The Shadow 232 by Maxwell Grant

Author:Maxwell Grant
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

MEANWHILE, the glow from the flashlight had stopped back at the steps. The Shadow heard orders in Spanish, slurred with the local dialect. The inspector was evidently an officer come to organize the new guards. Finding the steps unwatched, he simply supposed that they had been overlooked, so he was summoning another soldier to patrol the weak spot.

Binding and gagging the man who had forcibly gone off duty, The Shadow tried a door leading in from the balcony. It was locked and bolted on the other side, so he tackled a window, instead. The window had a heavy grating, clamped on the inside, but The Shadow’s fingers, probing through, worked delicate wonders with those clamps. The grating came loose.

All was silent in the mansion. Occasional lamps, soft in their glow, revealed deserted rooms furnished in exquisite Spanish style. There were short hallways, abbreviated flights of steps, that gave the house the semblance of catacombs, though the atmosphere itself was pleasant.

Below a curving flight of stairs The Shadow saw a stronger light, that indicated a habitable portion of the ancient domicile. He glided down the curving stairs and came to a square hall, not more than ten feet on a side.

The light was from the ceiling, and the hallway, with tiled floor and walls, was something of a patio in miniature. Opposite the stairway was a curtained doorway, through which more light came. On either side were similar curtains, denoting darkened rooms.

Considering the solitude upstairs, those side rooms would also seem deserted. The Shadow’s logical course was across the hallway, to the door at the other end. He started there.

It was then that the lulling atmosphere produced a warning. The place was too quiet, too unguarded, to be safe. The thought flashed to The Shadow’s brain a split-second before the trouble came. Before he could get his hand to a gun, the curtains at each side of the hallway parted simultaneously.

From each direction sprang an attacker. Wearing no uniforms, their drab attire gave them the look of spies, or servants, both dark-faced, and so alike that they might have been twins. But The Shadow had no time for such comparisons, except in relation to the weapons that the pair carried. Each dark attacker was brandishing a machete.

Both deadly blades were slashing for The Shadow. Had he remained rooted, his doom would have been sure. At best, he was only able to wheel toward the man on the right, meeting him a moment earlier than the other; but the quick twist was a lifesaver.

The first machete sliced above The Shadow, carving nothing more than a portion of his cloak sleeve. Before the second man could lengthen his lunge to bury the knife blade in The Shadow’s back, the cloaked fighter had gripped the first attacker and was wheeling him about.

With a side step toward the stairs, the second man tried to make a cross-stab at The Shadow, but the spin was too swift. Using the first attacker as a human bludgeon, The Shadow flung him upon his companion.

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