Maxwell Grant - The Shadow - 241 - Vengeance Bay

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VENGEANCE BAY
Maxwell Grant
This page copyright © 2001 Blackmask Online.
http://www.blackmask.com
? CHAPTER I. WAYS OF MYSTERY
? CHAPTER II. ONE SLIGHT ERROR
? CHAPTER III. TWO WAYS OUT
? CHAPTER IV. ENTER THE SHADOW
? CHAPTER V. BATTLE OF ILLUSION
? CHAPTER VI. THE SKY DIAMOND
? CHAPTER VII. THE TREASURE QUEST
? CHAPTER VIII. STRANGE VISITORS
? CHAPTER IX. PROWLERS BY NIGHT
? CHAPTER X. CROSSED BATTLE
? CHAPTER XI. THE WHOLESALE VANISH
? CHAPTER XII. CROSSED TRAILS
? CHAPTER XIII. WHERE TREASURE LAY
? CHAPTER XIV. IN DIFFERENT CAMPS
? CHAPTER XV. DEATH BELOW
? CHAPTER XVI. THE SHOT THAT TOLD
? CHAPTER XVII. ON THE ISLAND
? CHAPTER XVIII. THE SHADOW'S EXIT
? CHAPTER XIX. THE LOSING FIGHT
? CHAPTER XX. SHADOWS OF DAWN
? CHAPTER XXI. IN FROM THE DEEP
? CHAPTER XXII. OLD VERSUS NEW
? CHAPTER XXIII. FATE'S FINAL PLAY
CHAPTER I. WAYS OF MYSTERY
THE floor show was in progress at the Club Plaisance, but none of the regular customers were
interested. They were gathered in a corner of the swanky night club, a dozen of them, chatting with a man
who was a much greater attraction than the show.
Cafe society had found a new idol. His name was Vedo Bron.
The name itself marked the man as unusual, and Vedo Bron lived up to it. His manner was just foreign
enough to intrigue the fickle members of New York's wealthy class. He was suave to perfection, and he
wore his evening clothes as though they had been molded to himself.
Of course, Vedo Bron was handsome.
He had dark-brown eyes that glittered black under the mild lights in the corner of the cafe. Eyes that in
such illumination matched the jet of his sleek hair. His features were firm, even to the smile that played
perpetually upon his darkish lips.
A smile that had a reason.
Whenever that smile relaxed, close observers could see that the wrinkle from the corner of Bron's lip was
not a wrinkle, but a thin scar. Above one eye, Bron wore another such trophy, well concealed by the
curve of his heavy eyebrow. The peculiar hunch that he gave his right shoulder when he reached for a
drink was just another index to Bron's adventurous past.
This man who could look handsome only when he smiled, had faced death more often than he cared to
tell, and could prove it, should he wish, by exhibiting his wounds. For Bron was a man who had fought
often, and hard; always on the losing side.
The vagaries of brutal warfare had hounded Vedo Bron from one European battle front to another.
When small, ill-equipped armies collapsed under the crushing blows of a larger, more powerful force,
Bron had been among the last to retreat, encouraging his comrades to fight to the very last.
In each country from which he was driven, Bron's name was listed among those to whom death would be
delivered summarily, should the conquerors ever capture them.
Some had met such death, but not Vedo Bron. He had kept on fighting the oppressors until there were
no countries left in which to fight, and had finally used the neutral nation of Portugal as a stepping-stone
for a long flight to the United States.
Altogether, Bron was a refugee from so many lands that he could truly define himself a European, rather
than localize himself. As for his personal exploits, he was willing to recount them in a brief, matter-of-fact
style; but whenever anyone began to acclaim him as a hero, Bron shook off the praise with a shrug of his
one good shoulder and turned to some other subject.
At present, Bron was displaying his habitual sang-froid, as he read a newspaper clipping which a friend
had handed him. It told of a refugee, much like himself, who had been found shot through the heart in a
Midwestern hotel.
