Lingo

CHAPTER XX. THE TRAP SPRINGS

CHINATOWN lay basking in its evening glow. Crowds of sight-seers were thronging through the Oriental quarter, listening to the fancy spiels of the guides who conducted them. Chinatown, so the barkers proclaimed, was a district where insidious snares might swallow the unsuspecting visitor.

Tonight, these talkers were correct, even though they did not know it. Ominous danger lurked in Chinatown. A hidden trap awaited a mighty victim. But the pitfall lay on the outskirts of the quarter, behind the garish front of the secluded Silver Dragon.

Bland and serene in his American clothes, Koy Dow was closing his shop for the night. Customers seldom came to the Silver Dragon. It was too far away from the district’s center. There was nothing unusual in the early closing.

The front of the building lay black when Koy Dow had completed his task. Locking the flimsy front door, the Celestial stepped to the sidewalk and shuffled away from the direction of Chinatown’s lights.

Reaching the doorway that Hawkeye once had used, Koy Dow entered. This secret passage to the back of his own shop was part of Koy Dow’s trickery. The Chinaman had requested certain persons to be here tonight. Hence he was not surprised when he found them in the outer passage.

Lingo Queed was waiting with Blitz Schumbert and Buzz Dongarth. Koy Dow nodded to the trio; then he advanced and manipulated the hinges of the door that led to the hidden stairway.

“Where are we going?” quizzed Blitz, gruffly.

“Where we can look in on what happens,” replied Lingo. “Into that old meeting room of ours. The one that Koy Dow used for a trap.”

“Say, that’s a hot one,” growled Blitz. “It was bad enough to find out that the room was goofy all the time we was using it to meet in. Now I’m hearing that there was a peephole to it, too.”

“Only Koy Dow knew about it,” declared Lingo. “He told me about it before we held our meeting there; but since nobody else was wise, it didn’t make a difference.”

Koy Dow was beckoning from the stone stairs. As the others advanced, the Chinaman pressed his lingers to his lips.

“THE man he was brought to me so soon ago,” babbled the Celestial, in a low-toned singsong. “He has been put in the room so you can see. Do not give talkee. It is not wise that he should hear. We waitee for The Shadow.”

“Hold it a minute, Koy Dow,” suggested Lingo, as they reached the underground passage. He turned to Buzz and Blitz to give low-voiced orders.

“This bird that belongs to The Shadow was shipped to Koy Dow inside a big box, with some truckmen that looked like gorillas bringing it. Koy Dow planted him in the room.

“Hawkeye tells me the grapevine is busy. That means The Shadow is due, now that Koy Dow has closed his shop. Cardona’s stoolies will be getting the dope from the grapevine, though. That’s the only bad point.”

“It means The Shadow’s got to come tonight, don’t it?” quizzed Buzz. “If he don’t, the trap won’t be no good.”

“That’s it,” stated Lingo, “but it couldn’t be helped. I think The Shadow will fall, though.”

“He ought to,” put in Blitz. “They say he always mooches in ahead of the bulls.”

“I’m counting on it,” said Lingo. “But just the same, we’ve got to sit tight, in case the bulls spring a raid here. That’s why we’ve got to leave it to the trap. Don’t make any noise if The Shadow walks in; if he starts a battle, there’s no telling what might come.”

“No shootee gunee!” exclaimed Koy Dow, anxiously. “Gunee bringee cops. Koy Dow no wantee. No gunee — no talkee.”

“We’ll shoot plenty if The Shadow tries a getaway,” modified Lingo, with a low growl. “But if he don’t wise that something’s wrong, there’s to be no rods used.”

“Shadow no wisee,” assured Koy Dow, blinking solemnly.

“I’m moving out,” declared Lingo, turning in the passage. “I’m going to shift those mobs I’ve got posted. Hold them where they belong, until they get the signal.”

“Lights blinkee,” explained Koy Dow, “Outsidee shopee. You see. That happen when the trapee work.”

“I’ve got it all straight. And that’s when the crews move up in front. If there’s any bulls around, the mobs will block a raid.”

