The receiver clicked. The Shadow’s form moved toward the door. Invisible hands turned the lock and the knob. The door was opened. The way lay free for The Shadow’s unseen departure.
He had come here, this being of the night, to take the wealth of diamonds before the crooks arrived. He had come too late for he found the diamonds missing. Now he was setting forth to seek them.
The Shadow stood still. Some one was coming down the hall. It was the watchman, going his rounds to see if all doors were locked.
The door began to close, The Shadow still within the office. The door did not shut all the way. An interruption caused it to remain in its position.
Vague men had leaped up from the silence of the corridor. One of them, striking in the dark, felled the watchman. The old man’s lantern clattered to the floor.
The cracked voice of Gats Hackett was giving a command. The gang leader, impatient, was directing the attack before the zero hour of half past nine!
The door of the syndicate office was now closed. In the pale glow that flitted in from the window, the figure of The Shadow made a dim, fantastic silhouette. Both hands were gloved, and they were moving, drawing two huge automatics from beneath the folds of the black cloak.
DOWN in detective headquarters, Joe Cardona was shouting orders like a madman. Men were rushing to do his bidding. Thumping on the desk, the star detective gave his final instructions. Then he happened to remember Clyde Burke. He turned to the silent reporter, who was staring in open-mouthed wonderment.
“Come along, Burke!” shouted Cardona. “You want a story — you’ll get it! I’ve got a tipoff. They’re blowing a safe at the United Diamond Syndicate office!”
“A tip-off!” cried Burke, as he leaped to his feet to follow the detective. “Who’s it from, Joe?”
“You’ll find out!” responded Cardona grimly. “You’ll find out — maybe.”
That was the last statement Joe Cardona intended to make to any one regarding the identity of the man who had called. For the detective had received those tips before. Well did he know the sound of that spectral voice that he had heard.
Hot work lay ahead to-night. This squad was going forth on business — not to be misled by a hoax. The ace detective knew that plenty of gun play lay ahead.
Joe Cardona had recognized the voice of The Shadow!
CHAPTER XXIV
SMOKE WAGONS
THE door of the United Diamond Syndicate office fell inward as a powerful drive hurled it from its hinges. A group of gangsters surged into the room. The place was flooded with light as the glare of three powerful torches threw their rays toward the safe.
“That’s it!” screamed the voice of Gats Hackett. “Out of the way, you men—”
His voice stopped suddenly. From the center of the room came a sinister, mocking laugh. A rising figure was revealed by the glare of the torches.
Directly within the path of light, a perfect target for the guns of the furious mob, stood the spectral figure of The Shadow!
There was no time for delay to-night. Trapped by the premature attack that Gats had launched, The Shadow was moving straight into danger.
A new mission lay ahead of him. His presence was needed elsewhere than in this place. Stealth, surprise — both were discarded by the being in black as he deliberately met his enemies.
The gangsters saw The Shadow, but he was ready for them. His form was visible; theirs were not. But while the gangsters held revolvers that they could raise, The Shadow’s automatics were already up.
There were no echoes to his sardonic laugh. The reverberations of The Shadow’s mirth were drowned in the roar of his .45s as the controlling fingers loosed a stream of lead into the midst of the startled mobsters.
Bodies thudded to the floor. Gasping oaths spattered from snarling lips that closed to speak no more. Shattered flashlights fell useless. With one fierce volley from his recoiling automatics, The Shadow cleared the way. Upon the floor lay the piled-up bodies of Gats Hackett’s new band of killers — men who would never slay for their black-hearted chief.
One shot alone responded to The Shadow’s fusillade. It was Squint Freston who fired it. Downed with the others, the wolf-faced gangster had managed to discharge an answering bullet. But the hand that held the revolver was wavering. The single shot went wide.
Squint rolled sidewise upon the form of another gangster. A ratlike squeal came from his fanged lips. That squeal was Squint Freston’s death cry. He had been mortally wounded by a bullet from The Shadow’s volley.
The automatics disappeared beneath The Shadow’s cloak. He had used every cartridge. The hands emerged, bringing forth another pair of pistols. With a forward spring, the black-clad figure swept over the mass of bodies that cluttered the doorway to the hall.
GANGSTERS were running to escape The Shadow’s wrath. The few reserves who had been behind were heading for the stairs, around the turn in the corridor.
With them was the only man who had escaped the volley — the one who had been so anxious to go ahead, but who was now most eager to rush in the opposite direction.
Gats Hackett, dropping away when he had glimpsed The Shadow, was scurrying to the safety of the street.
The Shadow was behind them; yet Gats, despite his terror, regained an instinctive courage when he reached the head of the stairs. He shouted to his mobsters. At the commanding tone of his voice, they stopped at intervals along the stairs below.
“Lie low!” cried Gats. “He’s coming down this way! Get him! Get The Shadow!”
The revelation of the enemy’s name filled the fleeing gangsters with mingled rage and fear. Some fled on; but they were few. The others recognized the wisdom of their leader’s command and prepared to attack.
All the hordes of the bad lands hated The Shadow. Every member of that evil crew longed for the day when he might gain the glory of killing the terror of the underworld. A few seconds after Gats had given his order, men lay waiting on the stairs, each in readiness for the approach of a strange phantom shape.
“Stay here” — Gats was whispering to a man beside him — “and cover while I take a look. Maybe he’s back there where I left him.”
Gripping his smoke wagons, Gats crept forward with determination. Hate was dominating his dread. His boastful pride was coming to the fore. He would be the avenger whom all gangdom would acclaim. Gats Hackett — slayer of The Shadow!
Peering from the edge of the stairs, Gats spied The Shadow! He caught only a fleeting glimpse of the man in black; then The Shadow was gone.
In that split second, Gats had seen the head and shoulders of the phantomlike being disappearing over the edge of a window sill at the end of the corridor. He knew now how The Shadow had arrived here. He knew that the master of the night was leaving by the same route, thinking himself unperceived.
Springing forward, Gats reached the window. He leaned outward. Below was a courtyard, its bottom a white mass of paving. Between the window and the court, Gats saw a blurred splotch of blackness.
The Shadow was moving downward, his hands and feet finding purchase in the rough stone surface of the building’s walls.
This would mark the end of The Shadow! Leaning far out, Gats Hackett aimed both his revolvers straight downward. His famous aim could not fail. The Shadow, helpless upon the wall, could not fire in return!
Gats sought the triggers with his fingers. Staring downward, he saw a slight motion; then, from the blotch of black, two shining eyes burned upward.
The eyes of The Shadow! They would be Gats Hackett’s targets!