There was much doubt that the case was suicide. Rather, it seemed, the agents of tyrannical powers had
caught up with the refugee and done away with him. Bron's nod indicated that he agreed with the latter
theory.
"It was murder," spoke Bron simply, without losing any of his smile. "Thank you for this clipping. I shall
file it with the rest of my collection."
From his pocket, Bron produced a wallet that teemed with clippings. Thumbing through them, he added
the new one.
"It is always well," said Vedo Bron, "to study the ways in which one's enemies dispose of persons whom
they do not like. I have been forewarned regarding a dozen methods; needless to say, I have taken
precautions against those. All items like these are gratefully welcomed by myself."
Bron put the clippings away, and bowed as a friend proposed another round of drinks. People noticed,
however, that Bron watched the barkeeper from the corner of his eye, and when the waiter brought the
drinks, the refugee casually chose one that was on the far side of the tray.
After others had raised their glasses, Bron poised his at his lips, then lowered it after the mere semblance
of a sip. He became convivial, forgetting his glass as he chatted, until he saw that none of his friends had
slumped to the table.
Then, with a smile that was most charming, Bron raised his drink and finished it with a flourish.
AMONG the persons much intrigued by the ways of Vedo Bron was a girl named Margo Lane. This
wasn't the first time that Margo had met the adventurous refugee. It was her business to be present on
certain occasions, and to watch others more than Bron. Her business—and The Shadow's.
Famed for his adventures abroad, and the mysterious skill with which he had escaped capture and death,
Vedo Bron had placed himself in a very select category. Of such persons, none, not even Bron, could
claim as many exploits as that supreme master of mystery known as The Shadow.
For years, The Shadow had done more than keep his ways and whereabouts unknown. He had
shrouded his very identity in mystery while dealing with foemen whose craft and technique were quite as
evil as any on earth. During more than a decade, The Shadow had matched wits with the greatest brains
of crimedom and still lived to battle on.
Well did The Shadow know the pitfalls that Bron might encounter in America. Should foreign agents fail
to snare the refugee, crooks of the genus Americanus might succeed. Such a trivial thing as patriotism
would never stir their ratty hearts, and the murder of a man like Bron was something they would relish,
provided they were paid enough.
So The Shadow had been keeping a protective eye on Vedo Bron.
Sometimes the eye was The Shadow's own. As Lamont Cranston, languid New York clubman, The
Shadow often frequented the same places as Bron. But it wasn't in keeping with the character of
Cranston to be always on hand, so there were times when The Shadow delegated the task to others.
One watcher was a young chap named Harry Vincent, whose open manner and clean-cut appearance
made him welcome in every company. The other was Margo Lane, the attractive brunette who was on
the job this evening.
Both Harry and Margo were frequent visitors to night clubs, and took turns at drifting in and out on these
assignments.
Such little matters as the clippings and the drinks were important things for Margo to remember. As she
sat in a corner watching him quite idly, she realized suddenly that Bron must regard them as important,
too.
Though others did not notice it, Margo saw that Bron's suavity was becoming forced; that he let his smile
relax without intending it. His dark eyes were repeating their corner darts; this time, toward a clock
above the bar.
It was nearly midnight, and Bron must have remembered something scheduled for that hour. Finishing one
drink, he politely declined another and rose from his chair, lifting his right hand to stroke back his sleek
hair.
"You must excuse me," remarked Bron. "I have an early appointment tomorrow with Wishwell, the
columnist. He's been writing me up so much, that he wants me to do a guest column on the real inside of
Europe."
Others believed Bron; but not Margo. She knew that no columnist ever made early appointments. Bron
was going elsewhere, and this was Margo's clue to follow. She waited until he reached the door of the
Club Plaisance; then hurried rapidly in the same direction.
MARGO received a surprise the moment that she reached the street.
There wasn't a trace of Bron anywhere. He'd taken a cab and departed, but in such swift time that
Margo was actually breathless. Nor was there any other cab in sight. Apparently, Bron had told the
doorman to have one waiting, and had likewise instructed him to make all others move along.
