Maxwell Grant - The Shadow - 264 - Wizard of Crime

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WIZARD OF CRIME
by Walter Gibson
As originally published in "The Shadow Magazine," February 15, 1943.
Money was his power, men his pawns. He was King Kauger, mystery man of
murder and death. Could The Shadow match his wizardry?
CHAPTER I
MURDER BAIT
THIN, sharp, the flashlight beam stabbed through the darkness. Small but
powerful, the concentrated ray licked along the wall like a probing eye, to
focus on a door with a panel of frosted glass.
Spotted in the disk of light was the name:
CHEMICANA INC.
There came a laugh, seemingly imparted by the darkness itself. A
whispered
laugh, uncanny even to its echoes, which persisted through the corridor
outside
the frosted door. A tone that could be heard only by the being who uttered it,
for there was no one else in this tenth-floor corridor.
No one else!
It seemed more that there was no one at all. The flashlight was moving of
its own accord; the walls themselves were producing the sibilant mirth. These
were ghostly manifestations, rather than human. For no further sound nor stir
came from the void of blackness; nothing to prove that such inky space
contained a living figure!
The light crept downward, sideward, and wrapped itself around a doorknob,
where a heavy lock showed beneath. Odd how the glow gathered itself in a
smaller circle when it found this new objective. Actually, the flashlight
itself was approaching the door, thus accounting for the behavior of the
glowing spot. But that fact was not apparent until something more phenomenal
occurred.
Into the tiny glow came a gloved hand. It was black, like the void from
which it emerged, and the glove was very thin, so silken that it did not
conceal the movement of the supple fingers within. Momentarily, the hand
merged
with the encroaching fringe of blackness; then, with a deft flip, the fingers
reappeared, dangling a ring of keys gained by some swift trick.
Brought from blackness behind the spotted light, those keys did not
jangle. The hand itself prevented any telltale sound. Any of those keys might
have fitted the lock in question, for all looked shaped to it. But the magic
hand dealt in fine discriminations, for after a momentary pause, it let all
the
keys save one go sliding silently to the bottom of the ring.
The chosen key did more than fit the lock. It opened it.
Inside the suite of Chemicana, Inc., the light became very cautious. It
was masked in part by what seemed a fold of cloth as it turned to guide the
hand that closed and locked the door. Then the guarded glow was burrowing its
path through a sumptuous reception room, to a corner door that bore the word:
PRIVATE
No key was needled here. The light extinguished as a hand turned the
knob.
The tiny glow was no longer needed, for a certain amount of night light came
through the large windows facing the tenth-floor offices of Chemicana, Inc.
The
vague light added to the eerie character of the intruder who had reached the
inner precincts of the Chemicana offices.
Amid the dimness, the invader was a dream shape that flowed along the
inner passage. His very presence seemed an illusion. Had the light been
stronger, he would have shown as something more of substance, a figure cloaked
in black, his head topped by a slouch hat that totally hid his features.
Only one being in all the world answered to that remarkable description:
The Shadow!
CRIME HUNTER extraordinary, The Shadow was noted for his skill at probing
into schemes of evil. His mere appearance on these premises was proof that
crime threatened. That could be why his singular glide showed momentary pauses
at each door he passed.
Those doors were marked. One bore the title "Sample-Room"; another stated
"Conference Room." At the end of the passage was a door marked "Storeroom," so
The Shadow came back to examine those along the other side of the passage. He
reached a door that was glass-paneled, like the entrance to Chemicana, Inc.
It bore the legend:
WALDO PAXTON PRESIDENT
A gloved hand emerged from The Shadow's cloak. It brought another ring of
keys that did not jangle. Almost in the lock of the president's door, the key
stopped short. This time, The Shadow's hidden lips did not throb a laugh.
Instead, his eyes revealed themselves with a burning force in the faint light.
The Shadow was looking toward the door next to the president's office. It
was titled "Strong Room," but that was only half the story. More important was
the detail that the room needed no key to open it. The padlock, once
formidable, was shattered and hanging from its staple; while beside it the
hasp
was swung back free.
