The Creeper

CHAPTER XV. THE SHADOW’S RESCUE

FACED with immediate fray, The Shadow had sized the situation. Across the room was chaos; at that spot, men were spreading with varied purposes.

Some, mere patrons of the place, were dashing toward a doorway, anxious to get clear of a space that would soon be a battlefield. Others — those drawing guns — were vicious scoundrels who knew how to handle their gats. A round dozen, they were the enemies whom The Shadow soon must meet.

For the present instant, he had others with whom to deal: three who were apprentices at hand-to-hand conflict, but murderous, nevertheless. Hal, Wally and Steve — the three had come here keyed to kill. In the excitement, they were at fever pitch, strained to a point where they would face any foe.

They were ready with revolvers. They saw the cloaked battler, ready with his bulging automatics. They caught the blaze of burning eyes. The three touts opened combat. Steve and Wally fired first; their hasty shots sizzled wide of The Shadow. Hal, alone, gained an instant bead; but he found no chance to fire.

Before he could press the hair trigger of his gat, Jerry Kobal sprang forward and hurled him to the floor.

The Shadow’s automatics boomed simultaneously. Wally and Steve were his targets. Both staggered, their gun arms dropping. The Shadow whirled. The room roared with a cannonade. Thugs were opening fire from behind slot machines. The Shadow was answering with booming, wide-sprayed shots.

Crook-dispatched bullets whistled wide. A few of The Shadow’s slugs found human targets; but others bashed against the steel posts of the slot machines. These vicious fighters had overturned the gambling devices, to use them as entrenchments. They had cut off The Shadow from the further door; they were firing to block his exit by the other direction.

Only by a sudden reversal of his course did The Shadow trick the frenzied marksmen who sought his life.

Then, before the thugs could concentrate their aim, new shots ripped inward from the entrance at the stairway. Cliff Marsland had dashed up from below. Reaching the room, he found himself on a line with the bulwarked sharpshooters who were aiming for The Shadow.

Cliff’s shots roared down the alley behind the overturned slot machines. One aiming thug sprawled; his fall cleared the way for Cliff to clip another. This enfilading fire was too much. Wildly, The Shadow’s enemies leaped from their improvised trench and went diving for a doorway that led to Townley’s office.

Noncombatants had already sought that shelter.

Half of The Shadow’s foemen remained sprawled on the floor. Between them, The Shadow and Cliff had accounted for that number. Final blasts from The Shadow’s automatics spurred on the ones who fled, urging them to greater hurry. Only two remained: Townley, down behind his counter; Tom, cowering with upraised arms.

Neither had seen Cliff; nor would they believe — later — that he had figured in the fray. Fearfully, they had been watching The Shadow, hoping only that they would be spared from his barrage.

BUT all the while, another conflict had been raging on the floor. A struggle between Jerry and Hal, the two flattened below the line of zipping bullets that had whistled across the room. Jerry had fought to gain Hal’s gun; he had been succeeding until the very moment of The Shadow’s victory.

In that instant, Hal had twisted upward. Freeing his gun arm, he had driven it downward to deliver a stunning crash against Jerry’s skull. Catching the ex-crook’s limp body, Hal swung it as a shield in front of him. With surprising skill, the tout thrust his revolver beneath Jerry’s arm and aimed point-blank for The Shadow.

An automatic roared. It found the only vulnerable point — the edge of Hal’s left shoulder. The tout jolted sidewise as he received the searing flesh wound; but he did not lose his aim. His finger, though, faltered for a full second. It was in that interval that Cliff jabbed an angled shot from the doorway. Hal’s turn had given Cliff an opening which The Shadow had not gained.

The tout slumped. Jerry, limp and stunned, pitched forward on the floor. The Shadow swept in from the far doorway, while Cliff dived for the wall near the head of the stairs. There he found light switches and clicked them. The dive was plunged into darkness.

Automatics tongued long flashes through the smoky blackness. They were warning shots, those last stabs from the mighty guns. Warnings to the crooks in Townley’s office to stay where they were.

As echoes died, Cliff heard a hissed command. He joined The Shadow; together they hoisted Jerry Kobal’s form and headed through the door that led to the adjoining house.

Descending stairs, they reached a rear passage that led to the street. Jerry’s limp body went aboard Moe’s cab. Cliff followed; the taxi sped away. The Shadow was sending the hunted man to a place of safety, where he would have a physician’s care. Then The Shadow, himself, strode swiftly on his way.

His move was timely.

Clubs were pounding sidewalks on the avenue: patrolmen, signaling for aid. Radio patrol cars were roaring into view. Officers headed into the cigar store; others, guessing at a rear exit, were heading to the side street. New battle followed. It began when three policemen reached Townley’s upstairs joint.

Tom had crept over to turn on the lights. Thugs and scared-faced slot machine players had surged from the office. Seeing the police, they made for the same exit that The Shadow had chosen. The officers were met by only two resisters: Wally and Steve, who had been crippled by The Shadow’s first shots.

