They worked in compact gangs, Harry knew, and their foothold was greater, so far as the police was concerned.
If the newspapers spoke truly, gangsters ruled Chicago as kings.
All his old adventures with The Shadow recurred to Harry’s mind, as he stood by the window, looking out over the vast city of Chicago, to the blue waterfalls of Lake Michigan.
He had done much to help The Shadow, and still that mysterious man amazed and bewildered him.
In and out of New York, The Shadow had struck the plots and counterplots of crafty criminals until his name had become a terror to those who fought against the law. Yet The Shadow had never been revealed. His personality was still a mystery.
Some believed him to be a detective; others claimed that he was a master mind that knew no law. Whichever might be true, it was certain that The Shadow had brought many crooks to justice, and that he was a criminologist of tremendous ability.
Yet here, in Chicago, Harry Vincent felt qualms. This was to be a new game.
It would not be a battle of wits for The Shadow, although wits would play their part. It would be a fight against tremendous odds; against groups of desperate men who ruled their realm with automatics, bombs, and machine guns.
Even The Shadow, with all his amazing power, was human. When the gangsters of Chicago were thwarted, they spoke with bullets.
Did The Shadow know the dangers that lay here? Did he realize the strength of the powerful organizations that defied the police, and openly ridiculed the law? Did he know the risk he would take if he came to Chicago?