The Black Hush

CHAPTER XVI. OUT OF THE VAULT

THE same pall that had stopped the train on the elevated had accomplished another purpose. It had cast its strange blackness upon the polished face of the low-storied New City Bank.

As completely as if an invisible hand had stretched forth to wipe it away, the white marble front of the strong-walled edifice had been blanked into oblivion by a powerful ray of superdarkness.

Joe Cardona and his raiding squad had not arrived in this locality. While they were still hurrying to the spot, the first stroke had come. Amid a barrage of total gloom, men of crime were advancing to attack the vault of the blotted bank.

A tremendous hush lay over this one low building. It formed perfect coverage for the unseen men who were moving up to the side of the New City Bank.

Zoom!

An explosion made the side of the bank building tremble. But even that blast which blew the door clear of its fastenings was no more than a low rumble. The blanketing effect of the hush seemed to stifle all sounds within its enveloping folds.

Mobsmen pressed forward. They were entering a building equipped with all the most modern of alarm devices, but tonight they did not fear these mechanical sentinels. Every electrical apparatus in the entire bank had gone out of order when the black hush had struck.

Watchmen?

They were powerless, too. Telephonic communication was ended. Flashlights and powerful electric lanterns would not avail. Ping Slatterly thought of that fact with relish as he ignited the strong acetylene torch which was to play so important a part in this raid.

Immune from interference, the strong gleam lighted up the interior of the bank. A watchman scurried away as gangster shots were directed toward him. With his men forming a protecting cordon to meet stray shots from the darkness, Ping Slatterly headed for the vault which he had come to crack.

THE acetylene light shone upon the vault. Ping lowered the gleam so that his safe-blowers could prepare.

This would be a job as quick as the one at the outside door.

The gang leader gave a muffled laugh. The outside explosion could not have been heard very far away due to the sound-stilling gloom. This blast would not be heard at all. It required a larger charge, but the walls of the bank would aid the black hush in its silencing power.

“Ready?”

Ping’s voice had a hushed sound in the midst of that strange scene, where even the downward-turned gleam of the lantern was forced to penetrate a murky haze.

Growls of assent were the reply to Ping’s question. The men moved forward. Ping Slatterly turned his lantern up to the big door of the vault. An audible gasp escaped the mob leader’s thick lips.

Impelled by a power from within, the door of the vault was swinging open. As it moved wide, from the interior came a glare as forceful as the one from the lantern which Ping Slatterly carried.

Some being from within the vault was meeting the rays of the acetylene lantern with another illuminating device of the same type!

Ping Slatterly could not see the person behind that light, but the other could see him, for the light within the vault was focused with even greater power.

Moreover, the strange, unexpected intruder was able to observe Ping’s gang of followers. In the misty illumination, every one of the invaders was in plain view.

The light was astonishing in itself. Blinding, it came as a terrific counteragent to Ping Slatterly’s first weapon of attack. But another token of a formidable presence within the vault brought dread consternation to the gang leader and all his band of ruffians.

From the hollow interior of the vault came a sound that no man of the underworld could fail to recognize.

It was a laugh that broke with rising echoes — a sinister burst of derisive mirth that seemed to shatter the spell of the black hush.

The laugh of The Shadow!

Cognizant of the plans to raid the New City Bank, knowing the hour for which the attack had been arranged, The Shadow had entered this building long before — while the bank had still been open.

Keeping in seclusion, he had managed to elude discovery by the watchman. Familiar with every ingenious contrivance of vault protection, The Shadow had worked upon that massive door, and had opened it without detection. He had chosen it as the vital spot from which he could strike against the crooks when they appeared.

The Shadow’s method had proven its worth. He was here to meet the enemy. He had caught Ping Slatterly and his gangsters flat-footed.

The opening of the door; the appearance of the powerful light; the mighty laugh of The Shadow — these acts of gangdom’s greatest enemy had been timed to exactitude.