Koy Dow blinked as he watched Lingo go back. The Chinaman’s face was away from the view of Buzz and Blitz. Something like a smile showed on Koy Dow’s lips, as though the Chinaman was laughing to himself at all this added outside action.

It was plain that Koy Dow, although he had warned against premature gunfire, was not particularly perturbed by the possibility of a raid or a mob fight. He seemed to consider the premises of the Silver Dragon as his own little world.

Turning about, the Chinaman led Blitz and Buzz to the spiral stairway. He urged them up through the darkness. At the top, he edged each man to a loophole. He took the middle post, where he could grip the arms of the lieutenants.

BOUND and gagged, Harry Vincent lay in the center of the meeting room. All the usual appointments were in view: banners, taboret and teakwood table.

Over at the other side was the paneled doorway, which Blitz Schumbert knew could be opened only from the passage beyond it. Watching this scene, Koy Dow and his companions waited.

Out on the street, Lingo Queed had appeared in front of the obscure door that led to the hidden lookout passage. Lingo’s lanky form was half doubled as the big shot edged away toward the deeper darkness on Chinatown’s border.

Minutes drifted. They totaled a quarter hour. During all that while, none but a few stragglers passed this portion of the deserted street. Then, from an alleyway, came blackness.

Obscure at his arrival, The Shadow became momentarily visible as he moved into the center of the street.

A sharp observer might have caught an instantaneous impression of a cloaked and hatted figure, as this bold adventurer blocked the glow from far down the thoroughfare.

Another instant; The Shadow had merged with the darkness in front of Koy Dow’s. He crowded close against the blackened door that the Chinaman had so recently locked.

The Shadow knew this place. That was to his advantage. Acquainted with the existence of the secret lookout, he also had some knowledge of the shop itself. The door was no obstacle; in fact, Koy Dow had cleverly arranged that it would not be.

Within a minute, The Shadow had opened the barrier. Closing it behind him, he came into the stillness of the shop. A tiny flashlight blinked upon golden tapestries and jade ornaments as The Shadow threaded to the rear of the shop.

The Silver Dragon had a rear passage that The Shadow quickly found. He pressed past a hanging curtain, blinked his way ahead and came to the outside of the paneled door. The tiny flashlight showed a button. The Shadow’s gloved hand pressed it. The panel opened.

Flashlight blinked out. It went beneath the cloak; gloved hands swept outward, each with a brandished automatic as The Shadow sprang across the threshold. His blazing eyes saw Harry Vincent on the floor; but his motions showed readiness to encounter any lurking foemen.

The panel closed with a click. The Shadow shot a glance toward it; then laughed softly. He could open that barrier later. Present business was the rescue of his agent.

Sweeping his automatics beneath his cloak, The Shadow stooped to release Harry’s bonds.

Harry had been drugged prior to shipment from Rook Hollister’s hideout. He had come half to his senses to find himself impounded in this bizarre room, that looked unreal to his distorted vision.

The arrival of The Shadow had given him a return to normalcy. As The Shadow began to cut the bonds, Harry managed to raise his head. Staring, he looked beyond The Shadow’s shoulder, toward the paneled entrance. Though the wall remained unchanging, Harry caught a slight wave of hanging banners. He sensed a vibration from the floor.

The entire room was moving downward! The Shadow, apparently, did not realize it.

Harry tried to gasp a warning. The Shadow reached down and loosed the gag from between his agent’s teeth. But words were not ready when Harry wanted them. Harry’s jaw quivered; his tongue was numbed. He could do no more than make an inarticulate motion with his lips.

FROM behind the lookout slits, Buzz and Blitz were watching with elation. Koy Dow was clamping the arms of the lieutenants. The Chinaman’s clawlike finger nails dug through coat sleeves as Koy Dow indicated that no move must be made.

The caution was unnecessary. Both of Koy Dow’s companions were satisfied. They saw now why the loopholes were long, vertical slits that ran almost to the ceiling of the sinking room.

Through these slits, they could watch the progress of the room itself. The Shadow, as he released the prisoner, was going downward as in an elevator. Then, as the figures reached a point a dozen feet below, the ceiling of the room came by. View of the trap was cut off. Instead, the floor of an upper room settled into place.