The doorman's smug look seemed to confirm Margo's guess, particularly when he seemed concerned
because there were no cabs available and jogged off to the corner to summon one for the girl.
At that moment, Margo was looking in the other direction and saw something that helped.
Another car was pulling away from the curb, and Margo noticed two men in it. Following traffic along the
one-way street, the car swung sharply left. There was a chance, and a good one, that the mystery car
was trailing Vedo Bron, its occupants having had a chance to witness the refugee's departure.
Impatiently, Margo turned, hoping the doorman would forget himself and hurry with a cab. She was at
the curb and she jumped back, with a little gasp, as a coupe swept up in front of her.
Her gasp became one of pleased surprise when Margo recognized the driver. He was Harry Vincent,
come to take over the watch from midnight on.
Quickly, Margo told Harry of Bron's mysterious departure, and the equally mysterious pursuit that a car
with two men in it had begun.
Hearing that the pursuers had turned left, Harry waited for no further facts. He simply drew Margo into
his coupe and shot away, swinging left as the other car had.
Traffic was heavy on the avenue. Harry and Margo, as agents of The Shadow, were simply playing for
luck in this improvised chase. Both wished that The Shadow, himself, could be in the game. Their chief
had ways of finding luck, even when it didn't seem to exist. Or perhaps it wasn't luck; it might be better
defined as forethought on The Shadow's part.
FORETHOUGHT was the word.
Blocks ahead, a cab swung off the avenue and a passenger looked back, a permanent smile fixed on his
face. The passenger was Vedo Bron. He was pleased with his quick getaway from the Club Plaisance.
Then a car containing two men suddenly disentangled itself from among some trucks and darted around
the same corner that Bron's cab had taken. Bron was being trailed in expert fashion, as Margo supposed,
but Harry was too far behind to have observed it.
Almost from nowhere, a cab whipped into view, skewed between two trucks, and sliced the corner
close behind the men who were trailing Bron. That cab had been posted on the avenue, ready for just
such a trail.
Apparently the cab was empty, for only darkness was visible in the rear seat. But from that blackness
came a whispered sound: a strange, low laugh.
Weird mirth, signifying that its author would take a hand in things to come.
The laugh of The Shadow!
CHAPTER II. ONE SLIGHT ERROR
IN ways of mystery, The Shadow was quite the equal of Vedo Bron and the two men who trailed the
remarkable refugee. Where the car ahead was following Bron's cab by keeping it in sight, The Shadow
was seeing to it that neither Bron nor the trailers knew that he was in the game.
True, The Shadow's cabby deserved some credit. He was Moe Shrevnitz, a secret agent of The Shadow
and the speediest hackie in Manhattan, and he knew the tricks of the city streets. But The Shadow, in his
turn, knew Moe's abilities and limitations and therefore was able to guide him along routes that Moe
might otherwise have avoided.
Somehow, The Shadow seemed able to divine the course of the cars ahead. There were times when he
ordered his own driver to swing across to another avenue, or take a short cut through a side street. In
those instances, the chase was actually lost, but it always came back again.
On the wrong avenue, Moe would suddenly stare to see the other cars sweep out in front of him. Those
side-street excursions were equally productive of results.
When the chase narrowed to the lower tip of Manhattan Island, The Shadow became positively uncanny.
He had that sector mentally divided into pockets and was capable of telling in which one the chase would
end.
Swinging beneath the mammoth heights of great buildings, Moe jerked the cab to a stop near the water
front. There, across the way, Bron's cab was stopping; behind it, the other car sidling into a space
between some huge trucks that were parked for the night.
From his cab, Bron took a cater-cornered path on foot. For a few moments, he was boldly in the light, a
figure in evening clothes so perfectly fitted that they were a giveaway to anyone who knew him.
Then, showing the chameleon traits which had enabled him to elude the armed hordes of dictators, Bron
took to the darkness of the alleyway, disappearing in commendable style.
By then, The Shadow was out of Moe's cab and performing a glide that was positively phenomenal.
