Robert Wallace - The Dancing Doll Murders

In the impenetrable darkness that followed the killers crept forward. Van and the inspector were to be hunted down like rats.

“Drop!” hissed Van as machine-gun fire from two different angles swept toward them.

It was closer now. The murderers were advancing. Van and Farragut had found momentary shelter in a rocky hollow below the road. By lying flat against the cold ground they escaped that second fusillade. By keeping up a steady fire themselves, they held the killers at bay. But the flashes of their own guns let the others know where they were; and they dared not cease firing, for that would let the gunmen creep in close and slaughter them.

Farragut spoke hoarsely. “it looks like the fade-out for us, Phantom. I’ve only one extra clip. We can’t keep this up. Even if I had more, the two of us with these rods can’t expect to hold off three guys with choppers.”

Van’s teeth were clenched. Their lives, he knew, hung by a slender thread. They’d been lucky to find this momentary shelter. But it would cease to do them any good when their clips were exhausted. And they had no chance to run. The others would hear them. Already they were partially surrounded.

“Can you handle a gun in each hand, Inspector?” asked Van suddenly.

Farragut turned in the darkness. “I can use both hands all right, but I’m no two-gun marvel, Phantom. My left’s pretty weak. Why?”

“Just this,” Van whispered. “We’re trapped. Our only chance is to get one of those machine-guns. But if I stop firing and leave this hole now they’ll be onto it. You’ve got to cover me, Inspector. You’ve got to take my gun and make them think I’m still here.”

“Let you go out after them Unarmed!” growled Farragut. “Nothing doing!”

“It isn’t only our own lives. We’ve got to get out of here in time to save Moxley. I know for certain now that his death’s in the cards.” Before the inspector could protest further, Van shoved his own automatic into Farragut’s left hand. “Keep firing!” he whispered. The next instant he’d slipped over the edge of the rocks.

Flat on his chest, snakelike against the hard ground, Van crawled forward. He stopped a moment, listened to Farragut’s firing. The inspector was playing his part well, blasting away with both guns almost simultaneously, two points of flame in the darkness that the killers could see. And that murderous stream of machine-gun death was still converging on the hollow.

Lead screamed past Van’s head so close he could have lifted his arm into the path of it. Grim-eyed, he continued up the slope toward the nearest of the crouching gunmen. But not straight. He made a cautious circuit, inch by inch, foot by foot, trying not to stir a leaf or pebble, testing each foothold and handhold before he trusted his weight to it.

And the bursts from one of the machine-guns sounded nearer and nearer. Van edged off to the right of it – then edged back. The noise of the gun told him that the mobster who held it was crouched behind a rock just in front. Van would have to run the risk of being struck by one of Farragut’s bullets, too. In his haste he hadn’t told the inspector which man he planned to attack. It would be bitterly ironic if a slug from Farragut’s automatic ended the life of the Phantom!

Now! Could he make it? The spewing, flaming muzzle of the machine-gun was not more than six feet ahead! But that six feet held countless possibilities of death. One of Farragut’s bullets might strike him. The gunman might turn on him in time, and literally chop him to pieces as Sheehan, the police chauffeur, had been cut down. The Phantom drew his knees up slowly, spread his arms out.

Then he leaped like a puma, leaped into utter darkness – and felt a squirming human body at the spot where he struck. There was a single hoarse cry close to him. The machine-gun whipped around for a moment, its hot breath searing the Phantom’s face.

STRUGGLING, clawing, Van and the machine-gunner fought madly behind the rock. They fought with Death leering down as the referee. For there could be no quarter. The man Van had jumped was still trying to force the barrel of his weapon around into Van’s chest. And Van, recalling vividly the brutal murder of the police chauffeur, was trying to get his fingers into that twisting neck.

The man squirmed like some kind of loathsome reptile. His clothes and flesh were wet with ground dampness. Van couldn’t get a clutch on him. And every second the machine-gun’s muzzle was coming nearer. Eternity seemed to hang in the balance.

Van felt hot metal touch against his throat. He struck then, struck savagely, smashing his right fist into the mobster’s face. This man was a killer, a mad human wolf in the pay of the Chief. He deserved no mercy.

Van felt savage joy in the stinging contact of his fists. He battered the man’s head back against the rock; battered till the machine-gun was silent, till there was no movement in that squirming human form. He didn’t know whether the man was dead or alive. But he was out, anyway. He would be out for many minutes. Van snatched up the hot gun. There were two other killers out there in the darkness.

He jabbed the black muzzle viciously toward the next mobster, pressed the crescent-shaped trigger, and sent lead hurtling into the night. A man fifty feet away cried out in sudden fury.

Then bullets came back at Van, screaming, rocketing, striking the stone beside him, whining off into the darkness like demons gone mad. For a moment it was nip and tuck which gun would get in its inning. But cold anger filled Van – anger at the murder he had witnessed, anger at the knowledge that the Chief had almost beaten him with this latest trick. He found a mark suddenly, heard a man gasping and thrashing among the bushes.

The third machine-gunner tried to flee then. He was higher up. He sent a burst down where Van was, then took to his heels. Van shouted for him to halt. But the man went on. Up by the fence he turned again, lashed out at Van with murderous fire; and it was there that Van’s burst got him instead. He cried out once. Van heard the clatter of metal on concrete as his machine-gun fell.

Van called to the inspector. Together they climbed back up the slope to the highway and Van turned on his flash.

The man lying up there beside the road was the sinister “Doc” whom he had seen in the Chief’s hideout.

Four of Van’s slugs had stitched him across the chest.

QUICKLY looking over the police sedan, Van saw it was hopelessly out of commission. He stared at it grimly till Farragut called in excitement:

“There’s a car coming up the road.”

Van stepped aside, waving his flashlight. But instead of stopping the car speeded up and roared by. Van got a glimpse of it and swore harshly. It was a big limousine with four men in it and with a low official number.

“Moxley!” said Farragut. “Those were some of my boys with him. They couldn’t see who we were. They had orders from me not to stop for anything or anybody. I’m afraid you’re too late, Phantom!”

Too late! Van feared it also. Unless he could reach Moxley within the next half hour the man faced certain death. He grabbed Farragut’s arm.

“That girl must be around here somewhere,” he said swiftly, “and the car they came in!”

Farragut nodded, and they began a frantic search. They found Dolly DeLong, still wired and helpless, lying in the shadow of a culvert. Her face showed deathly pallor. She shrank away as Van reached down to touch her, mistaking him for one of the killers and thinking her own end was near. But when he drew the adhesive tape from her mouth, when he spoke quietly and she realized she’d been rescued, she broke into a torrent of words.