Whoever had entered the strong room was indeed in a predicament, if still
there. All The Shadow had to do was remove the dangling padlock, press the
hasp
across the staple and wedge it home. Even the broken padlock could be used to
bar the escape of marauders who might now be in the strong room, their work of
robbery yet incomplete.
It wasn't The Shadow's way to deal in possibilities - nor even
probabilities - when realities were at hand, inviting personal observation.
Whichever the strong room might reveal - robbery in progress, or evidence of
completed crime The Shadow intended to uncover it for what it was.
In the dimness, The Shadow melted through the doorway of the strong room.
There was just one change in the appearance of the door. Instead of being
tightly shut as The Shadow had found it, the barrier was slightly ajar.
So trifling was the difference that, to observe it, a person would have
to
creep up to the door itself. That was why The Shadow left it slightly open. He
wanted to detect any outside approach. The Shadow was confident that other
persons could not duplicate the stealth that he had demonstrated.
Within the strong room, the night light was clearer. The room had larger
windows, and they were barred.
The Shadow was on the probe, holding a leveled automatic that he had
drawn
from his cloak in place of the flashlight. The gun muzzle nosed about as of
its
own accord, poking from what seemed a living blackout. When he had satisfied
himself that the square-shaped strong room was devoid of other occupants, The
Shadow turned his attention to the large safe that occupied an alcove in the
far wall.
Modern in construction, bulky in size, the safe fairly glowered its
challenge at burglars. Its dials were like shiny eyes, the handle below them a
straight-lipped mouth. From its present appearance, the safe had laughed in
its
own way at the previous visitors to the strong room, for it looked as tight as
a
drum.
Reaching the safe, The Shadow shifted slightly to the left, so that an
intervening table would completely obscure him from anyone entering by the
door. Then, with his head tilted, listening for the possible return of the
missing burglars, The Shadow began to work the dials of the safe.
An incongruous situation, this!
The Shadow, master of justice, picking up where men of crime had left
off!
THIS situation could not, however, be judged by superficial appearances.
It went much deeper - to the heart of the safe itself. As yet, The Shadow had
no proof that crime stood unaccomplished. That could not be established until
The Shadow had seen the contents of the safe himself.
Efforts with the dials tended toward a negative answer in the question of
robbery. The Shadow was finding the safe difficult, even under his expert
treatment. Nevertheless, The Shadow continued working on the combination,
confident that he could accomplish what those before him had failed to do. For
The Shadow had a method whereby he could increase the efficiency of his
manipulation. From beneath his cloak he produced an instrument like an
earphone, attached to a suction cup. With this device were wires and a plug
which The Shadow inserted in a wall socket beside the safe.
Satisfied that no lurkers were outside the strong-room door, The Shadow
pressed the earphone against the safe front and listened intently while he
worked the dials. Thanks to the electrical contrivance, he could pick up the
amplified sound of falling tumblers. Under this process of detection, the
combination promised little further difficulty.
There was one thing odd about the tumblers. Their falls were followed by
a
slight ticking sound. This became more apparent as The Shadow paused, proving
that the ticking wasn't due to the tumblers at all. The sound couldn't mean a
time lock, for this safe wasn't of that type.
Listening to ticks instead of tumblers, The Shadow followed their
constant
beat for about a dozen seconds. He then noted that though the ticks continued,
they were accompanied by another sound, much like a faint whir. Hardly had the
added noise begun, before The Shadow was in rapid action.
Gripping the earphone, he twisted its suction cup free. With the same
wrench, The Shadow jerked the cord from the floor socket. In the same swift
process, he was coming to his feet, wheeling about to begin a lunge across the
room, away from the direction of the intervening table.
One second more and The Shadow would have gained his goal, the most
distant corner of the room. But the whirring mechanism within the safe had
already reached the striking point. With a mighty cough, the safe exploded,
flinging its steel doors wide. The cough became a mighty blast that quaked the
entire room with its concussion, jarring plaster from the walls and ceiling,
sending quiverers to the very foundations of the ten-story loft building.