Credited with being able to disappear in open view, The Shadow was really accomplishing that famed
result. Watching from the cab, Moe couldn't see a trace of him, and the darkness through which The
Shadow glided seemed to hide even his own shadow.
Darkness, it so happened, was The Shadow's chosen element. He knew its ins and outs as though he
were a part of it. The very garb that he wore—black cloak and slouch hat—was designed to aid his
fade-away into nothingness.
It wasn't that The Shadow completely disappeared. He just knew how to be away from the places where
people looked for him.
In this instance, The Shadow was making a wider circuit than Moe supposed. By the time he approached
the alleyway, the black-clad stalker saw two men move in ahead of him. They were the pair who had
trailed Bron from the night club, and each had a face that would have graced a rogues' gallery.
Superficially, they were respectably clad, but they looked uncomfortable in their store clothes. Their
coats bulged from sweaters beneath and the bulges had humps that indicated hidden knives or guns.
There was something in their gait that smacked of the water front; hence they could not be classed as
ordinary thugs. However, such discrimination was a minor point, at present.
The two men were posting themselves on either side of the alley, their hands shifting significantly to the
bulges beneath their sweaters. Since Bron had entered the alley, The Shadow intended to do the same.
His was the task of passing these two watchers unobserved.
The Shadow managed it in his accustomed style.
INSTEAD of trusting to the darkness directly between the pair, where the slightest stir might have tipped
them to his presence, The Shadow skirted to a building wall and came directly up in back of one human
watchdog, thus hiding himself from the observation of the other.
Pausing, The Shadow was close enough to grip the fellow's neck, a temptation which he ignored for the
present, though quite willing to go through with it should occasion demand. While the pair stayed where
they were, they couldn't harm Bron. Therefore, it was policy to wait.
The policy proved its worth.
Becoming restless, the lurkers shifted. The man at The Shadow's side of the alley edged over to his pal
and growled something that The Shadow did not quite catch. There wasn't time to listen, for The Shadow
was on his way.
Moving right behind his man, he was still obscure when the fellow gave a grumble; then, with a side step,
The Shadow detached himself from his human shelter and was in the alley itself.
From there, probing through the darkness was simplicity itself. The Shadow expected this to be a blind
alley, and it proved so. An alley with only one outlet, where two men were awaiting Bron's return!
One outlet, so far as the alley itself was concerned; but alleys naturally had doorways into houses, and
this one was no exception.
Finding such a doorway, The Shadow opened it and edged into deeper darkness closing the door behind
him. He moved into a cross passage and there saw lines of light from each direction, coming from the
cracks of doors.
The door to the left could only lead to a grogshop on the water front, a place called the Barnacle, and
which was aptly named, considering the hanger's-on who frequented it. They were the riffraff of this
particular portion of the water front. Naturally, Bron, always a stickler for formality, would not have
joined the Barnacle crowd while wearing evening clothes.
Therefore, Bron must be beyond the door to the right, which probably opened into a back room of the
grogshop. So The Shadow moved in that direction, and finding the door ajar began to inch it open.
He heard voices as he did: a suave tone, representing Bron, and a sharp, short-clipped speech which
was vaguely familiar.
Then The Shadow took a look.
Through the door crack, he saw Bron at one side of a table, facing a rangy man whose appearance was
reasonably presentable. The rangy fellow had small eyes, quick and darty, like his way of speech; a face
that was blunt and somewhat hardened, but by no means ugly.
The Shadow recognized the man as Speed Falley, an adventurer in his own right, but one whose
activities had thrown him into several tussles with the law. It wasn't necessary for The Shadow to
recapitulate Speed's past; the man himself was doing it, for Bron's benefit.
"You've tagged me right, Mr. Bron," Speed was saying, in his choppy way. "Yes, I've gone where the
dough is, regardless of consequences. In the rumrunning days I was with the fleet, getting my share of the
gravy. Some of the boys here can tell you."
