BATMAN: CRIME, CRIME EVERYWHERE
By Bruce Wayne
DISCLAIMER: Most of the characters portrayed in this story are copyright by DC Comics, an AOL/Time/Warner company. They are used without permission for entertainment without profit by the author.
CHAPTER 14 - THE FIERY BARRIER
Odds meant nothing to Batman at a moment like this. He wanted battle. The quicker it came the better. He knew that Robin had inadvertently led him on the wrong trail and that the real quest lay back in the building where the pursuit had begun.
The quicker the battle, the sooner Batman could settle it. But he wasn't forgetting certain details. There was the traffic officer, in a spot of new danger. Robin, too, was a consideration as he went to fight it out with Bob Holbert.
Flinging the Batmobile door wide, Batman got out of the magnificent vehicle as shots volleyed in his direction. He ducked the shots while on the move. He was moving to a spot where only he would be in danger, drawing fire away from the policeman's direction, as well as that of the halted dilapidated automobile.
Batman was at the curb, directly in back of the half-wrecked truck. Crooks hadn't reached him with their hasty shots. Flanking the truck on both sides, the six killers who formed the crew had a chance to get past the front of the truck and intrench themselves, at the same time keeping an opportunity for flight.
But they didn't choose that plan. They were learning something that they had never guessed. Batman punctured the truck tires with a sharp instrument from his utility belt.
The criminals continued to miss Batman with their gunfire. He was a lone target, moving in a rapid zigzag.
To a man, the six were ready to deal with the Caped Crusader. They weren't worried about themselves. They simply wanted to get him before he escaped.
Three from each side of the truck, they rounded the vehicle, hot on Batman's trail. But it was a trail no longer. Batman's flight had ended, much shorter than they thought. Full around, Batman was coming straight in their direction.
Razor-sharp, lightweight, Mini-Batarangs were thrown at the attackers like ninja Shurikens. While, perhaps, lacking the stopping power of heavier Batarangs, these weapons were painful deterrents.
Even more amazing was Batman was throwing himself into the path of aim of the six-man firing squad!
Each stride Batman took was making it easier for those marksmen, but the Caped Crusader's Mini-Batarangs were making it harder. He was throwing weapons ahead of him, and they were scoring from the first moment. The two foremost crooks fired. They were staggering when they pulled their triggers. Jerked high, their guns sizzled meaningless slugs above Batman's head.
Others fired, but they were diving for shelter as they did. They missed, too, by feet, not inches. The Batarangs seemed to pick them automatically. They were ducking past the truck, hoping to get away before those deadly devices struck them. One crouched crook held his ground. He bobbed up suddenly, to take point-blank aim at the caped foe who was only a dozen feet away.
As the gunman rose, Batman dived. A bullet slicked the top of his cowl. Striking the ground on one shoulder, the Dark Knight looked like a sure victim for the crook's next shot. But the shot never came. Batman's other hand threw a small pellet toward the gunman.
The pellet hit the ground and there was an immediate flash of bright light and a loud "BANG!" that startled the foe. More pellets were thrown and the battlefield became even more confusing with the addition of smoke seeming to be everywhere.
The thug who thought he might be the one to take out Batman was rewarded with two big feet to his face as the Gotham Avenger leveled him with a drop kick. The man caved back against the truck and floundered, losing his useless gun as he fell.
By then, the traffic officer who approached the chaotic scene began shooting from behind a nearby mailbox. He dropped one killer who was trying to scurry away. Flat on the ground, Batman crawled beneath the truck and clipped the legs of another criminal and knocked him out with a punch to the face. A third was making for Holbert's car. He was dropped by a sudden telescoping Bo staff blow the the back of the head.
Robin had taken care of the final marksman. He was free of Holbert. Bob, who was not used to fighting, had been no problem for the Boy Wonder.
But Holbert's cranium was apparently very thick. Bob was staggering blindly, shooting his gun in every direction but the right one. From across the street, it looked as if he had aimed for Batman, and the traffic officer saw it. Considering Holbert as dangerous as the others, the policeman gave him three bullets in a row.
Two went wide. The third found the fake detective's heart. Bob Holbert was dead, which was unfortunate. Just as White could have furnished a trail that other night, Holbert was the one man who could have talked on this occasion. Following the finish of the gunfire, Batman felt a note of grim regret.
When the officer looked for Batman, the avenger in black was gone. So startling was his disapperance that the cop actually believed The Masked Manhunter had faded into nothingness before his eyes. Batman had a habit of making such departures. Even Robin blinked, though he had seen it happen before.
The engine of the Batmobile revved to life and the incredible car took off down the street.
Robin quickly made himself scarce by taking to a nearby rooftop.
As approaching sirens broke the still night air, the traffic officer was the only one left to gather the dead and wounded crooks and picked up of what little remained of Stephen Helk.
Looking down from the rooftop of a five-story commercial building, Robin knew what was coming -- numerous police cars and ambulances would arrive and the traffic officer would long be telling the tale of a man in a black cape who had dematerialized himself like a puff of smoke. Robin moved from rooftop to rooftop that offered him a path to obscurity.
***
While the battle Batman fought raged, The Penguin was finishing his job of ransacking Helk's office. The Black Bird of Prey was quacking smoothly to the con men who worked with him.
