The fact that displeased Ernie more than the death of his men was the linking of the shooting with racketeering. Another column on the front page announced that the police were forming antiracket squads.
Ernie realized that it had all started with his fiasco when he had attacked the storage van. Since then, there had been other incidents — all cited in the newspaper.
A baker had resisted gangsters who had sought to wreck his shop because he was selling bread below the racket-determined price. In the midst of the fracas, shots from the street had dropped the gangsters. Two of them had been captured.
Another group, bent on ruining a florist’s greenhouse in New Jersey, had been surprised in the darkness. One of them had been captured by the local police, and had been identified as a Manhattan gunman.
There had been other perplexing incidents, and all of these were bringing worriment to racketeers.
Ernie flung the newspaper on the floor. He kicked the edge of the desk with his toe.
He could see the menace that lay behind all this. The Shadow was responsible!
The methods of the racketeers had been too bold. They had passed by the police. The methods of the law were slow. Crooked politicians were many. It was easy to fix cops.
But here was some one — and Ernie knew who — trimming the edges of prosperous rackets, and causing public outbursts.
Notoriety was damaging to racketeering. That had been proven in the past. It was being proved now.