He gestured to "the boys," particularly the older ones. They were men who knew the water, and liked
rough weather in more ways than one. Hardened veterans of run-ins with the coast guard, they
represented an offshore criminal type who didn't care whom they served, and why, provided their own
interests benefited.
But they differed considerably from the thugs who skulked the city streets. This crew, at least, showed
loyalty to their leader, Speed Falley; and the younger members looked as though they had learned many
lessons from the older.
"They don't need to tell me," spoke Bron, in his precise, foreign style. "I met many types of men during
my adventures, Speed. Some of them had dealings with you, in those days, and they all said you were
honest with them."
"So I was," assured Speed. "Other guys were paying them off in counterfeit dough, so crummy it couldn't
be passed on shore. But I paid 'em the real mazuma. Why not? They brought me what I wanted; so I
gave them what they wanted."
Bron nodded, his fixed smile playing as usual.
"I got by those days," continued Speed. "Rumrunning, was through. I'd never been caught, so it was
quits. I switched to straight smuggling; then the bottom dropped out of that racket. The law has nothing
on me, if that counts for anything."
Pressing a cigarette between his smiling lips, Bron fixed his darkish eyes on Speed and held the fellow's
gaze.
"It counts for everything with me," declared Bron. "I want a man whose record can be called clean."
"Mine is near enough, considering," assured Speed. "I'm on shore, partner in this joint called the
Barnacle, and we haven't lost our license. Good enough?"
Considering the statement, Bron nodded; then put his wants in preliminary terms.
"I need a man to take me to Massaquoit Bay," declared Bron. "A man like yourself, Speed, with a stout
crew like yours. I have work to do there, and I shall need protection from certain enemies. Protection is
most important. I spoke of it, Speed, when I talked to you by telephone."
Speed nodded, and gave a short laugh. He reached to a lamp that stood on the crude table and began to
toy with the cord. Speed was pulling the lamplight on and off, while Bron watched, rather puzzled.
"You wanted protection," declared Speed. "Good protection, Mr. Bron. The best way to find out how
good a thing is, is to give it a trial. That's what I've done. What I'm doing now is proving it."
Bron hadn't caught on to what Speed meant, but The Shadow had. Turning from the door, he was
starting back along the passage. It wasn't necessary for The Shadow to hear the words that Speed spoke
next:
"I posted a couple of my crew outside the Club Plaisance," Speed was telling Bron. "They trailed you
here to see that nothing happened to you on the way. This lamp is flashing a light outside the alley door,
to bring them in here. They'll repeat the orders I gave them. I told them that if they ran into any guy who
was mooching into your business -"
The thing that Speed was mentioning had at that moment happened. It involved one slight error on The
Shadow's part. He had mistaken those men who trailed Bron as enemies of the refugee, whereas they
happened to be friends and protectors, supplied by Speed Falley!
Knowing what Speed's orders must have been, The Shadow wanted no quarrel with the crew of the
ex-smuggler who intended to help Vedo Bron; hence, divining Speed's purpose with the lamp cord, The
Shadow was on his way out.
It was too late: The Shadow had listened too long. As he reached the turn in the passage, the blaze of a
flashlight met him; with it came the savage shouts of Speed's two henchmen, in from the alleyway.
With that shout, they branded The Shadow as a foeman of the very sort that Speed had told them to
expect!
CHAPTER III. TWO WAYS OUT
WITH a tremendous fling, The Shadow hurled himself upon the two men in the passage. Of one thing he
was certain: their only weapon, at the moment, was the flashlight they shared between them. They knew
what the summons from Speed meant; he was calling them into conference with Bron, the man they had
protected.
Therefore, it was The Shadow who was springing the surprise attack; not these two who blocked his
path. If he could fling them from the way and make a quick departure, the status of the present situation
would, if anything, be improved.
The Shadow was willing to let these men boast that they had driven off an unknown marauder. He
wanted to learn what the alliance between Bron and Speed would produce.