"More pictures, Rendy," he told one. "Check on those mailing lists" -- he was swinging to the other - "and make it swift, Wallingham. Ah!" The Penguin drew a photograph from the pile that Rendy handed him. "Here's a pretty young thing of the exact type that we want. Look her up in the list, Wallingham - B-868. That makes four already, but we'd better have more. Sometimes photographs lie, though these look pretty good. Here's another young lady, better than any yet. T-91. Get the information on her, Wallingham, and we'll call it quits. If I know my own eyesight" -- he studied the photograph by the desk lamp -- "Miss T-91 will fill the bill."
Rendy leaned over from the filing cabinet and listened at the window. He was a smooth-looking fellow, a bit oily in manner, and when he wrinkled his forehead and set his lips, his face went hard. Wallingham noted Rendy and became alert. Wallingham's face, off guard, showed shrewdness that resembled a rat's expression.
"What's up?" demanded The Penguin. "Hear anything?"
"Thought I heard gunshots," returned Rendy, "but now it's sirens. Maybe that guy Holbert got caught. He struck me as pretty dumb, except for his front."
The Penguin stepped to the window and listened. Next, he began to dump photographs from the filing cabinet. He told Wallingham to take the wastebaskets, fill them with letters and carry them out to the stairs.
"Take along your camera, Wally," added The Penguin. Then, with a chuckle: "You know how to work it. Set the thing that says time exposure, then press the shutter gadget. Come on, Rendy, get your camera, too, and help me pile this stuff on it."
The "camera" was soon set in the middle of a pile of papers and photographs. The Penguin set one knob, then clicked the shutter. He commented, "Three minutes." Then, picking up the chosen photos and the data that went with them, he bustled Rendy out into the hall.
Wallingham was at the stairs. He had the contents of the wastebasket dumped upon the "camera" box. The Penguin told him to hurry it, and Wallingham pressed the shutter switch. His thumb was in motion when the Man of a Thousand Umbrellas snarled, "Hold it!"
Wallingham had forgotten the timing gadget, and The Penguin was too late to stop him. However, the "Hold it!" saved Wallingham. He made a rapid dive in the Black Bird of Prey's direction. An instant later, the so-called "camera" showed what it really was: an incendiary bomb.
The thing went off with a muffled puff that threw up a display of fireworks. There was plenty of magnesium powder in it, and the stuff produced a blinding brilliance.
Wallingham was turned away from it. Rendy was throwing his arm over his eyes, like The Penguin. Thus they missed the flash that would have temporarily incapacitated them.
Oil was spattering. The letters and wastebaskets were ablaze. There was another jet of flame, reddish in hue, that lighted up the hall. In the midst of that hiss and splutter, with fire shooting in all directions, The Penguin gave a frantic snarl. He was pointing to the stairway. The others saw the thing he indicated.
It was a figure in black -- one that no crook could fail to recognize. Batman was on the stairs, dropping back to a landing, a short way below. In one hand, he was holding one end of his cape over his eyes.
A dozen seconds more, Batman, returning from one bout with a batch of crooks, would have been upon this smooth trio, ready to handle them in similar fashion. The only thing that had saved The Penguin and his minions was Wallingham's slip-up with the time device on the firebomb!
The thing had served the crooks far better than they intended. The mistake had been luck of the first order. The bomb had flashed just as Batman rounded the turn in the stairs. He had been late in covering his eyes against the magnesium flare.
Not only had Batman been too blinded to spot the faces of The Penguin and his companions -- the Caped Crusader was temporarily helpless!
The Penguin's snarl wasn't anything like his ordinarily quacking tone. The master criminal was cocking his gun umbrella and ordered his men to do the same. The tone hardened, as The Penguin ordered: "Get him! It's Batman! Give him all the bullets you've got!"
There was another flash and a bang in the stairway -- this time it was Batman's doing. The Flash/Bang pellet caused the criminals to shoot blindly, but with near accuracy. Batman had heard The Penguin's voice and was making the most of it. Three criminals went diving along the hall, past Helk's office.
It took both luck and speed for them to get clear, and behind them they could hear the sound of Batman coming after them. There was an exit to a fire escape at the end of the hall, and the fugitives needed it.
They were shooting at Batman as they ran, but their fire was frantic. The Dark Knight was coming through the flames at the head of the stairs. Quick with the cape, he had suffered less from the magnesium light than the crooks supposed.
He could see them partially, like kaleidoscopic figures. Not well enough to identify them, but he knew The Penguin's voice.
The fugitives needed more luck, and they had it. As Batman came through the rising fire and paused clear of the smoke, the other bomb went off in Helk's office. The Penguin had planted it much better than the one at the stairs. The thing literally ripped apart, vomiting liquid fire like the mouth of a volcano.
Again, Batman was bothered by the brilliance, though it was around the corner of the doorway. The thugs, looking back from the fire escape, received the same effect. Blinking, they groped for the fire escape and stumbled downward. Their fear of the Gotham Goliath spurred them to breakneck efforts.
As Batman's vision cleared again, he found himself surrounded by fire, with billows of stifling smoke blotting the whole scene. His path to the stairs was cut off by a fierce conflagration behind him. Ahead, a regular holocaust was sweeping from the door of Helk's doomed office.
Wheeling, Batman drove straight into a circling mass of flame and seemed to leap upward with the spouting fire. He was taking the stairway that led upward, a continuation of the steps from below. It was his only path, and he gained it just in time.
