"Thought I saw something floating out there," replied the first.
"Don't waste good lead. You got that guy the first time you fired. Come along. We've got to help Biff. It's time we scrammed."
The suggestion was a wise one. Even in this isolated spot the sound of gunfire had at last brought visitors. Two cars were stopping on a roadway, across a little cove. The men on the dock could hear voices. Hurriedly, they rushed back to aid Biff and other wounded men. They piled their companions into the cars and prepared to leave. One man took the sedan; the other the touring car. With their load of wounded gangsters, they pulled away up the road that led to the winding lane. The silence of death prevailed upon the little pier. There The Shadow had fought his mighty battle against terrific odds, only to end his glorious fight with a farewell plunge into the Sound. People were arriving now, a uniformed policeman among them. White-faced men were peering at the sprawled forms of dead gangsters. The officer pulled a motionless man from the coupe; then saw another body beneath the form that he had removed.
This man was alive. He managed to rise of his own accord. He staggered as his feet touched the pier, then sat down on the running board of the coupe and stared about him with a bewildered air. It was Glade Tremont. He had regained consciousness during the end of the fray.
Now, he could scarcely realize what had happened. People were crowding up to talk with this lone survivor of the carnage
Men piling victims into cars that had gone; dead men on the dock; a live man emerging from the coupe witnesses had seen all these. But no one, either on the pier or the roadway across the cove, saw the dripping figure that came from the Sound and crawled stealthily among the rocks, five hundred yards away. No one saw the figure — nor did any hear the mocking laugh that came from lips that were obscured by the flapping brim of a water-soaked slouch hat.
The Shadow, victor of the fray, had returned from the waters. He had feigned a dying plunge when he had dived to safety. Though weaponless, he had escaped unscathed.
Chapter XV — After Midnight
An automobile pulled up to the door of Glade Tremont's home. A policeman stepped out to meet it. Doctor Gerald Savette, suave and questioning in glance, looked at the man in uniform.
"You are Doctor Savette?" asked the officer.