Events began a few seconds later. The truck ahead came to a sudden stop as the driver jammed the air brakes. Simultaneously the car that was almost beside it halted with the same promptness. As though governed by a signal, the moving blockade became a standing one!
Competent driver though he was, Stanley had not expected this. The gap between the limousine and the truck closed as the big car hurtled forward. Realizing the danger, Stanley jammed the brakes to avoid crashing into the truck. His action was just in time. The limousine came to a grinding halt less than fifteen feet to the rear of the truck.
Even as he stopped the car, Stanley heard the voice of Lamont Cranston, giving a firm command.
“Drop to the floor! Lie there!”
The voice came not from the rear seat, but from the running board on the right!
As Stanley obeyed the injunction, he heard the rear door on the right close with a slight slam. Then came another sound, the direct sequel to Cranston’s warning.
The car in the left lane had swept forward like the limousine, coming to a stop directly beside Cranston’s vehicle. As it pulled up from the rear — this touring car that followed — a man leaned from the driver’s seat and opened fire with a pair of revolvers.
The sordid face of Gats Hackett gleamed amid the flashes of the .45s as he emptied his smoke wagons into the unprotected rear seat of the limousine.
Twelve shots sounded their terrific roar throughout the echoing lanes. Each bullet was fired by a master hand. Gats Hackett, shooting steadily from close range, covered every possible spot within the interior of the car.
Whistles broke out shrilly as the tunnel police responded. Gats had expected that. He knew what was about to happen.
The car ahead of his shot forward. Gats Hackett’s driver followed it, while the gang leader still leaned outward, grinning his derision back at the stalled limousine.
Other events were happening. Up in the truck on the right lane, the driver was shifting into gear. His hand became suddenly motionless. He tumbled backward, unconscious. Then a hand gripped the lever, and the truck, like the cars, began a mad flight toward the Jersey end of the tube.
Traffic was open ahead; for cars had passed out of sight during this terrific interlude. But in the rear, all cars were stopped, their drivers fearful to proceed.
The limousine did not move. Police were approaching it. A uniformed man opened the front door to find Stanley crouching on the floor.
“Were they after you?” demanded the officer.
“I–I - don’t know,” gasped Stanley. “Look — look in back. Mr. Cranston — is he — is he still alive?”
The policeman yanked open the rear door of the limousine, and turned his flashlight inward. One glance showed him the bullet-riddled interior. No man could have lived through that volley of shots.
There was no sign of a human being — nothing was there but an empty suitcase.
“Nobody here,” growled the policeman. “Looks like they didn’t get the guy they were after. Come on; drive along with me.”
He clambered into the front seat, and Stanley started the limousine slowly onward.
The chauffeur was dumfounded. His wits were slowly returning as he voiced a plausible explanation.
“I guess — guess all that shooting must have made me goofy,” he declared. “I didn’t have anybody with me to-night. This car belongs to Mr. Cranston. I left him in town. But I was scared — mighty scared when I heard those shots. I couldn’t help thinking of Mr. Cranston—”
“Lucky you didn’t have him with you,” returned the officer grimly. “He wouldn’t have had a snowball’s chance, I’m telling you. The back of the car looks like an army had been working on it.”
MEANWHILE, far ahead, cars were scurrying from the tube. The shots had not been heard there.
The startling unexpectedness of a gun volley in the midst of the Holland Tunnel had nonplused the police. When the alarm reached the Jersey side, the officers were too late to intercept the final vehicles that shot free from the tunnel. Two automobiles, a touring car and a sedan, sped from the left lane, so close together that they made a tandem; then they spread apart and ran side by side.
A moment later, a heavy truck hurtled forth on the right. It plowed after the cars that had gone before. Up in the sedan, Gats Hackett was glancing backward.
“Keep going, boy,” he shouted to the driver. “Louie’s coming with the truck. Don’t wait up for him. Say — we finished that bozo, didn’t we? You know who he was?”
The driver grunted a negative reply.
“The Shadow!” informed Gats. “That’s who I just snuffed out. The Shadow — that was him in the limousine.”
“Whew!” exclaimed the driver.
The gasp was echoed from two gunmen in the back seat. They had seen Gats Hackett do the work. They were confident that a dead man lay in the rear of the bullet-riddled limousine.
The lights of the truck were far behind as the leading cars reached a drawbridge. The touring car shot across; the sedan followed. Scarcely had it passed the center of the bridge before a whistle sounded. The bridge was opening.
“Good enough!” exclaimed Gats. “That’ll stop any cops. Louie’s stuck back there, but I guess he can get out of it. He looks like a dumb truck driver. He won’t squeal.”
Gats was right about the truck. It had stopped before it reached the drawbridge. Its front seat was dark; and no one saw what happened there.
A figure slid away from the driver’s seat; then drew a huddled form upward and across the steering wheel. A moment later a black form slipped from the truck and edged toward the side of the road, unseen in the darkness.
The draw was open for twenty minutes. While traffic was still stalled, Stanley came up and put the limousine in line behind the other waiting cars. He had been sent on after answering questions put by the tunnel police. It had been agreed that Stanley was innocent. He was returning to Lamont Cranston’s home.
The drawbridge opened. The huddled man at the wheel of the truck was stirring. Louie, as Gats had referred to him, opened his eyes and looked around. He rubbed the back of his head, where a dull ache annoyed him.
Louie could not remember what had happened. He had stalled the truck in the tube as he had been instructed. He had heard the cannonade let loose by Gats Hackett. Then had come blackness, brought on by a sharp, hard blow.
It seemed only a moment ago that he had lost consciousness in the tube; now he was facing a drawbridge! Still rubbing his head, Louie drove the truck forward, wondering what the explanation to this might be.
In the limousine, Stanley looked back, fancying that he had heard the door open and close. He shook his head seriously. This terrible experience had shattered his nerve.
What had happened to Mr. Cranston? Stanley could not guess. Perhaps his employer was dead, back in the tunnel. Yet Stanley felt that he had done the right thing to act bewildered. If his master had escaped, he probably did not want to be connected with the terrible affair.
Like the truck, the limousine crossed the drawbridge. Stanley drove along a series of roads, and entered a driveway. He stopped in front of his master’s mansion. Here, he decided, it would be best to report to Richards, Cranston’s trusted valet.
Sorrowfully, Stanley alighted and opened the rear door, so that the bullet-riddled interior could be seen.
A figure stirred and moved wearily. Two arms stretched. A tall man stepped from the car, carrying a closed suitcase in his hand. He gave the bag to Stanley. The chauffeur nearly dropped it in his amazement. He was staring at Lamont Cranston!
“Home already, Stanley?” questioned the millionaire in a languid tone. “Really, I can scarcely believe we are here. I must have slept all the way!”