A great belch of spreading flame split the darkness as vividly as
lightning. The outside night glow was a pitiful thing compared to that gush of
brilliance. The fierce glare showed furniture thudding the cracking walls, to
bounce back in a strew of wreckage. Amid that barrage reeled the cloaked
figure
of The Shadow.
Flame was gone and in its place issued a huge pour of stifling smoke to
blanket the entire scene. A swirl of thick vapor filled the room like a
monstrous genie. It was a cloud that seemed to possess a crushing force.
Beneath that murderous pall lay a cloaked figure, silent, motionless,
unseen; that of the lone venturer who had entered this room where a cataclysm
awaited such human victims as himself. Whoever the men of evil that designed
this horrible climax, they had planned well according to their misguided
lights.
The Shadow, master of justice, had come here seeking evidence of crime.
Instead, crime had found The Shadow!
CHAPTER II
BELOW AND ABOVE
TEN floors below, two astonished men were picking themselves up from the
sidewalk. One man, young and wiry, stooped to give his companion a helping
hand. If he'd been a trifle slower with the Samaritan act, it would have been
misunderstood - for at that moment a policeman came dashing from a corner with
a drawn gun.
The cop thought for a moment that the young man had slugged old Crowell,
the building watchman. Then seeing that the stranger was helping, not
hindering, the policeman lowered his revolver.
The young man turned as he heard the cop's arriving clatter. Briskly, he
introduced himself.
"I'm Fred Murdock," he said. "Technician working for Chemicana, Inc. I
was
here waiting for Mr. Paxton, president of the company. Crowell was going to
show
us up to the offices."
The cop nodded, then looked at Crowell. The old watchman was still
bewildered, looking at the building and shaking his head. He couldn't
understand how the walls had come out, knocked him down, and then gone in
again.
Actually, it wasn't the explosion that had jarred Crowell to the
sidewalk.
Fred had flung him there while making his own dive, the moment that the blast
came.
Before the officer could speak to Crowell, there was a sound of a motor
from across the street. The cop swung about, but only in time to see a taxicab
wheeling the corner. Turning to Fred, the bluecoat queried:
"That the cab you came in?"
Fred shook his head.
"I came by subway," he replied. "The cab was parked across the street
when
I arrived. If it's all the same to you, officer, I'd suggest that we
concentrate
on the explosion. It was so high up, it may have happened in the Chemicana
office. We have some explosives in the sample room, on the other side of the
building."
Gesturing upward as he spoke, Fred was startled to learn that the
explosion hadn't happened in the sample room. Dull-blue smoke was pouring from
barred windows on this side of the tenth floor. The issuing cloud was proof
that the blast had come from the strong room.
How anyone had gotten there, Fred couldn't guess. It would have taken a
human fly to scale the walls of this office building, where windows were
irregular and sparse. But that wasn't the matter at stake. The question was:
who was in the strong room, and why?
The moment Fred broached that question, the cop responded:
"Come on!"
It wasn't as easy as it sounded.
First, they had to shake old Crowell from his daze, so that he could
produce the necessary keys. Nor was it just a matter of unlocking the big door
of the building. After that, there was a large grilled gate that would have to
be opened to reach the stairway to the basement, so that Crowell could unlock
the switch box that controlled the elevators.
All that done, there would still be a ten-story trip in a slow,
old-fashioned lift, before they even reached the Chemicana offices.
MEANWHILE, things were moving rapidly on the tenth floor. As if the
echoes
of the blast produced them, two men came from the door marked "Sample Room."
One
was broad, heavy of build, though quite as tall as his thinner, more wiry
companion, who followed the big man like a patient dog.
Both were disguised, though hardly with design. Their faces were
concealed
within objects intended for a different purpose. The men were wearing gas
masks,
acquired from among the exhibits in the sample room.
The bulky man yanked open the door of the strong room. It almost
flattened
on him, for its heavy hinges had been broken by the blast. Thrusting the door
aside, the man entered, his companion close behind him. Both appeared puzzled
by the lack of fumes, for it was anticipation of such that had caused them to
don the gas masks. Finally, the bulky man gestured toward the windows.
