CHAPTER VI THE SHADOW SUSPECTS

This is how I like to think of The Shadow. From "Six Men of Evil".

A click sounded amid darkness. A pale-blue light appeared in mid-air. Its
weird rays threw a lurid glow upon the polished surface of a table. Yet within
that sphere of light there was no sign of a living being.
The bluish glare seemed to fade at its outermost edges. It was a solitary
gleam that was battling with surrounding darkness that restrained the light
like a living shroud. The very atmosphere betokened the presence of some
sinister, living being.
This was the single light in the sanctum of The Shadow. Somewhere in
Manhattan, tucked away from the roar and bustle of crowded New York, this spot
formed the sanctuary where a master mind evolved its mighty plans to cope with
hidden crime.
Of all mysterious abodes, The Shadow's sanctum was most amazing. Its very
existence was not even suspected. The Shadow, himself, was a mystery. His true
identity was unknown. Yet he was recognized as a personage of power whose
strange activities were not restricted to New York alone.
It was an axiom among fiends of crime that The Shadow could be everywhere.
The biggest shots of crookdom feared The Shadow when they plotted crime. Months
before, a man of evil had spoken The Shadow's name with awe while riding
northward through Mexico. That was no exception to the rule. In every city that
harbored an underworld The Shadow was feared as a living presence.
In London, in Berlin, in Madrid, crooks of all nationalities lowered their
voices when they discussed The Shadow. In Paris, skulking crooks still mumbled
tales of The Shadow's prowess - of that eerie night when an unknown being in
black had battled single-handed against a horde of apaches. In Moscow, there
were men who remembered the time when The Shadow had fought himself free from a
regiment of Red troops.
Who was The Shadow?
No one knew. Gangsters recognized him as an overpowering menace. The
police of New York knew him only as a fierce foe to crime. Studious
criminologists had expressed the well-founded opinion that The Shadow was the
single factor that prevented the balance of justice from swinging to the side
of lawlessness.
When crime became rampant, then did The Shadow strike. A living being of
the darkness, he came and went unseen. Always, his objective was the stamping
out of supercrime.
Dying gangsters had expired with the name of The Shadow upon their
blood-flecked lips. Hordes of mobsmen had fallen before The Shadow's wrath. A
man garbed in black, his face unseen beneath the turned-down brim of a slouch
hat - that was the spectral form that gangdom called The Shadow!


HAD leaders of the underworld suspected the existence of The Shadow's
sanctum, they would have spared no effort to discover it. Often had vicious
plotters sought to reach The Shadow; but they had seldom gained more than a
surface knowledge of his habitats.
Those who had found themselves upon The Shadow's trail were no longer
living to pursue their quest. Time and again had The Shadow turned upon those
who sought to kill him; and those who had encountered The Shadow had
encountered death.
Thus, The Shadow, secret in his identity, preserved the places where he
lurked. This sanctum was inviolate. Not even the trusted men who served The
Shadow knew its location. In fact, they, like The Shadow's enemies, held no
clew to the identity of the black-garbed phantom of the night.
When the weird blue light glowed, as it was glowing now, its strange rays
were seen only by The Shadow. Into the revealing gleam came the first visible
symbols of The Shadow's presence. Two long, white hands, with tapering fingers,
crept across the surface of the table beneath the light. They were like detached
things, materialized from nothingness.
Upon the third finger of the left hand shone a mysterious jewel. The rays
that struck it from above were reflected in a gleaming glory. At first they
showed the blueness of the light that illuminated this corner of the room. Then
the color of the gem underwent a visible metamorphosis.
Its hues deepened and turned to purple. Then they acquired a crimson touch
that developed into a vivid red. Living sparks seemed to leap from the weirdly
glowing stone.
This gem was unique. A rare fire opal, known as a girasol, its splendor
was unmatched in all the world. That stone was The Shadow's symbol, its
ever-changing shades a token of The Shadow's own prowess. For The Shadow, when
he appeared by day, could adopt disguises that deceived the most brilliant
sleuths.