On the next floor, Batman paused long enough to beat out flames that were smoldering on his cape. That done, he did not bother with the fire escape. The crooks had by this time reached the ground.
To head off his foes, Batman made for the roof. From that vantage point, he saw the fugitives scrambling into a car parked on the next street. The glow of the fire showed them only vaguely. There was no identifying the men with The Penguin or their car.
The car was away, past a jutting building. Nothing he could do about it now.
The fire department, reaching the scene, found the old building in a mass of flames. It was a condemned firetrap, and promised them a battle. While they were pushing a ladder to the roof, one firefighter gave a startled call to the others. There, atop the building, they saw a fantastic creature that might have been the spirit of the flames.
A shape cloaked in black was weaving through hungry tongues of fire into a mass of billowing smoke. Like a human salamander, the figure evaded the scorching effect of the fire. Batman, with the aid of his Nomex-reinforced costume, was sidestepping the dangerous spots, but to the observers it looked as though he had picked the thick of the holocaust.
They watched the smoke, those firefighters, as a sweeping breeze dispelled it.
The gaseous clouds cleared away, leaving a stretch of roof that had a flame-reddened background. That was all. There was no sign of the uncanny figure that seemed to dwell in the fire itself.
A chunk of roof caved into the gorging flames below. They thought for the moment that the fire creature must have fallen with it, into the devouring pit. But near the fire escape, like a phoenix, the incredible creature of the night stood at his full height for a moment ... and then was gone!
***
The Penguin had complimented Stephen Helk on his ability as a law dodger. The compliment was deserved. Though Helk was identified after his death, neither Batman nor the police were able to trace his most recent activities.
Previously, Helk had been selling fake oil stock, but that racket had gone bust and Helk had disappeared. No one, except The Penguin, had tagged him as the hidden head of a cheap racket that operated under the name of Ajax Producers.
By setting fire to Helk's office, The Penguin had covered up the evidence long enough to stretch over the next two days, which was what he chiefly wanted. Thus, the Black Bird of Prey's racket was still an unsolved riddle on the night of the diamond show.
The great event began with all the promised fanfare. Early in the evening, the grand lobby of the Hotel Gotham was flooded with beautiful women, who were to appear as models and display the diamonds. Cameramen were taking pictures over each other's shoulders as fast as the girls arrived.
Alan Clendon was in charge of the arrangements, with Mushy Nebuchadnezzer a member of the committee. Among others in the lobby was Bruce Wayne, and he noticed Jon Daley in the offing.
The diamond seller displayed a rather cynical attitude, as if he thought the show should be considered unimportant. Daley was interested in the raw product, diamonds in the rough, rather than the finished variety. At least, such was the impression that he gave.
Most photographed among the super models was Cynthia Crawford, whose own vast fortune, reckoned at about twenty million, entitled her to wear the most diamonds.
Cynthia was a striking brunette, with dark eyes and features molded to roundish perfection. She looked very lovely, even without the four million in diamonds that she was to display.
The diamonds were to come later. At present, the models were being assigned to suites in the hotel, where they could try on their special costumes. When they arrived in the Skyview Salons, on the upper floors of the hotel, the gems would be waiting.
Clendon, portly and affable, wasn't at all nervous this evening. As for Nebuchadnezzer, the deep lines had faded from his bearded face, and he seemed youthful despite his gray hair. Both men explained their mood while riding up in the elevator with Bruce Wayne.
"There's nothing to worry about," declared Clendon. "Detective Bullock is on duty, with a squad of thirty detectives. If a single finger is lifted toward a diamond, an arrest will follow."
"The commissioner is here, too," added Nebuchadnezzer. "The situation is doubly safe. I have great confidence in Commissioner Gordon."
Bruce Wayne gave an obliging nod, as though he appreciated the approval that Nebuchadnezzer, a foreigner, had given his friend. From a corner of the elevator, Daley gave one of his short laughs. He didn't look as bland as usual tonight, and the laugh seemed forced.
Nebuchadnezzer gave him an anxious look. "What's the trouble, Mr Daley?"
"He's worrying about the diamond cutters," said Clendon to Nebuchadnezzer. "Daley has to make all the arrangements for them. Living quarters, working hours, and what not. You know, Mushy, diamond cutters are artists and therefore inclined to be temperamental."
Daley inserted a shrug at that point, and abruptly changed the topic. He took a sudden interest in the diamond show, asking how many persons had been invited. Clendon said about two hundred and that all were persons of high social standing.
"We invited a select group," he stated, "and gave them the privilege of bringing friends. Still, we are taking no chances. You will understand, when we reach the salons."
The salons were two rooms, one above the other. The elevators went to both, but the car stopped at the lower one. Bruce Wayne and his companions entered a large room, with detectives watching them from the moment that they stepped off the elevator. The room was ornately furnished, and in one corner was a small band. Beyond it, a curtained platform.
Boxes had been brought in and were jutting out from behind the curtain. Clendon explained that they contained special scenery, which would be used in the platform display at the end of the evening.
"There are the diamonds," Clendon said as he pointed to a bulky safe that was guarded by detectives. "And the models will be given the gems that they are to wear after they arrive here - not before."
