rising from the floor, too jolted to recognize fully his surroundings. A portion of the window frame had broken; in its fall, the chunk of wood had found The Shadow's head. He was as groggy as the thugs that he had slugged.
Right then, he couldn't have combated invaders; but despite the smoke, he was gaining some return of his ability. The half minute that the crooks allowed
him was enough. When they suddenly poked guns and flashlights in from the window, The Shadow sensed the menace.
He still had his gun, but didn't wait to raise it. He wheeled for a corner, using the smoke as cover. Instinctively, he reversed his course amid the fumes. Guns stabbed wide when his foemen sought to follow his course with bullets.
Through The Shadow's returning senses thrummed thoughts of the Masked Playboy.
He remembered that he had flung the dupe to safety, but couldn't recall the direction, except that it was toward a corner. He wanted to get to that spot and make sure that the man was safe, then spring a surprise thrust on the crooks.
Ordinarily, that would have been easy for The Shadow. In his present condition, the task went awry.
The corner that The Shadow reached was the one leading into the wrecked office. Perhaps it was the thickness of the smoke that invited him in that direction; for he was depending chiefly upon the instinct to take cover.
Whatever the cause, the result came when The Shadow reached the wall and took a roundabout swing to brace himself there.
He fired as he went backward; the gun's recoil sent him off balance.
There
wasn't a wall to stop him. He went sprawling through the blasted doorway, to land amid the wreckage near the ruined safe.
THE SHADOW'S one wide shot proved that he wasn't in form. It not only missed the crooks at the window; the spurt also betrayed where The Shadow was.
Again, guns began to tongue through the smoke. First shots were high; but latter ones scored the floor at the doorway.
The Shadow wasn't present to receive the final barrage. He was crawling clear of the doorway, blindly seeking new cover along the wall within the loan office. Tortured by the smoke, he was forced to rest with his face muffled in the folds of his cloak sleeve.
Two figures arose in the thinner smoke of the next office. One was the leader of the invading crooks. He had received a hard blow from The Shadow's gun; so had the thug who arose with him. The two stooped above a third: the hoodlum who had taken The Shadow's bullet.
That pal wasn't worth carrying away. Mobsters at the window reached through to help the rising pair. The leader snarled, gave a look about. He saw a figure crawling toward him on hands and knees. Shaking free from his helpers,
he pounced upon the Masked Playboy.
Again, crime's tool was in the hands of his persecutors; and with their prisoner, crooks were carrying away the battered camera that contained their precious photographs.
Sounds of the scramble through the window roused The Shadow. Though in the
next office, he was aware what had occurred. He still had time to overtake the mobsters and their dupe. On his feet, he started for the connecting door.
Three men swept in from the hallway. They roared for surrender as they fell upon The Shadow. In the smoky darkness, they thought they had bagged the Masked Playboy. These new invaders were the first members of the police headquarters squad that had come here on advice from stool pigeons.