Had the passageway been one foot wider, The Shadow would have succeeded in his drive. Meeting his
unwanted opponents head-on, he hurled them backward, sending their flash light with them; then, as they
sprawled apart, The Shadow sprang ahead and between them.
One man, stopped by the wall, made a wild grab for The Shadow's ankle and clutched it. It wouldn't
have happened had the fellow been a trifle farther away.
Spilling headlong, The Shadow was only halfway to his feet when his adversaries came leaping blindly for
him. They weren't empty-handed; one man had a revolver, the other a knife. The weapons didn't glint in
the darkness; but The Shadow was quite sure that the men had drawn them. Reversing his attack, he hit
with a low drive, his shoulders meeting the knees of the lunging pair. They went over and above The
Shadow, their weapons with them.
With quick bounds to the cross passage, The Shadow turned left, away from the conference room. A
wild shot ripped from behind him, fired by one of the sprawled men. The fellow was shooting at
nothingness, for The Shadow had already swung the corner of the passage. But the next sound that
came, though far less threatening than the bark of a gun, was something that promised trouble.
It was the clatter of a door—the door to Speed's room—and with it came a flood of light. With an ear
trained to danger, Speed Falley hadn't failed to distinguish the muffled shot from the outer passage and to
act on it at once. He was in the doorway, drawing a revolver of his own, his eye scouring the darkness of
the passage.
Behind Speed was Vedo Bron, his face anxious despite its smile. When trouble occurred in Bron's
vicinity, he usually took it to be meant for him.
Even with Speed living up to his nickname, The Shadow wasn't to be found. He'd reached the far end of
the passage and was pressed against the door that led into the Barnacle proper.
Blackness against blackness—such was the formula that rendered The Shadow invisible in this pinch.
Seconds more, he'd be easing through that door, closing it behind him without a trace of his departure.
Men would be talking of a ghost; not of The Shadow.
The needed time wasn't given.
A sudden yank took the door from The Shadow's grasp. Men in the Barnacle, watchers posted by
Speed, had heard the shot from behind scenes. The tug they gave the door brought The Shadow halfway
with it, into a shabby barroom occupied by human water rats.
Two men had pulled the door, together; the mutual shout they gave was enough to bring the other
customers full about.
They saw The Shadow, but found it hard to recognize him. He was more than a mere intruder cloaked in
black. In a trice, he became a human cyclone, whirling Speed's men as he gripped them.
Swung full about, the pair were flung hard into the passage, blocking Speed's approaching dash as well
as his path of aim. There were stumbles, oaths from the passage. By that time, The Shadow was away.
WHIRLING into the clustered customers, The Shadow was slugging with a pair of automatics. He
needed such weapons, for his opponents were ready with their own.
The cutthroats who patronized the water-front dive were only too anxious for a brawl, and they carried a
variety of carving tools, from plain dirks to odd-shaped knives that they had brought back from their
voyages.
There were "wanted" men among that tribe; some, perhaps, who believed that The Shadow was upon
their trail. All were the sort who did their dirty work and thought it over afterward. They regarded any
chance invader of these premises as their rightful prey. But The Shadow belonged in another category.
He didn't wait for opposition to come to him; he went after it, instead. As he slugged a path through the
crowd that tried to stop him, his big guns began to chatter with precise effect.
He wasn't picking human targets; he was punching out the lights that illuminated the place. Blinks
accompanied The Shadow's bullets; with the final shot, the Barnacle was plunged in darkness.
Leaving the riffraff to scuffle among themselves, The Shadow wheeled out to the street and immediately
took to cover. The commotion in the dive was bringing all the police in the neighborhood, and they were
numerous, for the Barnacle had a reputation as a brawl trap.
As the bluecoats poured into the place, The Shadow heard the smash of furniture, the crash of glassware.
Taking a course across the street, he reached his cab.
Much against his wishes, The Shadow had placed a certain man in jeopardy. That man, was Vedo Bron.
It was quite likely that Speed Falley would explain himself to the police, perhaps by helping them quell
the riot that The Shadow had caused. But Bron wasn't anxious to have his whereabouts known, nor to let
anyone learn of his connection with Speed.