Some of the female models were coming into the salon. Members of the jewelers association were bedecking them with diamonds. After that, the girls strolled around, chatting with their friends. A few of them went to a little elevator at the back of the salon. Bruce observed that Harvey Bullock was in charge of the elevator.
"The elevator," explained Clendon, "runs from this floor to the one above. Since it is the key position that covers both salons, Detective Bullock has chosen the elevator as his post."
Bruce was looking for someone among the sleek society men who were present. He finally spied a young man whose clean-cut appearance marked him as something other than a lounge lizard. It happened, however, that the young man was his former ward.
Dick Grayson was perfect for this assignment. Bruce was sure that he would prove to be useful. He had come to the diamond show on an invitation forwarded from Bruce Wayne. Seeing Bruce, Dick came over and shook hands.
As the two civilain-attired heroes chatted in a corner, near a table that had a telephone, Bruce undertoned questions in his calm style.
He wanted to know if Dick had been to the salon above, and the younger man nodded. When questioned regarding the persons on the upper floor, Dick stated that they were on a par with those in this salon. Dick had seen plenty of society men, most of them a glossy sort, and there had not been any among them who looked like professional crooks.
Dick added that the commissioner was upstairs. Evidently, Gordon was satisfied that Clendon's committee could handle the distribution of the jewels in the lower salon, while he remained above, to make sure that all was safe in that quarter.
Looking over the scene, Bruce told Dick to go upstairs and then added calmly: "Stay in touch over the comm-link, so that we can keep in constant communication."
Dick went up in the little elevator with Bullock, while Bruce turned to watch the parade of super models. It was really quite a spectacle. The glamourous girls had turned out in force for the occasion, and they were all smiles and glitter. Most of the gowns ranged from rose to wine color, and the diamonds had been distributed according to the varying hues.
Bruce watched a few million dollars' worth go by, in the shape of necklaces, rings, and brooches. There were yellow diamonds; trimmed with red gold; blue diamonds, in platinum settings; other varieties that the committee members kindly classified for the benefit of onlookers.
A buzz began as the star of the evening entered. Clad in simple black, Cynthia Crawford stepped from the elevator and smiled as she reached the committee. She was promptly adorned with the choicest of the diamonds, a galaxy of gems valued at close to four million dollars, which had been reserved for her arrival.
Cynthia's graceful finger received a fifty-carat champagne diamond. Her wrist was girded by a bracelet that sparkled with thick-clustered gems. The earrings that she put on were mere baubles valued at two hundred thousand dollars each, because of the perfectly matched diamonds that hung from each lobe.
While a committee member was fastening a half-million-dollar anklet to the model's trim ankle, Clendon produced the greatest prize of all, the celebrated Durban Diamond, that rated well above one hundred carats. It was a magnificent stone, the size of a small egg, and it was set in a simple pendant.
Hung from Cynthia's neck, the Durban Diamond had the black gown as a background and made a show in itself. In fact, the gem parade depended upon the Durban Diamond, which was valued somewhere around two million dollars.
It was rumored that some day the Durban might be cut into lesser stones, each a magnificent diamond in itself, if it found no takers at its present price.
Therefore, all eyes were on the famous gem. Everyone wanted to remember it and boast, in years to come, of having seen it intact. Among those who studied the diamond was Bruce Wayne. He was thinking what the Durban could mean to any master criminal who conspired to steal it.
Two million dollars, as good as ready made. Sliced into parts, the Durban Diamond could be peddled sectionally for its full value. It wouldn't have to be fenced through the usual channels. In fact, it couldn't be. Disposing of that diamond would be as simple a task as stealing it, if the criminal chose a wise opportunity.
At present, however, Cynthia Crawford was unlikely to lose the Durban Diamond, unless an earthquake struck Gotham City. Smiling much more affably than usual, the brunette strolled about the salon, showing all the diamonds, and particularly the Durban, to everyone who wanted to see them.
Viewers kept a respectful distance, except for the detectives. They were almost at Cynthia's elbows, but she didn't seem to mind them. Her pose brought a slight smile to Bruce's lips. He had heard that Cynthia Crawford was a very sought after woman.
When Cynthia arrived near the elevator, the detectives left her with Bullock, who was standing by. The last of the models were arriving, and the detectives were needed back by the safe. Most of the guests flocked over to see the rest of the diamonds, and Bruce expected Cynthia to be uncomfortable, but she wasn't.
Columnists and the celebrity news programs, not that Bruce ever watched them, had been remarking lately that Cynthia's beauty was greater than ever. There were other brunettes who resembled her, had even been mistaken for the wealthy super model. Probably Cynthia Crawford had decided to outshine her competitors by using charm along with beauty.
Bruce saw her enter the elevator with Bullock. The door closed and the little car started upward. Bruce turned toward a wall and whispered over his open microphone, "The big one is coming your way, Wing."
"Boss? You gotta a minute?" Bruce heard a feminine voice come over his earphone. It was Oracle.
"Go ahead," he whispered, still facing the wall.
"I've done the background check on Helk," stated Barbara Gordon. "He was running Ajax Producers, a fake motion-picture business with a phony movie- star contest. Swindling people who thought they belonged in pictures --"
By then, facts had clicked home to Batman.
He cut her off by saying, "Understood. Send the file to the Batcomputer."
Out of a perfect lull, the present situation had suddenly become a proposition that was made to order for crime.