The Shadow had walked into an elevator, large in size, which had all the semblance of an ordinary room.

He and the prisoner whom he had come to rescue were trapped within cellar walls that surrounded the sides of the camouflaged elevator.

Buzz and Blitz had seen the trap work earlier in the day; but they had viewed it from the passage in the Silver Dragon. Tonight, they had gained the pleasure of seeing its action up until the final moment when The Shadow and Harry Vincent had reached the bottom of the pit.

DOWN below, Harry Vincent was managing to blurt out words. Incoherently, he was trying to explain the present plight. Then came a jolt that announced the bottom of the shaft.

The Shadow came upright. An instant later, the room was plunged into darkness.

Harry sank back, despairing. Then, above him, he heard the sibilant tones of a whispered taunt. The Shadow’s mirth prevailed within this room of darkness, as though the mysterious master had found the element that was his choice.

“Come!”

The single word followed the echoes of that hissed mockery. A gloved hand gripped Harry’s shoulder.

The released prisoner was drawn to his feet.

Harry found his balance; then wavered unsteadily. A flashlight glimmered; The Shadow steadied his agent.

Across the room, toward the paneled door that had descended with them. Such was the course that The Shadow took. The flashlight glimmered on the panel; Harry rested against the wall as he watched The Shadow’s hand probe the circle of light.

Harry wondered at The Shadow’s purpose. This room was nothing but an inner shell, The door was useless, now that the chamber had descended amid stone walls that formed the foundation of the Silver Dragon.

Moreover, Harry recalled that when captors had left him they had been forced to knock for exit. The door could not he opened from the inside. Yet The Shadow seemed persistent in such effort.

Click!

The Shadow had found some hidden spring. The panel slid open. A puff of air whisked inward. The flashlight carved a glimmering path through darkness. The Shadow urged Harry toward the spot where the agent had believed that stone foundations stood.

Another secret of Koy Dow’s strange premises. An underground passage of which The Shadow knew.

An exit below ground that matched the one above.

Dazed, Harry found The Shadow conducting him through a maze of narrow paths that were tunneled through foundation walls.

Away from Koy Dow’s. Off toward the heart of Chinatown. They were traveling catacombs that must once have formed the secret dugouts during the days of the Chinese tong wars. Yawning caverns looked like former arsenals wherein the members of battled factions had drilled for battle.

The flashlight showed a stairway. Up stone steps, through a grated door; then came another barrier; finally a passage. The Shadow opened a final door and drew Harry into the darkness of a secluded street.

THE flashlight blinked no longer, but Harry noted the parking lights of a cab. The Shadow opened the door of the vehicle; Harry climbed aboard. He heard a whispered order:

“Report.”

Mechanically, Harry answered.

“Rook Hollister,” he said, steadily. “In the penthouse. Two stories above the Roof Cafe of the Hotel Moselle. Clyde Burke still a prisoner there—”

A fierce hiss interrupted. The Shadow saw blackness stiffen. Sharp words came in low but commanding utterance as The Shadow responded to this unexpected news.

Harry’s words were but brief phrases as The Shadow demanded details. Swiftly, the cloaked rescuer learned how Harry and Clyde had been trapped; how they had been quizzed; then ignored until this night.

Harry told how he had been dragged out and forced to the storeroom on the floor below Rook’s hideout. How he had been packed in a shipping box; then drugged for his journey.

Of one thing, Harry was sure: Rook Hollister had retained Clyde Burke. Harry recalled brief statements that he had overheard. Mention of the fact that he was to be placed within a trap; that Clyde would be reserved for a later occasion.

The report ended abruptly. The Shadow’s whisper carried brief commands. Harry heard them; so did the driver of the cab. Moe Shrevnitz was the man at the wheel.

Then blackness closed the door. Harry thought he caught a faint swish as The Shadow moved away. The cab jolted forward. Moe was taking Harry from this district.

But The Shadow had remained. His ways were to be his own. Brief duties held him; then would come the final move. One agent rescued, The Shadow was faced with the task of saving another whose plight was desperate.