Shattered panes were the answer to the fume question. The outside air was
sucking the last wraith of bluish smoke. The gas masks weren't needed;
nevertheless, the pair did not remove them. Other work lay ahead, and time was
short.
Both men were wearing asbestos gloves that looked like gauntlets. As with
the gas masks, these had been borrowed from the sample room; Shoving their
heads into the large safe, the two men brought out a smaller safe, gave it a
sidewise heft and planted it on the floor.
A well-constructed strong box, this smaller safe, as modern as its big
brother. The little safe was quite intact, uninjured by the explosion. Its one
oddity was the fact that two men could lift it, for it looked heavy enough for
a dozen men!
As it was, the two men had to take a new grip in order to carry the small
safe. They were stooping, planting their gloved hands between the roller
wheels
on which the safe was mounted, when the thin man of the pair gave his chief a
sudden nudge, and pointed to a corner of the room.
There lay a shrouded cluster of blackness that definitely wasn't
furniture. The shape was human! To men of crime like these, that black cloak
and canted slouch hat could signify but one being:
The Shadow!
The bulky man lunged into action with a speed that matched the power of
his thin companion. His quick strides across the room were accompanied by a
savage snarl that couldn't be heard within his gas mask. His left hand grabbed
the gauntlet of his right, but it was the latter that peeled itself, in
whipping to his pocket, to return with a fisted gun.
Flinging the gauntlet to a table that leaned against the wall, the bulky
man aimed his revolver downward at the blackened shape that lay motionless and
helpless.
A mere tug of a trigger finger and The Shadow, menace of crimedom, would
be removed for all time.
That fact itself influenced the bulky man. His manner became calculating,
though not without semblance of a gloat. Slowly, his hand receded; the unfired
gun pushed itself into his pocket.
Reaching to the table, the gas-masked robber felt for his glove and
regained it; then, his gaze still fixed on The Shadow, he slid the gauntlet on
his hand. Heeling about, the big man reached the little safe and gestured for
his lesser companion to help him lift it.
The gesture included a motion toward The Shadow. To all intents, the
cloaked intruder was dead, a victim of his own zeal in arriving here before
crime's blow-off.
To plant bullets in that body would be folly. The evidence, as it now
stood, would brand The Shadow as the person who had blown the Chemicana safe!
Even if The Shadow lived, the case against him would stand. This was a
situation made to crime's order, and the crook in charge was proving himself
too smart to spoil it.
Toting the small safe out from the strong room, the crooks headed to the
storeroom at the rear of the passage, shouldering its door open as they
arrived. They weren't wasting time rolling the safe, because their objective
was a flight of steps, steep as a ladder, that led from the rear of the
storeroom up to the roof.
Working the safe up the steps, the pair reached a barred door at the top.
No time wasted here, for they had a handy battering-ram - the portable safe
itself. They shoved it against the door and the principle of inertia did the
rest. The door simply couldn't stand the momentum packed by the squatly safe.
The door shattered, its bar crumpling with it. A neat artifice, this, for it
gave the door the appearance of having been jimmied from the outside, rather
than smashed from within.
THAT stroke accomplished something more. Its dull echoes thudded down the
steps, through the passage and into the shattered strong room. They seemed to
stir the blue-tinted atmosphere wherein the fumes were almost gone. Likewise,
the echoes stirred blackness, for The Shadow heard them.
A gloved hand poked upward from cloak folds, bearing an automatic. Though
groggy, The Shadow had been clutching that weapon, ready to use it. If the big
man with the gas mask had lingered a few moments longer, he would have
received
a bullet from the victim he thought was dead.
Another hand lifted and reached. It caught the leaning table, which
promptly clattered when The Shadow's weight put too much strain on its one
good
leg. The Shadow sagged again, but the slight jolt roused him further. Drawing
himself up beside the wall, he reeled to the window and gained long drafts of
reviving air.
From somewhere deep in the building, The Shadow heard a muffled rumble
announcing the upward start of an elevator. Above his head, he caught other
sounds, the scrape of feet, the rolling of a heavy object. Without waiting to
examine the big safe that stood broken in its alcove, The Shadow turned from
the strong room. In the passage, he saw the open door at the rear, the steep
steps deep in the storeroom.