Something suddenly happened in the corner of the salon that made Bruce turn. A light was blinking above the band. The musicians looked puzzled, for it was the signal to start the platform show.
The signal was coming from upstairs. Who was sending it and why, the musicians did not know, for it was coming much earlier than expected. The leader shrugged, then snapped his fingers.
As the band opened with a chord, an attendant pulled the curtain. Then came a long shriek from the turning spectators.
Over the edge of the platform rolled a girl's figure, bound and gagged. She sprawled headlong into the band, where musicians lifted her and pulled the gag from between her teeth. As arrivals saw the girl's face, the shouts became louder. The girl was in a faint, but that didn't prevent them from recognizing her.
The helpless prisoner was Cynthia Crawford!
That fact, alone, was astonishing enough, but trivial compared to the rest. Cynthia was no longer dressed in black. In fact, she was rather scantily attired, mostly in fluffy pink. Her velvet dress had been taken by her captors.
Other than some men who had little interest in diamonds and were now enjoying a free eyeful of the super model, no one was interested in Cynthia's clothes. They were thinking of other things that she had been wearing -- the diamonds. As far as jewels went, Cynthia was utterly devoid of them. All of her glittering adornments were gone: ring, anklet, bracelet, earrings, even the huge Durban Diamond which had so recently graced the glamourous girl's neck!
Robbery had been staged in the presence of a hundred witnesses, on a gigantic scale. In one swoop, mysterious crooks had garnered a haul of four million dollars in a place that was under the law's complete protection!
How and when the mammoth crime was staged seemed a mystery as great as the deed itself. Yet among those who saw the present plight of Cynthia Crawford was one whose keen mind quickly traced the past.
To Batman, this crime was a paradox, not a mystery. It was a thing that couldn't have happened so suddenly and completely as the situation indicated. Crime's stroke had come, yet it was not finished. The schemes of master criminals could still be frustrated.
Bruce had seen Cynthia take the elevator to the floor above. He had just heard from Oracle and had learned the important link to Helk. His keen insight into the ways of criminals told him the rest.
Minutes, perhaps, remained wherein Batman could still defeat a game which everyone else believed that crime had won!
To be continued ...
By Bruce Wayne
DISCLAIMER: Most of the characters portrayed in this story are copyright by DC Comics, an AOL/Time/Warner company. They are used without permission for entertainment without profit by the author.
CHAPTER 14 - THE FIERY BARRIER
Odds meant nothing to Batman at a moment like this. He wanted battle. The quicker it came the better. He knew that Robin had inadvertently led him on the wrong trail and that the real quest lay back in the building where the pursuit had begun.
The quicker the battle, the sooner Batman could settle it. But he wasn't forgetting certain details. There was the traffic officer, in a spot of new danger. Robin, too, was a consideration as he went to fight it out with Bob Holbert.
Flinging the Batmobile door wide, Batman got out of the magnificent vehicle as shots volleyed in his direction. He ducked the shots while on the move. He was moving to a spot where only he would be in danger, drawing fire away from the policeman's direction, as well as that of the halted dilapidated automobile.
Batman was at the curb, directly in back of the half-wrecked truck. Crooks hadn't reached him with their hasty shots. Flanking the truck on both sides, the six killers who formed the crew had a chance to get past the front of the truck and intrench themselves, at the same time keeping an opportunity for flight.
But they didn't choose that plan. They were learning something that they had never guessed. Batman punctured the truck tires with a sharp instrument from his utility belt.
The criminals continued to miss Batman with their gunfire. He was a lone target, moving in a rapid zigzag.
To a man, the six were ready to deal with the Caped Crusader. They weren't worried about themselves. They simply wanted to get him before he escaped.
Three from each side of the truck, they rounded the vehicle, hot on Batman's trail. But it was a trail no longer. Batman's flight had ended, much shorter than they thought. Full around, Batman was coming straight in their direction.
Razor-sharp, lightweight, Mini-Batarangs were thrown at the attackers like ninja Shurikens. While, perhaps, lacking the stopping power of heavier Batarangs, these weapons were painful deterrents.
Even more amazing was Batman was throwing himself into the path of aim of the six-man firing squad!
Each stride Batman took was making it easier for those marksmen, but the Caped Crusader's Mini-Batarangs were making it harder. He was throwing weapons ahead of him, and they were scoring from the first moment. The two foremost crooks fired. They were staggering when they pulled their triggers. Jerked high, their guns sizzled meaningless slugs above Batman's head.
Others fired, but they were diving for shelter as they did. They missed, too, by feet, not inches. The Batarangs seemed to pick them automatically. They were ducking past the truck, hoping to get away before those deadly devices struck them. One crouched crook held his ground. He bobbed up suddenly, to take point-blank aim at the caped foe who was only a dozen feet away.
As the gunman rose, Batman dived. A bullet slicked the top of his cowl. Striking the ground on one shoulder, the Dark Knight looked like a sure victim for the crook's next shot. But the shot never came. Batman's other hand threw a small pellet toward the gunman.
The pellet hit the ground and there was an immediate flash of bright light and a loud "BANG!" that startled the foe. More pellets were thrown and the battlefield became even more confusing with the addition of smoke seeming to be everywhere.
