No one knew who The Shadow was. A strange personage of the night, he appeared from nowhere, garbed in black, and vanished as amazingly as he appeared.
Time after time, The Shadow had thwarted the affairs of master crooks.
While none knew what The Shadow was, many — Zull among them — knew what The Shadow was not.
They knew that he was not a detective — though his ability at solving crime surpassed that of the most expert sleuths. They knew that he was not a criminal — though he understood the ways of crooks and gangsters and fought them successfully with their own weapons.
It was rumored — never proven — that The Shadow was a man of wealth, who studied criminology through contact with crime. Yet he seemed to choose his activities with the care of a connoisseur, ignoring certain crimes where one might logically expect him; stepping into others when not anticipated.
Gangsters and detectives alike had surreptitiously sought to trace The Shadow through one source — his radio broadcasts.
Once a week, this mysterious man appeared at a great broadcasting studio, and sent his voice over the air on a national hook-up.
But every effort to learn his identity had failed. Even those connected with the radio programs did not know The Shadow.
Sometimes he broadcast from a room with black hangings, which evidently had a secret entrance. There he was hidden from prying eyes.
But on one occasion, when alert eyes had been watching that special room, The Shadow had entered the studio in disguise. He had deliberately broadcast from the very room in which the actors in a radio drama were doing their parts.