"Maxwell Grant - The Shadow - 117 - Vengeance Is Mine" - читать интересную книгу автора (Grant Maxwell)

before they could make a get-away outside.
Reaching the latched bottom door, The Shadow yanked it inward. He came
into the confines of a blind alleyway behind the apartment house. Finding the
right direction, he made for the front street. A coupe slithered past the
outlet while The Shadow was on the way. Coming out into the glare of a street
lamp, The Shadow saw the small car turn the corner.
Across the street, Moe Shrevnitz saw The Shadow and pointed after the
speeding car. Then Moe sensed that something was wrong; otherwise, The Shadow
would not have come blindly out into the light. Moe scrambled from the wheel,
dashed across the street to meet his chief. The Shadow was already in swift
motion.
Pushing Moe aside, The Shadow sprang for the wheel of the taxi. Moe was
just in time to leap into the back seat when the cab roared away. From his
unusual post, the cabby watched The Shadow; saw the cloaked driver produce an
automatic, to have the gun in readiness. Whirling the corner, The Shadow
spotted the lights of the coupe, four blocks ahead.


THE chase that followed made Moe's own feats of driving fade into
insignificance. That fall down the steps had jolted The Shadow badly; his mind
was working in one channel only. He was out to overtake the coupe; and his
driving skill proved uncanny. The car ahead had dodged into another street. It
weaved at every corner; yet The Shadow picked up the trail at every turn.
Sirens were shrilling, telling that the police had learned of the chase.
At one corner, coupe and taxicab whizzed by so fast that they left a patrol
car
at its post. At another block, the coupe lurched left; the cab followed it so
rapidly that a second patrol car missed the turn completely. There would be
more, however; they might cut in from anywhere.
The Shadow had cut the distance to a single block. He lessened that by a
third as the coupe took another corner. They were heading toward the river.
Ahead, high to the right, loomed the superstructure of an East River bridge.
There were only two outlets from the street.
The first was a narrow thoroughfare to the right - a blind alley that was
stopped by the high ramp to the bridge. The second, farther on, was a street
to
the left that ran parallel to the river. That was the outlet that the coupe
wanted.
Just as The Shadow viewed this scene, a police car swung in from the
thoroughfare that fringed the river. Turning right, the police car was coming,
head-on toward the coupe, certain to block its path. Crooks were in a bad
spot;
for The Shadow was hot behind them. Their only course was to take the little
street that went off to the right, even though it ended blind within half a
block.
The coupe made the swerve. The Shadow saw quick motion from the man
beside
the driver. He spied the police car veering wide, hoping to cut into the blind
street before The Shadow's cab arrived.
Instantly, The Shadow performed an amazing move; for he had foreseen a