The thug who thought he might be the one to take out Batman was rewarded with two big feet to his face as the Gotham Avenger leveled him with a drop kick. The man caved back against the truck and floundered, losing his useless gun as he fell.
By then, the traffic officer who approached the chaotic scene began shooting from behind a nearby mailbox. He dropped one killer who was trying to scurry away. Flat on the ground, Batman crawled beneath the truck and clipped the legs of another criminal and knocked him out with a punch to the face. A third was making for Holbert's car. He was dropped by a sudden telescoping Bo staff blow the the back of the head.
Robin had taken care of the final marksman. He was free of Holbert. Bob, who was not used to fighting, had been no problem for the Boy Wonder.
But Holbert's cranium was apparently very thick. Bob was staggering blindly, shooting his gun in every direction but the right one. From across the street, it looked as if he had aimed for Batman, and the traffic officer saw it. Considering Holbert as dangerous as the others, the policeman gave him three bullets in a row.
Two went wide. The third found the fake detective's heart. Bob Holbert was dead, which was unfortunate. Just as White could have furnished a trail that other night, Holbert was the one man who could have talked on this occasion. Following the finish of the gunfire, Batman felt a note of grim regret.
When the officer looked for Batman, the avenger in black was gone. So startling was his disapperance that the cop actually believed The Masked Manhunter had faded into nothingness before his eyes. Batman had a habit of making such departures. Even Robin blinked, though he had seen it happen before.
The engine of the Batmobile revved to life and the incredible car took off down the street.
Robin quickly made himself scarce by taking to a nearby rooftop.
As approaching sirens broke the still night air, the traffic officer was the only one left to gather the dead and wounded crooks and picked up of what little remained of Stephen Helk.
Looking down from the rooftop of a five-story commercial building, Robin knew what was coming -- numerous police cars and ambulances would arrive and the traffic officer would long be telling the tale of a man in a black cape who had dematerialized himself like a puff of smoke. Robin moved from rooftop to rooftop that offered him a path to obscurity.
***
While the battle Batman fought raged, The Penguin was finishing his job of ransacking Helk's office. The Black Bird of Prey was quacking smoothly to the con men who worked with him.
"More pictures, Rendy," he told one. "Check on those mailing lists" -- he was swinging to the other - "and make it swift, Wallingham. Ah!" The Penguin drew a photograph from the pile that Rendy handed him. "Here's a pretty young thing of the exact type that we want. Look her up in the list, Wallingham - B-868. That makes four already, but we'd better have more. Sometimes photographs lie, though these look pretty good. Here's another young lady, better than any yet. T-91. Get the information on her, Wallingham, and we'll call it quits. If I know my own eyesight" -- he studied the photograph by the desk lamp -- "Miss T-91 will fill the bill."
Rendy leaned over from the filing cabinet and listened at the window. He was a smooth-looking fellow, a bit oily in manner, and when he wrinkled his forehead and set his lips, his face went hard. Wallingham noted Rendy and became alert. Wallingham's face, off guard, showed shrewdness that resembled a rat's expression.
"What's up?" demanded The Penguin. "Hear anything?"
"Thought I heard gunshots," returned Rendy, "but now it's sirens. Maybe that guy Holbert got caught. He struck me as pretty dumb, except for his front."
The Penguin stepped to the window and listened. Next, he began to dump photographs from the filing cabinet. He told Wallingham to take the wastebaskets, fill them with letters and carry them out to the stairs.
"Take along your camera, Wally," added The Penguin. Then, with a chuckle: "You know how to work it. Set the thing that says time exposure, then press the shutter gadget. Come on, Rendy, get your camera, too, and help me pile this stuff on it."
The "camera" was soon set in the middle of a pile of papers and photographs. The Penguin set one knob, then clicked the shutter. He commented, "Three minutes." Then, picking up the chosen photos and the data that went with them, he bustled Rendy out into the hall.
Wallingham was at the stairs. He had the contents of the wastebasket dumped upon the "camera" box. The Penguin told him to hurry it, and Wallingham pressed the shutter switch. His thumb was in motion when the Man of a Thousand Umbrellas snarled, "Hold it!"
Wallingham had forgotten the timing gadget, and The Penguin was too late to stop him. However, the "Hold it!" saved Wallingham. He made a rapid dive in the Black Bird of Prey's direction. An instant later, the so-called "camera" showed what it really was: an incendiary bomb.
The thing went off with a muffled puff that threw up a display of fireworks. There was plenty of magnesium powder in it, and the stuff produced a blinding brilliance.
Wallingham was turned away from it. Rendy was throwing his arm over his eyes, like The Penguin. Thus they missed the flash that would have temporarily incapacitated them.
Oil was spattering. The letters and wastebaskets were ablaze. There was another jet of flame, reddish in hue, that lighted up the hall. In the midst of that hiss and splutter, with fire shooting in all directions, The Penguin gave a frantic snarl. He was pointing to the stairway. The others saw the thing he indicated.
It was a figure in black -- one that no crook could fail to recognize. Batman was on the stairs, dropping back to a landing, a short way below. In one hand, he was holding one end of his cape over his eyes.
A dozen seconds more, Batman, returning from one bout with a batch of crooks, would have been upon this smooth trio, ready to handle them in similar fashion. The only thing that had saved The Penguin and his minions was Wallingham's slip-up with the time device on the firebomb!