On the roof, the two burglars had just finished pushing a ladder across
to
the top of a neighboring office building. They were back at the safe, rolling
it
in the other direction. A cute trick, a decoy trail, as evidenced by the
ladder.
Their real objective was the opposite side of the roof, where a skylight
glistened in plain view. That half of the building served as a warehouse,
separated by a fire wall from the offices. The skylight would be a simple
matter when the pair reached it, and their fake trail would grant them
precious
minutes for their getaway.
This was timed crime, figured perfectly so far as Crowell, the watchman,
and any of his companions were concerned. But these two crooks hadn't reckoned
with the revival of The Shadow. They were at the safe, getting ready for
another lift, rather than leave revealing roller tracks, when a challenge
stopped them short.
It was a strange peal of mirth, coming from the square of blackness that
they had just left, a weird demand for them to face a ruthless enemy they
could
not see, whose very presence seemed unreal, considering that crooks had marked
him as helpless if not actually dead.
Sinister was that taunt, with its fierce crescendo:
The laugh of The Shadow!
CHAPTER III
FORGOTTEN TRAILS
CRIME'S sequel was reversed. Two crooks stood rooted, the bulky man and
his lean companion. Flanking the safe that they had stolen, they were open
targets for more than The Shadow's taunt. His guns would speak next, but only
if the pair refused to quail.
The Shadow was allowing the alternative of surrender. With men already
coming up in an elevator, the capture of these criminals would be immediate,
and quite satisfactory from The Shadow's viewpoint. He'd come here to learn
something about the contents of the Chemicana safe and, under present
circumstances, the best way was to let the law take over.
However, a false move by either of the startled robbers could well be the
man's last, according to The Shadow's scheme of things. The Shadow was
watching
from the level of the ladder top to see what happened. The faces of the
unmasked
pair weren't visible, for they were turned so the light was behind them, but
their actions were quite plain.
The thin man started a frantic move. Whipping off his right-hand glove,
he
started to grab for a gun, at the same time dodging behind the little safe,
which afforded a reasonable barricade. Still The Shadow's laugh persisted, for
the bulky man was seeking the same shelter from the other side, though in his
hurry, he wasn't discarding his gauntlet to pull a gun.
Companions in crime were due to meet head-on, behind the cubical shield
that wasn't big enough for both. Their wild effort to elude The Shadow was
proving itself ludicrous. He expected to see these comedians in crime come
sprawling back from their head-on collision. Therefore, The Shadow withheld
his
fire, deeming it unnecessary.
Freakish chance changed the situation. The big man managed to side-step
his diving pal. In so doing, the bulky crook grabbed the safe and wheeled it.
Sheer luck did the rest.
The safe stopped on the diagonal, a corner pointing at The Shadow. The
two
crooks struck the rear sides of the safe instead of each other, and the added
width gave each just the amount of shelter he required!
Instantly The Shadow's automatic began to stab. He was clipping the
projecting side corners of the safe, to keep crooks where they were. Their
improvised shelter was itself a handicap for the thin man, as the safe,
shunted
in front of him, was on the left side; whereas his gun was in his right hand.
The big man, more cramped for space, hadn't found time to unglove and draw his
gun.
Along with his shots, The Shadow emerged. His plan was to reach the safe,
spring across it, and batter down the opposition before it could organize. But
again, this situation was showing its freak angles.
The Shadow was hardly out of shelter before the thin crook's left hand
appeared, glove and all, lobbing an object shaped like a pineapple, that the
fellow had managed to haul from his left coat pocket.
At the same time, the bulky crook gave an angry bellow and completely
forgot himself. Relinquishing the security behind his angle of the safe, he
sprang up and floundered his hands across to stop the toss that his thin
companion made.
It was too late. The hand grenade was already on its flight.
As for The Shadow, he didn't wait to jab shots at the bulky man who had
exposed himself to fire. The Shadow's own position was more precarious,
considering that the lobbed grenade was coming straight at him. There was just
one way to avoid it, so The Shadow took it. Wheeling in the midst of his
lunge,
he dived back through the roof door, grabbing for the ladder steps on the way
down.