MEANWHILE, unknown to Ping Slatterly and his henchmen, forces of the law were coming to this beleaguered spot. The Shadow’s purpose was to meet the crooks with a surprise attack, and drive them in flight into the toils of Joe Cardona!

An amazing scene — this meeting between The Shadow and the hosts of crime. While that ringing laugh hurtled from the vault, the gang leader and his men stood like petrified figures, unmoving characters in a sordid tableau.

So had The Shadow planned; now, he acted with full precision. A shot burst from the vault. Like the first stroke which The Shadow had delivered at Thaddeus Harmon’s penthouse, this one was again directed at the acetylene lantern in Slatterly’s hand.

The bullet reached its gleaming target. Ping’s lantern was shattered. The gang leader dropped back, unwounded by the deflected bullet.

Revolver in hand, he cried to his men to reply in kind. The Shadow’s lantern made a shining bull’s-eye.

Behind it was The Shadow himself!

So Ping Slatterly had reasoned. The gang leader, however, had not reckoned with the wisdom of The Shadow.

That lantern was not in The Shadow’s hand. It was propped upon a stack of boxes in the vault. Below it, prone upon the floor, lay The Shadow. His form was protected by a raised ledge of steel that ran along the bottom of the vault at the very front!

As Ping Slatterly pressed finger to revolver trigger, The Shadow’s automatic roared. Loosing his powerful .45s, The Shadow directed one squarely toward Ping Slatterly, while the other began a sweeping motion about the semicircle of mobsmen.

Ping Slatterly fell, an oath upon his lips. The sight of their leader dropping, the spatter of bullets aimed in their direction — these were tokens that threw the mobsmen into confusion. One gangster paused to fire at the lantern in the vault. His shot went wide. He never dispatched another. Like Ping Slatterly, he crumpled as an automatic roared. The other mobsmen were scrambling to shelter. They dashed for the protection of marble walls, seeking to avoid the glare that outlined them. The Shadow’s shots, quick as a warning, were intermittent as the gunmen fled.

The Shadow knew where they would go — out through the broken door — into the forces of the law that awaited them there. His task was to deal first with those who attempted resistance to his might.

Ping Slatterly — a second mobster — these had fallen. A third, turning to crouch on the verge of the area of light, fell wounded as a bullet from an automatic shattered his revolver arm. The man screamed as he dived after his companions. His hoarse cry was strangely suppressed by the blanketing hush.

Again came the laugh of The Shadow! This master fighter who struck from darkness, had beaten back the invaders by his irresistible might. Not one shot had reached that glowing lantern which gave The Shadow his advantage over his enemies. He had beaten a dozen and more men of crime to the first shots.

As the last of the defeated invaders fled from the room where Ping Slatterly lay before the opened vault, The Shadow arose from his place of protection. The light moved forward as he gripped it. The door of the vault swung shut.

The Shadow’s ambush had succeeded. Now, with one automatic in his hidden right hand — a fresh weapon which had come from beneath his cloak — The Shadow moved forward in steady pursuit of the fleeing mobsmen.

The glaring acetylene headlight cut a misty swath through the smudgy gloom. Its penetrating rays, reaching every cranny, were seen by the last of the fleeing mobsmen, now well ahead in the darkness.

The moving threat impelled every departing rat to scurry to the only exit that seemed to offer safety — that opened door which Ping Slatterly had so boldly blasted from its mighty hinges.

Watchmen, saved from destruction, still cowered in spots of safety. They did not know what had happened; they, like the fleeing mobsmen, also avoided the acetylene glare. Then, with the same suddenness with which it had appeared, The Shadow’s light went out.

A triumphant laugh stirred up feeble echoes amid the awesome atmosphere of the black hush. The final whispers died away. The Shadow, lurking in the gloom, was planning his secret departure, timing it with the confusion which was due to break outside of the bank when the mobsters met the police.

Single-handed, The Shadow had brought disaster to these fiends of crime amid the pall which they had sought. Once again, the perpetrators of the black hush had been foiled!