whizzing blackjack.
The electric torch had fallen to the floor. Its beam still sent a narrow patch of radiance across the room.
The feet of the two antagonists made no sound on the soft rug. The Shadow kept giving ground, foot after foot. Once, he had a good chance to smash Bruce's skull with a quick blow of his gun butt. But he contented him with that
same peculiar defensiveness - a slow retreat.
He was almost at the open square of the window when the chance came for which he had been watching. The Shadow swerved. His free hand darted like lightning to the hollow of the young man's collar bone. He dropped his gun and clamped the other black-gloved hand on Bruce's forearm.
It was perfect jujutsu, but The Shadow did not apply pressure enough to cause his foe to scream with agony. He merely threw Bruce backward so that he sprawled full length on the soft rug.
The Shadow immediately bent and recovered his own dropped gun. As he did so, he made an intentionally awkward movement. A scrap of paper fell from his pocket to the floor. The Shadow took no apparent notice of his loss.
With a gasp of simulated terror, he escaped through the window. It was the
only cry he had uttered during the whole strange combat and he took care to keep
it low-toned.
By the time Bruce reached the window, The Shadow had fled into the darkness of the grounds.
Arnold Dixon's son turned away with a snarl of triumph. He had beaten The Shadow at his own game. He was free now to press his criminal plan to completion. He was certain that his father had heard nothing of the silent fight down here on the ground floor.
But as he turned to hurry to the staircase, he saw the scrap of paper that
had fallen from The Shadow's pocket. It lay in the light of the electric torch,
crumpled and white. Bruce's eyes gleamed as he saw it.
He picked it up, smoothed it with trembling fingers. It seemed to be the identical paper that The Shadow had obtained when Paul Rodney dropped it in the
house of the dead Snaper and Hooley.
Bruce read the awkward printing of the first two lines with eager attention. He didn't know it, but the lines were a perfect reproduction of the original; a photostatic copy:
When the Indian is high follow his nose and reach under It wasn't the cryptic sentence that made Bruce's eyes gleam. It was the typewritten paragraph that followed:
Memo: The 'Indian' is a rock formation at the base of the cliff below the house that was burned. It is only 'high' when the low tide exposes it. By sighting in a straight line from the nose, a spot is reached on the surface of the water that covers the entrance to a submerged tunnel leading inside the cliff itself. Reaching under at this exact spot will disclose the existence of the tunnel. It must logically lead to the place where the stolen Cup of Confucius is buried.
Bruce read the typed memo with a hissing intake of his breath. He darted to the open window and sprang out. His form disappeared in the blackness outside.
It was exactly what The Shadow had wanted him to do. Bruce had swallowed the bait and was off to retrieve for himself the million-dollar treasure from the ancient past of China.
Crouched close to the ground, The Shadow watched the panting young man flee.
CHAPTER XVI
CHANGED ORDERS
A MAN was crying out bitter words in the lighted top-floor room of the Dixon mansion. The man was Arnold Dixon himself. He sat bound and helpless in a
chair, glaring at two other men who sat a few feet away from him, guns in their
alert hands.
One of these silent captors was Clyde Burke, of the Classic, famous New York reporter and a loyal agent of The Shadow. His companion was Harry Vincent,
another agent, who was also there by orders received over the telephone from Burbank. It was those orders that had resulted in the tying up of the millionaire by these resolute intruders.
Clyde and Vincent had been told to guard Arnold Dixon and prevent, by whatever means they thought necessary, his leaving the house. They were to stay
with him, their guns ready to repel an attack, until they received orders from The Shadow.
'You're liars!' Arnold Dixon cried. 'You're not trying to help me. You're here to rob me, to kill me!'
'You're mistaken, Mr. Dixon,' Harry Vincent told him, curtly. 'We're neither thieves nor murderers. We're here at the orders of a man you have every
reason to thank for being alive and unharmed at this very minute!'
'Who?' Dixon demanded.
'The Shadow!'
Dixon's eyes bulged. He seemed struck with awe. He started to reply, and stopped short.
The reason was the quick palm of Harry Vincent that flung itself across the millionaire's mouth, stifling his words. Into the trembling millionaire's ear he whispered a swift command:
'Quiet! Not a sound, if you value your life!'
Clyde Burke had turned so that he was watching the door of the chamber.
At
a sign from Vincent he backed noiselessly away, so that the opening door would hide any trace of himself or Vincent from whoever was creeping up the stairs of
the old mansion.
It was obvious to both agents of The Shadow that some one was creeping up the staircase outside.
Arnold Dixon remained silent in his chair, his eyes watching the white knob of the door.
Slowly, the knob began to turn. The door moved inch by inch. It was opening!
A face peered cautiously. Dixon cried out in hoarse terror as he saw a clipped brown beard and hard, pinpoint eyes. It was Paul Rodney.
'QUIET!' Rodney snarled. 'One more yelp like that and you get it for keeps, old man!'
His foxy glance convinced him that except for the trussed Dixon in the chair, the room was empty. He was unable to see Harry Vincent and Clyde Burke, hidden by the barrier of the open door. Even had he peered past it, the two agents of The Shadow would still have been invisible, for they had backed into the opening of a deep closet.
Rodney laughed suddenly. 'Okay, Squint. Come on in! Somebody's been here ahead of us. Did us a favor by tying the old boy up. They must have heard us sneaking in the window downstairs and scrammed.'
Squint crept into the room. His beady eyes wrinkled with pleasure.
'How about a little torture stuff, first?'
'That's out! Torture is all you're interested in, you little devil!'
It was Dixon who betrayed the hidden agents of The Shadow. He didn't mean to. He did it unconsciously by the fixed glare of his frightened eyes. Squint whirled and uttered a quick yell of warning.
Both crooks fired at the open closet.
There came answering bullets that made the two thugs skip backward hastily
out of range. Vincent and Burke had thrown themselves prudently to the closet floor as Squint yelled.
They sprang out now, determined to save Arnold Dixon from death. Their very boldness turned the tide of battle. Rodney, not knowing how many enemies he had to deal with, and worried by the thought that the house might be surrounded by police, backed swiftly toward the door, his gun jetting scarlet.
Squint had already beaten his boss to safety. But Rodney lingered a moment
in the doorway, braving the spurt of lead that boomed from Vincent's gun and splintered the casing all about him.
Vincent's poor aim was due to his jerky movements. He was leaping away from the trussed millionaire in the chair, hoping to draw Rodney's fire and save the life of the hapless man.