The grenade struck, short and wide of the doorway above, tearing out a
chunk of the roof where The Shadow had been. In his dive to shelter, the
cloaked fighter was amply ahead of the toss that came his way. The Shadow's
speed was inspired purely by his effort to be ready for a counter-thrust at
the
earliest moment.
Even as the blast resounded from the roof, The Shadow was on his feet
again, one hand clamping the ladder, the other wielding his automatic. He
intended to be back on the roof and surging for the safe before the men behind
it could gather their wits anew. Once started on such errands, The Shadow
moved
with incredible speed.
The trouble lay in getting started!
One step up the ladder, The Shadow was overhauled from behind. New
fighters were in the struggle, the clatter of their arrival drowned by the
louder burst of the wild-tossed grenade.
Fred Murdock was at the fore of this new faction. Close behind him were
the officer and the watchman. They'd finished the end of their trail to find
The Shadow!
ALL that Fred had to grab at was a blot of blackness. He'd seen The
Shadow
momentarily, against the fiery reflection of the bursting grenade; only enough
to know that there was someone on the ladder, but he was making the most of
that brief glimpse.
Finding substance in the blackness, Fred clutched hard, yelling for the
others to help him. They piled into the struggle blindly, but with results. In
grabbing nothing, they were finding something, amazing though it seemed. But
before they could identify their find as anything more than a cloaked mass
that
seemed a steel mechanism rather than a human form, The Shadow was gone from
their combined clutch.
Handicapped by the steep steps, The Shadow was forced to wheel in the
opposite direction, out through the passage. He gave a laugh as he went, for
he
wanted to draw his assailants after him, to clear the way for a quick return
to
the roof.
The Shadow was depending on darkness. But as the others sprang in chase
of
the elusive laugh, Fred found the proper light switch by the storeroom door
and
pressed it. Side by side, each with a gun, Crowell and his friend, the cop,
saw
The Shadow right ahead of them.
Both fired, and with their shots the cloaked thing vanished, leaving a
laugh that mocked the echoes of the gunfire.
But The Shadow's pursuers weren't long deceived, for they saw the door of
the sample room almost at the spot where The Shadow had disappeared.
Overtaking
them, Fred went boldly through the doorway and clicked another light switch.
Turning, he saw The Shadow halting by an exhibit case in the corner.
As he heard Fred's shout, The Shadow plucked an object from the shelf and
whipped it across his shoulder as he swung about. He caught a brief glimpse of
two excited men coming through the doorway, both waving guns his way. Then
came
a burst of light so brilliant that the whole room seemed to quiver under its
blinding blaze!
The Shadow had uncorked a magnesium flare!
That sample of the Chemicana wares left men completely dazed. It didn't
bother The Shadow, for knowing what was coming, he had flung his cloak across
his eyes. Thus baffling his pursuers, he was off to his own chase again, but
instead of going up to the roof, he took the elevator outside the office door,
hoping to intercept the two crooks when they reached the street by their own
route.
The men in the sample room didn't even hear the elevator. When they
recuperated, they supposed that The Shadow had fled by the roof route.
Following that course, they came upon a barren scene. Burglars were gone, so
was their safe - things about which these pursuers knew nothing - and there
wasn't a sign of The Shadow.
What Crowell, the watchman, finally saw, and pointed out to the patrolman
from the local beat, was the ladder that the safe-stealers had laid across to
another building. So the two took to the precarious bridge, thinking they were
on the right trail.
It was Fred alone who saw the roller marks leading to the skylight in the
warehouse section of the building. Crooks had chosen the easiest way of moving
the safe along, after their encounter with The Shadow.
THE skylight was loose, so Fred raised it. Below, he saw a stairway and
the closed door of a freight-elevator shaft. Dropping through, Fred tried the
door and found it clamped. Correctly assuming that the fugitives, whether one
or several, had used the elevator, Fred went down the stairs on the chance of
overtaking them.
