tackled him and come out worse in the sprawl. It was the swarthy countenance that belonged to Inspector Joe Cardona!
These men weren't more of Dwig's mob, coming to aid him in some fell work. The Shadow had encountered the wrong foemen - the police!
CHAPTER VII. PROOF OF CRIME
'Lookout, Sherbrock!'
It was Dwig Brencott who shouted the warning, and his cry took the attention of the invading detectives.
They knew that Cardona had tackled an opponent they had scarcely seen, but supposed that their leader had come out winner. For some reason, Sherbrock was the man they had come after, so they surged straight for him.
But Dwig and his men were quicker. It was Dwig who grabbed Sherbrock and fairly hurled him into the open door, while the two men with him, mobbies in guard uniform, seized the desk and hoisted it at the invading police.
Detectives ducked amid a shower of scattering jewels. They fired as they dived aside, but their shots were wide, for the desk was heavy and they had to avoid it.
By the time Cardona's men had a chance to take real aim, Dwig's uniformed pals were into the vault, too, hauling the big door shut behind them. It had hardly closed, before bullets from police specials began to bash the steel front.
Finding that they couldn't drill the heavy metal, the detectives sprang to the door and tried to get it open.
It was locked, automatically, from the inside.
In their futile effort to overtake four fugitives, the detectives left the door of the room quite clear. On his feet, The Shadow whisked out through that convenient exit, seen only by Cardona, who lost sight of the cloaked fighter between blinks.
Then, seeing what the detectives were about, Cardona found his own feet and started to join them, only to stop short and listen.
Cardona heard a sound which his excited men did not - the rumble of an elevator, coming from the wall that held the vault door. Joe shouted for his men to stop attacking the steel barrier.
'They've taken a way out!' Cardona bawled. 'That's no vault. It's an elevator! They're getting to the rear alley. Come on - we're going down to head them off!'
Getting to the alley wasn't so simple as Cardona supposed, considering that all the windows in Sherbrock's place were barred, while the rear passage, downstairs, ended in a heavily locked door.
Bellowing orders as he reached the top of the stairs, Cardona heard responses from officers below: men that he had left down there. They were trying to get through to the alley, and couldn't.
The only thing was to go around by the front, and Cardona beckoned them toward the stairs. Joe was in too great a hurry to think of something that would ordinarily have puzzled him: namely, what had become of The Shadow. Somewhere between Sherbrock's offices and the floor below, the cloaked intruder had mysteriously vanished!
It happened that The Shadow had found what Cardona wanted, a short route to the rear alley.
SHERBROCK'S windows were barred, but others on the second floor were not. Cutting out from Sherbrock's. The Shadow had swung in back of the stairway leading up to the third floor, on chance of finding a suitable window - which he did.
It was narrow, barely large enough for The Shadow to slide his lithe form through. Once the squeeze was accomplished, he dropped to the ground below, the only token of his arrival being the swish of his cloak.
That sound wasn't heard. Others were making a loud clatter in the alley. Out of a rear door that slid suddenly open came Sherbrock, impelled to rapid gait by pressure of Dwig Brencott and the two thugs who wore the uniforms of armored-truck drivers.
There was a car in the alley, the low-built sedan that The Shadow had seen earlier. The fugitives dived into it, scooping up Sherbrock as he stumbled on the step.
The car was in motion when The Shadow turned and aimed low, swift shots at a rear tire. The answer was a clang, repeated with each bullet. The Shadow's fire had found an intervening fire plug, invisible against the fenders of the moving car. It was a squatty fire plug, wide enough to stop two shots, though The Shadow sliced them at slightly different angles.
Those blasts brought a jolt from the car, as though it had been hit. The driver veered across the street and zigzagged back again, putting all his weight on the accelerator. Off at a wild speed, taking a crazy course, the car was roaring away in a fashion calculated to offset the efforts of any marksman.
The Shadow held his next shots until the car swung the corner. There, the zigzag couldn't help. He ripped a rear tire broadside, and saw the car take a real jounce under the impetus of the bursting rubber. The car disappeared around the corner, but it wasn't going far. The Shadow started on the run to overtake it.
From the sharp crack of the first shots, Cardona recognized that he had heard them through an open window. Still on the second floor, Joe dived beyond the stairs and thrust his head and shoulders out in time to see the effect of The Shadow's second fusillade.
Unable to wedge his stocky form through the narrow opening, Cardona decided to go out by the front way - a wise choice, considering that the fugitive car was no longer in the rear street.
Downstairs, Cardona found police cars and sprang into one, ordering a rapid chase.
Meanwhile, The Shadow had reached the rear corner, where he paused only to pick a darkened course across the side street to the wrecked car, which was tilted high upon the curb. Resuming his dash, he arrived at the sedan and found it empty.
A passageway between two buildings explained where Sherbrock and the crooks had gone. It was very short, and led to a wide street that cut through this neighborhood at an angle. Looking for a car, The Shadow saw one swing hesitatingly toward him. It was Margo's.
With a long leap, The Shadow hooked the door of the coupe, opened it, and dropped in beside the girl, so suddenly that she could only give a breathless gasp. Margo had been looking for Cranston, but by the time the door had slammed, she wasn't surprised to see The Shadow, instead.
In sharp, whispered tone, he was questioning if she had seen the fugitives. She hadn't, but she had spotted something else.
'The armored truck!' Margo exclaimed. 'It started away before I did. It was gone when the police arrived. But I saw it again, just now, going around the next corner!'
THE SHADOW ordered a chase. As Margo put speed into the coupe, she realized that the armored truck must have picked up the fugitives that The Shadow was after. A few turns and she saw the truck once more, as did The Shadow. It was taking a corner and guns spouted from its loopholes. Wide shots, that didn't damage Margo's coupe.
Leaning from his window, The Shadow responded, aiming for the tires. His aim was accurate, but the truck's tires were bulletproof, as The Shadow expected, though he considered it worth-while to test them. Then The Shadow's free hand, lunging to the left, shoved the wheel from Margo's control and sent the coupe skewing around a nearer corner.
Margo caught the idea as The Shadow let her resume control. He wanted to pursue the truck along a parallel street.
Across their path flashed a police car. Rapidly, The Shadow yanked the wheel again, thus informing Margo to follow the prowl car.
The police car was speeding for a corner where the armored truck was due, but The Shadow didn't wait for the fugitive vehicle to arrive. He blasted shots at the rear tires of the police car, and, fortunately, they didn't stand the gaff. The police car hit the curb at the corner just as the armored truck zoomed across.
If The Shadow hadn't halted them, Cardona and his companions would have been juggernauted by the heavier, more powerful vehicle.
It was The Shadow who resumed the chase alone, telling Margo to keep a respectful distance behind the