Huddled in front of the counter, the wounded touts went mad. They had been sent here to kill; kill they would, now that their first agonies were ended. The Shadow had left them wounded, for the law to capture. They, themselves, were the ones who changed the decision. Gripping their revolvers, both Wally and Steve began to fire at the police.

THE bluecoats responded. Weakened, Wally and Steve fired wildly. Quick shots from police revolvers mowed them to the floor. Keeping on, the officers took up the chase of the men who had gone out through the emergency exit.

Gunfire from below. The fleeing customers had been trapped between two bands of police. They would surrender; soon the officers would be back.

Townley and Tom were scrambling about, unlocking slot machines. They were hastily unloading quarter dollars to hide the silver before the law took charge. They had no time to notice a huddled man who crawled up from the floor.

It was Hal, the last of the three touts; the one man who formed a link back to Zimmer Funson, the only one who could send word to The Creeper. Cliff had dropped the would-be murderer; but only with a hasty bullet. Though wounded, Hal was in no serious plight. Gaining his feet, he steadied and made his way to Townley’s deserted office.

Sinking into a chair, Hal picked up a telephone from the desk. He put in a call to Zimmer. Coolly, the tout stated the facts as he remembered them. His tone was steady, although he clipped his statements short.

“I got Jerry Kobal,” declared Hal. “Yeah. He’s through… Maybe they lugged him away; but not till after I’d crowned him… Who? The Shadow… Yeah, The Shadow… Sure, he was here; but he didn’t keep Kobal from blabbing…

“He got rid of the scroll… Yeah, Kobal did… To-night. That’s when… Handed it to an old geezer who gave him five grand… Sure. I remember the name: Montague Rayne… That’s right. Montague Rayne. I said Rayne — not Wayne… Begins with an R; that’s right…

“The cops? Yeah, they’re here. They finished Wally and Steve… Yeah, both of them; but they won’t get me… What’s that? Not a chance. I’ll shoot my way out of here if I have to… Don’t worry; nobody will be wise. They won’t know you were in it, Zimmer…”

Hal hung up. Steadily he arose, and drew a revolver from his pocket. His gold teeth glittered as he formed an ugly grin. He walked to the door and opened it. He stopped short at sight of a stocky, swarthy-faced man who was standing in the center of the room, holding a gun while he ordered Townley and Tom to cease their scrambling for quarters.

Hal snarled; he knew the arrival’s face: Detective Joe Cardona, acting inspector at present. Even a race-track tout would know Joe Cardona.

JOE heard the snarl; he straightened on the instant, aiming his revolver instinctively as he saw Hal draw a bead on him. The tout’s finger was on the hair trigger when Joe Cardona fired. The quick shot that jabbed from Joe’s stubby gun was the only move that could have stayed Hal’s murderous purpose.

Like Wally and Steve, Hal had come here to kill. He had been stopped before; he was stopped again.

He wavered; his trembling finger lacked even the trifling strength that was necessary to yank the hair trigger. Knees gave way; the boastful tout floundered and sprawled upon the floor.

There were other bodies about. Those of thugs; of Wally and Steve. But this final addition brought a last hush to the fray. Townley and Tom stared with drawn faces. Joe Cardona turned to them, after a look at Hal’s dead face. The ace detective spoke soberly.

“He’s no gorilla, that fellow.” Cardona shook his head. “If he had been, he’d have quit. This was his first try at murder. It’s the new ones who are the toughest sometimes. They’re after blood; they don’t calculate. Too bad I had to shoot him; I wouldn’t have had a chance, if I hadn’t.”

As Cardona said, it was “too bad.” Not that Hal had died; for the tout had deserved his fate. But in dropping him, Joe Cardona had unwittingly performed a service for The Creeper, arch-foe of the law.

He had cut off the last link between to-night’s attempted crime and Zimmer Funson.

Had Hal — or his pals — remained alive to blab Zimmer’s name, one of The Creeper’s chief lieutenants would have been put in a bad spot. The Shadow had left those possible informants alive; policemen and Joe Cardona, to save their own lives, had been forced to finish the careers of all three.

Moreover, Hal had passed the word to Zimmer. The news would reach The Creeper. That supercrook would gain the name of Montague Rayne; thus he would know the person to whom Jerry Kobal had passed the precious scroll of parchment.

The Creeper’s thrust had succeeded, despite the loss of three henchmen. The Creeper would regard it as a real success; he cared nothing for a trio of Zimmer’s touts.

New opportunity for The Creeper. A new quest — the search for Montague Rayne, the unexpected factor who had entered the game. Yet The Creeper’s path would not be smooth. There was still a power with whom he must contend. The Shadow had rescued Jerry Kobal, despite Hal’s belief to the contrary.

Whatever The Creeper had learned, The Shadow would know also.

Keen, crafty, his very identity unknown, The Creeper remained formidable. But there was one who moved as cunningly as he; one whose love of justice was greater even than The Creeper’s urge for evil; one whose ways were also hidden beneath the cloak of darkness.

That one was The Shadow, whose might had prevailed to-night; that super being whose prowess could conquer all odds.