Then came another thought: Bodine’s surprise seemed genuine enough, but it might be feigned. Perhaps he was thinking the same as Cliff. Maybe he wanted Clipper to be left, to learn the merciless methods of Arnold Bodine’s mob.
Cliff’s hesitation came to a sudden end. As Cliff stood with his back in the hallway, something struck him from behind. A man had entered silently from the corridor.
The tap of a revolver butt had settled the question. Cliff Marsland collapsed in a helpless heap.
Some one had struck from behind. In his moment of certain victory, with the killing of Arnold Bodine thwarted, Cliff Marsland was stunned and at the mercy of his unexpected foeman!
CHAPTER XIII. THE SHADOW’S FIGHT
“GET him, Clipper! Get Bodine!”
The hissed command came from the little hallway just behind the prostrate body of Cliff Marsland. There, from the darkness, Sneaks Rubin was speaking. The pasty-faced gangster had arrived at a crucial moment. Leaving nothing to chance, he had followed his two gunmen to make sure that they did the job.
And by working from the background, he had ended the plans of Cliff Marsland!
Sneaks fired no shot. This was not his job. He had hesitated long before he had followed his hirelings to the door of Bodine’s apartment. He had come only because they had not returned to the alley. He had been close enough to Bodine’s door to hear the gang chief’s last words.
Clipper Tobin picked up his automatic, which lay in the center of the room. Sneaks turned. The police were coming, and Sneaks had reasons for wanting to be outside that building.
He had delivered his blow and his order in less than two seconds. Now he was scurrying down the corridor, the door closed behind him, anxious to be in the fire tower before Arnold Bodine died.
The dull report of Clipper’s automatic reached the ears of Sneaks Rubin just as the shrewd little crook was crawling into the entrance of the fire tower. He grinned gleefully as he thought of Bodine lying dead.
Clipper could not have missed his mark.
But Sneaks Rubin thought wrong.
Clipper had aimed while picking his gun from the floor. Bodine, who chanced to be unarmed, in the security of his hideout, had dropped when the shot was fired. Before Clipper could shoot again a footstool hurtled across the room. It missed Clipper’s head by a close margin.
It struck his gun hand instead. The automatic fell from the gangster’s numbed fingers. As he scrambled for it, Arnold Bodine leaped toward the same objective.
Clipper gained the automatic, but before he could bring it into play, Bodine was struggling with him.
Clipper was the stronger; Bodine fought with the desperation of a man who knows that minutes gained will mean rescue.
They whirled about the room, Bodine hoping that he could knock the telephone from its table and shout for help. People might arrive from downstairs before Cardona and his squad. But Bodine did not succeed. Gradually Clipper brought the muzzle of the automatic toward his opponent’s body.
Shots cracked. They missed. Clipper, enraged, tried to free himself. He fired again taking hurried aim, and a bullet shattered the glass front of a small bookcase. Then Bodine, grappling, forced the muzzle of the automatic underneath his own arm.
Clipper pressed the weapon upward as he discharged two shots in quick succession. One reached its mark. Bodine, crippled, lost his hold. Clipper flung him to the floor. He fired his last two bullets into Bodine’s heart. Then he stood panting like a fierce beast that had killed its prey.
The struggle had carried him to the corner of the room. With a snarl, Clipper jerked open the large window and drank great drafts of fresh air. Turning, he spied Cliff Marsland’s helpless form. He aimed his automatic and pressed the trigger.
Then he remembered that the gun was empty. He leaped across the room like a wild animal and snatched up the automatic that lay beside Cliff. A sudden leer appeared upon Clipper’s evil face. He might need every bullet in this gun. Help was coming — every bullet might be useful. But that could wait. He pocketed the pistol.
With a display of prodigious strength, Clipper picked up Cliff’s body and carried it to the window. He looked out as he prepared to thrust the body through. The roof of the garage was a trifle to the left.
Directly beneath was the blackness of the blind alley. That was where Cliff Marsland would die!
Clipper was thrusting the body headforemost. Cliff’s head and shoulders were hanging over space.
Clipper gripped the victim’s waist for the final effort. As his hands lifted upward, a revolver shot sounded from the doorway. Clipper staggered back, his left shoulder limp. The body of Cliff Marsland slumped downward against the wall, the head resting on the window sill. The timely shot had saved him from a horrible death!
A MAN clad in black was standing in the doorway, a smoking automatic in his gloved hand. His expert shot had picked the one spot on Clipper’s body that could have been struck without danger to Cliff Marsland. Clipper dropped to the floor, his automatic dangling in his right hand. He managed to turn his head.
“The Shadow!” he whispered.
He had recognized the avenger of the underworld. The tall man with the turned-up cloak and the wide-brimmed slouch hat concealing his face was indeed the strange being of whom Clipper Tobin had often heard. And now he had met The Shadow!
Clipper’s bulging eyes noted the body of Arnold Bodine. The form of Cliff Marsland was beside him. He had killed one. He was not to be cheated of the other!
With a snarl, he seized Cliff’s body and twisted himself behind it. He pulled Cliff’s loaded automatic from his pocket and pointed it toward the door and fired.
His first shot, a hasty one, was wild. The second was well aimed, but the bullet never left the muzzle.
Once again The Shadow’s marksmanship prevailed.
He had chosen the automatic in Clipper’s hand as his target, and his shot proved true. The gun fell from Clipper’s stunned claw. The killer was helpless.
Even then Clipper Tobin would not yield. The shrill sound of a police whistle came to his ears. He was defeated in conflict, and captors were approaching. Still, he was determined at least to elude The Shadow.
He raised himself and carried Cliff’s body up before him as a shield. Wounded as he was, his effort cost the killer energy.
The two forms stood before the window. Now The Shadow advanced, his gun ready for the first vulnerable spot that Clipper might offer.
Clipper cursed. If he had realized what was about to happen, he would have shot Cliff before he lost his gun. At least one more enemy would have died with him. But that was too late. Here, however, was another scheme for safety.
As the black-clad Shadow came closer, Clipper suddenly flung Cliff’s body forward, almost into the arms of the man in black. With a leap he was through the window; with a wide swing, Clipper projected himself toward the roof of the garage, ten feet below.
The Shadow caught Cliff Marsland’s body with one arm and let it slide gently to the floor. He reached the window and stood there like a gigantic silhouette, staring into the darkness. Reflected lights from the avenue revealed a tragic scene.
Clipper’s drop had carried him at an angle over the intervening space to the garage roof. He landed there, on the very edge. He was a target for The Shadow, but the man at the window did not fire.
Instead, he calmly watched Clipper Tobin struggle against the hand of Fate. For Clipper was slipping from his precarious post of safety. His body had toppled over the edge; he was fighting to draw himself to the roof.