The thing had served the crooks far better than they intended. The mistake had been luck of the first order. The bomb had flashed just as Batman rounded the turn in the stairs. He had been late in covering his eyes against the magnesium flare.
Not only had Batman been too blinded to spot the faces of The Penguin and his companions -- the Caped Crusader was temporarily helpless!
The Penguin's snarl wasn't anything like his ordinarily quacking tone. The master criminal was cocking his gun umbrella and ordered his men to do the same. The tone hardened, as The Penguin ordered: "Get him! It's Batman! Give him all the bullets you've got!"
There was another flash and a bang in the stairway -- this time it was Batman's doing. The Flash/Bang pellet caused the criminals to shoot blindly, but with near accuracy. Batman had heard The Penguin's voice and was making the most of it. Three criminals went diving along the hall, past Helk's office.
It took both luck and speed for them to get clear, and behind them they could hear the sound of Batman coming after them. There was an exit to a fire escape at the end of the hall, and the fugitives needed it.
They were shooting at Batman as they ran, but their fire was frantic. The Dark Knight was coming through the flames at the head of the stairs. Quick with the cape, he had suffered less from the magnesium light than the crooks supposed.
He could see them partially, like kaleidoscopic figures. Not well enough to identify them, but he knew The Penguin's voice.
The fugitives needed more luck, and they had it. As Batman came through the rising fire and paused clear of the smoke, the other bomb went off in Helk's office. The Penguin had planted it much better than the one at the stairs. The thing literally ripped apart, vomiting liquid fire like the mouth of a volcano.
Again, Batman was bothered by the brilliance, though it was around the corner of the doorway. The thugs, looking back from the fire escape, received the same effect. Blinking, they groped for the fire escape and stumbled downward. Their fear of the Gotham Goliath spurred them to breakneck efforts.
As Batman's vision cleared again, he found himself surrounded by fire, with billows of stifling smoke blotting the whole scene. His path to the stairs was cut off by a fierce conflagration behind him. Ahead, a regular holocaust was sweeping from the door of Helk's doomed office.
Wheeling, Batman drove straight into a circling mass of flame and seemed to leap upward with the spouting fire. He was taking the stairway that led upward, a continuation of the steps from below. It was his only path, and he gained it just in time.
On the next floor, Batman paused long enough to beat out flames that were smoldering on his cape. That done, he did not bother with the fire escape. The crooks had by this time reached the ground.
To head off his foes, Batman made for the roof. From that vantage point, he saw the fugitives scrambling into a car parked on the next street. The glow of the fire showed them only vaguely. There was no identifying the men with The Penguin or their car.
The car was away, past a jutting building. Nothing he could do about it now.
The fire department, reaching the scene, found the old building in a mass of flames. It was a condemned firetrap, and promised them a battle. While they were pushing a ladder to the roof, one firefighter gave a startled call to the others. There, atop the building, they saw a fantastic creature that might have been the spirit of the flames.
A shape cloaked in black was weaving through hungry tongues of fire into a mass of billowing smoke. Like a human salamander, the figure evaded the scorching effect of the fire. Batman, with the aid of his Nomex-reinforced costume, was sidestepping the dangerous spots, but to the observers it looked as though he had picked the thick of the holocaust.
They watched the smoke, those firefighters, as a sweeping breeze dispelled it.
The gaseous clouds cleared away, leaving a stretch of roof that had a flame-reddened background. That was all. There was no sign of the uncanny figure that seemed to dwell in the fire itself.
A chunk of roof caved into the gorging flames below. They thought for the moment that the fire creature must have fallen with it, into the devouring pit. But near the fire escape, like a phoenix, the incredible creature of the night stood at his full height for a moment ... and then was gone!
***
The Penguin had complimented Stephen Helk on his ability as a law dodger. The compliment was deserved. Though Helk was identified after his death, neither Batman nor the police were able to trace his most recent activities.
Previously, Helk had been selling fake oil stock, but that racket had gone bust and Helk had disappeared. No one, except The Penguin, had tagged him as the hidden head of a cheap racket that operated under the name of Ajax Producers.
By setting fire to Helk's office, The Penguin had covered up the evidence long enough to stretch over the next two days, which was what he chiefly wanted. Thus, the Black Bird of Prey's racket was still an unsolved riddle on the night of the diamond show.
The great event began with all the promised fanfare. Early in the evening, the grand lobby of the Hotel Gotham was flooded with beautiful women, who were to appear as models and display the diamonds. Cameramen were taking pictures over each other's shoulders as fast as the girls arrived.
Alan Clendon was in charge of the arrangements, with Mushy Nebuchadnezzer a member of the committee. Among others in the lobby was Bruce Wayne, and he noticed Jon Daley in the offing.
The diamond seller displayed a rather cynical attitude, as if he thought the show should be considered unimportant. Daley was interested in the raw product, diamonds in the rough, rather than the finished variety. At least, such was the impression that he gave.
Most photographed among the super models was Cynthia Crawford, whose own vast fortune, reckoned at about twenty million, entitled her to wear the most diamonds.
Cynthia was a striking brunette, with dark eyes and features molded to roundish perfection. She looked very lovely, even without the four million in diamonds that she was to display.
The diamonds were to come later. At present, the models were being assigned to suites in the hotel, where they could try on their special costumes. When they arrived in the Skyview Salons, on the upper floors of the hotel, the gems would be waiting.
