WITH a sudden lunge, Zemba reached his feet and sprang upon The Shadow. The cloaked fighter wheeled. Zemba’s left fist caught The Shadow’s right wrist. The Shadow swung his left-hand automatic. Zemba stabbed with his wounded arm. A lucky jolt sent the automatic bounding from The Shadow’s bare hand.
A snarl from the door. It was Jacques. He saw The Shadow. The latter’s head swept backward. His slouch hat skimmed to the floor; cloak folds slipped from his neck. Above that garb of blackness, Jacques saw the leering features of Gaspard Zemba.
Jacques saw the real Zemba also; he spied another visage that was distorted in fiendish anger. For a moment, Jacques had favored The Shadow; his loyalty turned again to Zemba. He could not spy the latter’s left hand; but suddenly, he saw The Shadow’s. The black-clad fighter had suddenly flattened his hand against the front of his cloak.
There, framed against a solid background, Jacques saw a hand that lacked its third finger, except for a short stump. The Apache needed no other talisman. Stopping his finger on the trigger, he aimed his machine gun toward Zemba. His final hesitation proved his finish.
A revolver barked. It was Robeq’s. The detective was a sharpshooter, skilled through his service in the Foreign Legion. His bullet found the Apache’s heart. Jacques rolled headlong to the floor, carried forward by the weight of his machine gun.
The Shadow’s left hand remained motionless while Zemba, twisting, glared at the sight of the missing finger. Then came a whispered laugh. The hand moved forward, away from the black cloak. A bent finger straightened. The missing digit-popped into view.
The Shadow had matched Zemba’s device of a false finger. He had found it quite as simple to be one finger short. Always, when he had shown his hand to Apaches, The Shadow had placed it upon a table, against his coat, or encircling a pack of cigarettes. With other fingers pressing close together, the illusion had been perfect. A finger gone from the lower knuckle outward!
With a lunge, The Shadow sent Zemba sprawling. Venomous as before, the supercrook snatched up a revolver that lay beside the body of Rusanne. He aimed with his left hand. Steadily, The Shadow covered him. Once before these two had met in duel, near the Allee des Bijoux, when The Shadow had been Zemba; and Zemba had been Robeq.
On that occasion, Zemba had loosed a wild volley of bullets; while The Shadow had deliberately fired one wide shot. He had wanted to spare Zemba, then. At that time, The Shadow had not learned the location of the murderer’s hide-out.
There had been another in that fray in the Montmartre. Etienne Robeq, at that time passing as Herbert Balliol. Then, he would have fired at The Shadow, had he gained the opportunity. Remembrance of that error struck him at this moment. Robeq aimed for Zemba and fired. The Shadow had been waiting, testing Zemba’s nerve to the last. Robeq’s bullet saved him the trouble of dispatching the evil murderer.
Other revolvers sounded, hard after Robeq’s. Delka and Cliff had responded instinctively. Zemba’s rolling body sprawled motionless in death.
THE SHADOW stepped across to the safe, where Harry and Clandine were holding the four spies. He stooped before the fireplace. With steadied fingers of his ungloved left hand, he began to manipulate the dial upon which Robeq had failed. Harry, while he watched, remembered other events.
It had been The Shadow who had come into the Allee des Bijoux behind the Cabaret du Diable. The Shadow, as Zemba; but with his cloak, hat and gloves covering the disguise. He had come ahead of Robeq. The Shadow had fought. He had lost his black garb. After that, he had appeared as Zemba. Robeq — as Balliol — had come from the far end of the street. Harry had thought him to be The Shadow, when the flashlights had started their play!
Harry knew now why The Shadow had so easily escaped Zemba. Actually, the prisoner had been Robeq; his captor, The Shadow. To aid Robeq, The Shadow had deliberately left him the key. Then, later, Robeq had actually trapped Zemba, in the Allee des Bijoux. Thinking Zemba to be The Shadow, Robeq had let him go. Apparently, it had been The Shadow capturing Robeq!
Strange twists of circumstances; yet all were plain at last. Right had gained the victory; to complete the triumph, the door of the safe swung open. The Shadow had solved the combination. Stepping back, he let the others throng forward, eagerly. Robeq, Delka and Clandine, while Harry and Cliff guarded the spies.
Sealed packages came forth in eager hands. Bulky envelopes containing their important documents. The military plans from which Gaspard Zemba had hoped to reap his millions. Besides these trophies were stacks of money, boxes of gems — loot that Zemba had gathered in other campaigns of crime.
A warning hiss.
Robeq and Delka sprang about, leaving Clandine at the safe. The Shadow had picked up his slouch hat; again it was on his head, while his left hand was pointing toward the four spies. He wanted them guarded. Robeq and Delka nodded, though they did not know The Shadow’s reason.
THE answer came. The Shadow beckoned to his agents. They headed for the door at the left, through to the room beyond the curtains. Lights blazed suddenly. Robeq and Delka heard the roar of new gunfire; then snarls, thuds and groans.
Marlier and the other guards had broken their bonds. They had guessed that matters could have gone wrong; for they had been given detailed instructions by Zemba, including the possibility of a fake squad of agents. The Shadow had heard them coming up by the secret stairs. He and his agents had gone to deal with them.
While Robeq and Delka listened, Clandine cried out. The spies were making a sudden lunge, to overpower their three remaining captors. Robeq and Delka wheeled as one. The spies were upon them. Guns boomed. Robeq and Delka had no other alternative.
Two of the spies sprawled dying. A third cringed, clutching a wounded arm. The last spy surrendered. Delka had him covered; Clandine held the recovered spoils. Robeq dashed to aid The Shadow. He reached the far room, to find it dark. He clicked a flashlight and surveyed the scene.
Sprawled about were helpless Apaches: Marlier and the others who had made their mad attack. They had met The Shadow and his agents. The master fighter and his aids had gained the opening shots. They were gone, all three, down by the secret stairway.
As Etienne Robeq lingered upon this scene of final fray, he heard a sound which held him rigid. It came from depths below, like a voice of vengeance issued within the confines of a tomb.
It was a laugh that spoke of triumph. Mirth that came as a last knell; a toll of judgment, to mark the end of the notorious Gaspard Zemba. To Etienne Robeq, it came also as a parting token from The Shadow and the stalwart men who had aided him in battle.
Such was the laugh of The Shadow.