It was a better chance than Fred suspected. The stairs ended in the
basement, where Fred discovered a metal-faced door, wide open. Originally
bolted from the inside, the door had been easily opened by the men who had
fled
along this route. Their burden had slowed their flight, for Fred saw them
after
he dashed through the open doorway
They were disappearing upward on a small elevator that went up through
the
sidewalk on the far side of the rear street. Between them glistened the stolen
safe, but all Fred could see of the thieves was their legs. Having no gun of
his own, Fred couldn't halt the safe snatchers. His best and only bet was to
find some steps up to the street, which he did.
Emerging, Fred found himself in a doorway beside a tiny alley. He would
have given the alley prompt attention, if he hadn't seen a cab stopping just
across the street. It looked like the same cab that had been parked near the
office building; to find it here in the rear street beside the warehouse made
it doubly suspicious.
Forgetting all caution, Fred sprang across and grabbed the cab door,
intending to climb inside and argue matters with the driver.
A determined hand tugged the door shut as Fred tried to open it. Looking
through the window, Fred received a contrast to his previous surprises. He
wasn't confronted by a cloaked figure, nor by a hard-faced safe stealer.
Instead, he was looking at a girl, a very stunning brunette, whose
determined manner didn't render her any less attractive!
Rather apologetically, Fred dropped back. The girl relaxed and gave him a
disarming smile.
"I'm sorry," she said sweetly. "This cab is taken."
If anything, her tone was too sweet; moreover she dropped back from sight
so quickly that Fred's suspicion was immediately reawakened.
He shot a quick look at the driver, caught sight of a shrewd face that
gave him a short appraisal. Fred could tell by the driver's actions that the
cab was going to pull away.
"I'll say this cab is taken!" snapped Fred. "I'm taking it!"
The tug that Fred gave the door handle proved a mammoth one. The door
flew
wide and Fred went with it into a long back somersault that would have damaged
the curb, if the fall hadn't been broken by the same person who started it.
To Fred, it was an encounter with a living whirlwind that arrived from
nowhere and literally scooped him into the air. Sprawled beside the sidewalk,
he could feel the street spin, as the black vortex developed into a cloaked
figure that whisked into the cab as the door was slapping shut again!
The exhaust gave Fred a pungent puff in the face and the cab was away.
Amid the roar of the motor, Fred was sure that he could hear the trailing
echoes of a departing laugh.
But there were other echoes that puzzled Fred still more. He could hear
them from the alley across the way, the thrumming notes of another car getting
under way.
THOSE sounds weren't any puzzle to The Shadow. He was ordering his driver
to make a wide circuit of the neighboring blocks and cut off the car that the
safe-crackers were using for their getaway. Like a whippet, the cab responded
to the order. Its driver, Moe Shrevnitz, was used to these tactics, for he was
an old hand in the Shadow's service.
As for Margo Lane, the girl in the cab, she had taken these wild rides
before, but this trip left her breathless, as usual. It covered a round trip
of
a dozen blocks as fast as the ordinary cab would have made half that distance
on
a straightaway.
The tour ended with a whispered laugh from the darkness at Margo's elbow.
The tone seemed The Shadow's answer to an unspoken challenge. Curiously, Moe's
cab hadn't sighted a single car during its wide but rapid circuit.
The door closed, almost silently The Shadow was out again, moving toward
the alley from which the crooks had started their quick flight with the stolen
safe. It might be that they'd faked that getaway by merely spurting the car's
motor while remaining stationary.
Meanwhile, it wasn't good policy for Moe to remain parked, for he could
hear the approach of police sirens. So Moe began a short cruise that took him
around in front of the office building. As the cab turned the corner, Margo
saw
a limousine coming to a stop. She recognized the important looking man who
摘要：

WIZARDOFCRIMEbyWalterGibsonAsoriginallypublishedin"TheShadowMagazine,"February15,1943.Moneywashispower,menhispawns.HewasKingKauger,mysterymanofmurderanddeath.CouldTheShadowmatchhiswizardry?CHAPTERIMURDERBAITTHIN,sharp,theflashlightbeamstabbedthroughthedarkness.Smallbutpowerful,theconcentratedraylick...

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