“I saved both of them!”
NOT a single one of the four had made a move. All were dominated by their terrible enemy, the man whose face they could not see, and whose voice came like tones of doom.
“I need not dwell upon your former crimes,” said The Shadow. “I know them all — thanks to those papers which Theodore Galvin left with his ill-gotten gains.
“Some of the wealth was rightfully his. It will go to his heirs. The rest will be returned to its owners; those who were robbed by your crimes and schemes — Hiram Mallory and Theodore Galvin.
“You were master minds of crime, aided by such lesser crooks as Maddox and Briggs, eliminating enemies with the aid of Shargin and his gang. Covering clews with the help of—”
The sentence was never finished. One of the four had acted. Strangely enough, Briggs was the one to combat The Shadow’s strategy.
The big man had been kneeling beside a bag when the blinding light had come. Moose Shargin was beside him. Briggs, with upraised hand, had nudged the gang leader’s hip pocket. He had struck the butt of a gun.
Briggs had been waiting. Then, realizing that his hand was virtually out of sight, he had suddenly snatched the gun.
Luck played a great part. Briggs was not only a remarkable shot; he was also left-handed. Shargin’s gun was on his right hip. Briggs, seizing it, instantly found the trigger.
As his hand came into view, he fired directly at the light. The cannonlike roar of the automatic ushered in darkness. Briggs had hit the light that The Shadow held!