glass to see two pale and deadly eyes that seemed to grow and grow till he fell into them and went to sleep.
The directors would know a miracle of hypnotism when they heard about it. But the guard wouldn’t know till he was told.
The Avenger turned the wheel of his car and swung into Sixth Avenue, near Thirty-fourth Street. He drove down Sixth, his face a mask, eyes like stainless steel chips. A car was following his closely. It had picked up the trail eight blocks above, about fifteen minutes after he he had left Town Bank and was on upper Broadway.
The driver of the trailing car was clever. He drove now with regular lights, now with cowl lights, flaring. He drove far behind for a while, then very close. Whenever a truck loomed, going in the same direction, he hung behind the tail of the truck and out of sight.
But The Avenger had faced precisely this sort of danger too often for any man to fool him.
He went on down Sixth Avenue, turned slowly into his own street—Bleek Street.
The car behind was powerful. It had a pickup like an electric locomotive. It screeched around the corner on two wheels, like an animal that had only been waiting for a dark spot from which to spring. It went half over the curb, and its nose rammed the side of Benson’s car.
The Avenger had been driving with the windows down. A touch of his finger, just before the crash, had snapped all windows up.
Four machine guns were suddenly chattering from the big sedan that held Benson’s car rammed against the blank wall of the storage warehouse across from his headquarters.
The glass of Benson’s car was starred in a hundred places, but did not break. The armor of its sides clanged under the leaden hail like a tin roof in a rainstorm, but was not pierced by it.
However, there was a cold efficiency here that went far beyond the usual, murderous gang efficiency. Not one or two machine guns, but four! And when these were found to be ineffective, there was another deadly weapon, brought along for just such an emergency.
One window of the attacking sedan rolled down a foot. It revealed, for just an instant, a little more clearly, the five dark figures within. One of the figures had a round object in his hand. And the round object was thrown forward in a flat, practiced arc so that it came to rest directly under The Avenger’s car.
The round object was a bomb! It contained enough explosive to lift Benson’s car twenty feet and let it fall again in a tangled mass—with The Avenger a shattered, pulped thing at the remnants of a steering wheel.
He had had his answer from Town Bank: A death sentence!
CHAPTER VII
Beyond The Law
The girl was very pretty, in a dark, sinuous way. She had big, dark eyes and silky chestnut hair and a figure that had landed her many jobs in show business.
But that was before her brother had become so wealthy and could afford to give her enough to live comfortably.
Her brother was Nicky Luckow. And the girl, Beatrice Luckow, was with her brother, now. Her beauty was very much marred by a hard line around her lips that matched the hardness in Luckow’s face, and in the faces of three of Luckow’s men who were also at his apartment. “The sap’s played right into our hands,” exulted Luckow. “So little Tommy Crimm’s going to get back at the guys that turned the heat on his dad, eh? And what do you think his idea is? An idea—I’ll admit—that I stuck in his brain first.”
“What?” said Beatrice, hard young eyes examining a thumbnail that was tinted deep crimson.
“We’re to stick up the Town Bank. How do you like that? Tommy goes with the boys. All they’re to do is get back this Ballandale stock. That is, that’s all Tommy knows they’ll do. Of course if there’s a lot of cash just lying around, the boys might kinda take to it.”
“What’s so wonderful about that?” objected Beatrice.
“Tom goes with ’em,” said Luckow. “Didn’t you hear me say that?”
“Well?”
“Well, if
The directors would know a miracle of hypnotism when they heard about it. But the guard wouldn’t know till he was told.
The Avenger turned the wheel of his car and swung into Sixth Avenue, near Thirty-fourth Street. He drove down Sixth, his face a mask, eyes like stainless steel chips. A car was following his closely. It had picked up the trail eight blocks above, about fifteen minutes after he he had left Town Bank and was on upper Broadway.
The driver of the trailing car was clever. He drove now with regular lights, now with cowl lights, flaring. He drove far behind for a while, then very close. Whenever a truck loomed, going in the same direction, he hung behind the tail of the truck and out of sight.
But The Avenger had faced precisely this sort of danger too often for any man to fool him.
He went on down Sixth Avenue, turned slowly into his own street—Bleek Street.
The car behind was powerful. It had a pickup like an electric locomotive. It screeched around the corner on two wheels, like an animal that had only been waiting for a dark spot from which to spring. It went half over the curb, and its nose rammed the side of Benson’s car.
The Avenger had been driving with the windows down. A touch of his finger, just before the crash, had snapped all windows up.
Four machine guns were suddenly chattering from the big sedan that held Benson’s car rammed against the blank wall of the storage warehouse across from his headquarters.
The glass of Benson’s car was starred in a hundred places, but did not break. The armor of its sides clanged under the leaden hail like a tin roof in a rainstorm, but was not pierced by it.
However, there was a cold efficiency here that went far beyond the usual, murderous gang efficiency. Not one or two machine guns, but four! And when these were found to be ineffective, there was another deadly weapon, brought along for just such an emergency.
One window of the attacking sedan rolled down a foot. It revealed, for just an instant, a little more clearly, the five dark figures within. One of the figures had a round object in his hand. And the round object was thrown forward in a flat, practiced arc so that it came to rest directly under The Avenger’s car.
The round object was a bomb! It contained enough explosive to lift Benson’s car twenty feet and let it fall again in a tangled mass—with The Avenger a shattered, pulped thing at the remnants of a steering wheel.
He had had his answer from Town Bank: A death sentence!
CHAPTER VII
Beyond The Law
The girl was very pretty, in a dark, sinuous way. She had big, dark eyes and silky chestnut hair and a figure that had landed her many jobs in show business.
But that was before her brother had become so wealthy and could afford to give her enough to live comfortably.
Her brother was Nicky Luckow. And the girl, Beatrice Luckow, was with her brother, now. Her beauty was very much marred by a hard line around her lips that matched the hardness in Luckow’s face, and in the faces of three of Luckow’s men who were also at his apartment. “The sap’s played right into our hands,” exulted Luckow. “So little Tommy Crimm’s going to get back at the guys that turned the heat on his dad, eh? And what do you think his idea is? An idea—I’ll admit—that I stuck in his brain first.”
“What?” said Beatrice, hard young eyes examining a thumbnail that was tinted deep crimson.
“We’re to stick up the Town Bank. How do you like that? Tommy goes with the boys. All they’re to do is get back this Ballandale stock. That is, that’s all Tommy knows they’ll do. Of course if there’s a lot of cash just lying around, the boys might kinda take to it.”
“What’s so wonderful about that?” objected Beatrice.
“Tom goes with ’em,” said Luckow. “Didn’t you hear me say that?”
“Well?”
“Well, if
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