Bron's own cab had left; the best The Shadow could do was offer Moe's. So he told the cabby to swing
past the alley that formed an outlet from the rear room of the Barnacle. There, The Shadow caught a
glimpse of Bron, with Speed steering him toward the street. But the pair withdrew suddenly as a police
car arrived with siren whining.
Forming a new plan, The Shadow told Moe to stop at the next corner. There, divesting himself of hat and
cloak, he stepped from the cab.
The Shadow's appearance had completely changed. No longer a figure in black, he was clad in evening
clothes as immaculate as Bron's. Indeed, in the rather meager light of the water front, he looked almost
the twin of the famed refugee.
Sending Moe along, with instructions to remain handy, The Shadow strolled back toward the Barnacle.
He'd left his guns in the cab, along with his black garb, for he intended to approach the police openly. If
arrested and searched, he could simply introduce himself as Lamont Cranston, a friend of the police
commissioner.
The Shadow intended to submit to such a process should he find Bron in custody for he was sure that he
could use his Cranston personality to effect Bron's release, also. He would recognize Bron as a friend
and state that they had both come to this neighborhood merely as a lark.
For the present, however, The Shadow's approach was wary, since there was no need for surrender
unless Bron had been arrested.
Nothing was happening at the alley. Near the entrance to the Barnacle, the strolling Mr. Cranston saw
the police bringing out the participants in the recent fray. Evidently, the hunt hadn't carried to the rear
room, for neither Bron nor Speed was among the prisoners.
Turning, The Shadow strolled across the street, and the officers who saw him made no effort to halt him.
They decided that anyone so well attired could not possibly have come from the Barnacle.
It was a prosaic finish to an exciting affair, and The Shadow rather regretted it. His only course was to
stroll around the block, meet up with Moe's cab, and cruise the neighborhood for a while. It wasn't even
necessary to watch for Bron's later departure. The Shadow knew that Bron was going to a place called
Massaquoit Bay, and would be well protected, meanwhile, by Speed Falley.
Hence, in keeping with Cranston's style, The Shadow paused to extract a cigarette from a jeweled case
and insert it in a long holder. Flicking a lighter, he applied its flame to the cigarette as he stood with his
back to a basement doorway, just around the corner.
NEVER, perhaps, had The Shadow been more off guard, for nothing else could have explained the thing
that happened. Luck played a part, too; luck of an ill variety.
That basement doorway happened to be the worst place possible for a man in evening clothes, answering
the description of Vedo Bron, to make any pause at all.
Up from the gloom of the entry sprang two blocky men, whose tactics were both hard and swift. With a
lunge, they landed upon Lamont Cranston, swinging small sacks that had the appearance of improvised
sandbags.
Hearing them behind him, The Shadow turned, raising his hands in warding style. Though The Shadow
halted the fists, he didn't stop the objects they carried. One weighted bag caught him on the chin, the
other landed at the back of his head.
With a slump, he folded into the arms of his attackers, who dragged him to the basement entry.
The door was closing when a police car whined along the street, sweeping the building walls with its
spotlight. The closing of the door marked the strange departure of Lamont Cranston, otherwise The
Shadow, and the unknown captors who had so suddenly overpowered him!
摘要：

VENGEANCEBAYMaxwellGrantThispagecopyright©2001BlackmaskOnline.http://www.blackmask.com?CHAPTERI.WAYSOFMYSTERY?CHAPTERII.ONESLIGHTERROR?CHAPTERIII.TWOWAYSOUT?CHAPTERIV.ENTERTHESHADOW?CHAPTERV.BATTLEOFILLUSION?CHAPTERVI.THESKYDIAMOND?CHAPTERVII.THETREASUREQUEST?CHAPTERVIII.STRANGEVISITORS?CHAPTERIX.PR...

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分类：外语学习 价格：5.9玖币 属性：75 页 大小：191.23KB 格式：PDF 时间：2024-12-22

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