Clendon, portly and affable, wasn't at all nervous this evening. As for Nebuchadnezzer, the deep lines had faded from his bearded face, and he seemed youthful despite his gray hair. Both men explained their mood while riding up in the elevator with Bruce Wayne.
"There's nothing to worry about," declared Clendon. "Detective Bullock is on duty, with a squad of thirty detectives. If a single finger is lifted toward a diamond, an arrest will follow."
"The commissioner is here, too," added Nebuchadnezzer. "The situation is doubly safe. I have great confidence in Commissioner Gordon."
Bruce Wayne gave an obliging nod, as though he appreciated the approval that Nebuchadnezzer, a foreigner, had given his friend. From a corner of the elevator, Daley gave one of his short laughs. He didn't look as bland as usual tonight, and the laugh seemed forced.
Nebuchadnezzer gave him an anxious look. "What's the trouble, Mr Daley?"
"He's worrying about the diamond cutters," said Clendon to Nebuchadnezzer. "Daley has to make all the arrangements for them. Living quarters, working hours, and what not. You know, Mushy, diamond cutters are artists and therefore inclined to be temperamental."
Daley inserted a shrug at that point, and abruptly changed the topic. He took a sudden interest in the diamond show, asking how many persons had been invited. Clendon said about two hundred and that all were persons of high social standing.
"We invited a select group," he stated, "and gave them the privilege of bringing friends. Still, we are taking no chances. You will understand, when we reach the salons."
The salons were two rooms, one above the other. The elevators went to both, but the car stopped at the lower one. Bruce Wayne and his companions entered a large room, with detectives watching them from the moment that they stepped off the elevator. The room was ornately furnished, and in one corner was a small band. Beyond it, a curtained platform.
Boxes had been brought in and were jutting out from behind the curtain. Clendon explained that they contained special scenery, which would be used in the platform display at the end of the evening.
"There are the diamonds," Clendon said as he pointed to a bulky safe that was guarded by detectives. "And the models will be given the gems that they are to wear after they arrive here - not before."
Some of the female models were coming into the salon. Members of the jewelers association were bedecking them with diamonds. After that, the girls strolled around, chatting with their friends. A few of them went to a little elevator at the back of the salon. Bruce observed that Harvey Bullock was in charge of the elevator.
"The elevator," explained Clendon, "runs from this floor to the one above. Since it is the key position that covers both salons, Detective Bullock has chosen the elevator as his post."
Bruce was looking for someone among the sleek society men who were present. He finally spied a young man whose clean-cut appearance marked him as something other than a lounge lizard. It happened, however, that the young man was his former ward.
Dick Grayson was perfect for this assignment. Bruce was sure that he would prove to be useful. He had come to the diamond show on an invitation forwarded from Bruce Wayne. Seeing Bruce, Dick came over and shook hands.
As the two civilain-attired heroes chatted in a corner, near a table that had a telephone, Bruce undertoned questions in his calm style.
He wanted to know if Dick had been to the salon above, and the younger man nodded. When questioned regarding the persons on the upper floor, Dick stated that they were on a par with those in this salon. Dick had seen plenty of society men, most of them a glossy sort, and there had not been any among them who looked like professional crooks.
Dick added that the commissioner was upstairs. Evidently, Gordon was satisfied that Clendon's committee could handle the distribution of the jewels in the lower salon, while he remained above, to make sure that all was safe in that quarter.
Looking over the scene, Bruce told Dick to go upstairs and then added calmly: "Stay in touch over the comm-link, so that we can keep in constant communication."
Dick went up in the little elevator with Bullock, while Bruce turned to watch the parade of super models. It was really quite a spectacle. The glamourous girls had turned out in force for the occasion, and they were all smiles and glitter. Most of the gowns ranged from rose to wine color, and the diamonds had been distributed according to the varying hues.
Bruce watched a few million dollars' worth go by, in the shape of necklaces, rings, and brooches. There were yellow diamonds; trimmed with red gold; blue diamonds, in platinum settings; other varieties that the committee members kindly classified for the benefit of onlookers.
A buzz began as the star of the evening entered. Clad in simple black, Cynthia Crawford stepped from the elevator and smiled as she reached the committee. She was promptly adorned with the choicest of the diamonds, a galaxy of gems valued at close to four million dollars, which had been reserved for her arrival.
Cynthia's graceful finger received a fifty-carat champagne diamond. Her wrist was girded by a bracelet that sparkled with thick-clustered gems. The earrings that she put on were mere baubles valued at two hundred thousand dollars each, because of the perfectly matched diamonds that hung from each lobe.
While a committee member was fastening a half-million-dollar anklet to the model's trim ankle, Clendon produced the greatest prize of all, the celebrated Durban Diamond, that rated well above one hundred carats. It was a magnificent stone, the size of a small egg, and it was set in a simple pendant.
Hung from Cynthia's neck, the Durban Diamond had the black gown as a background and made a show in itself. In fact, the gem parade depended upon the Durban Diamond, which was valued somewhere around two million dollars.
It was rumored that some day the Durban might be cut into lesser stones, each a magnificent diamond in itself, if it found no takers at its present price.
Therefore, all eyes were on the famous gem. Everyone wanted to remember it and boast, in years to come, of having seen it intact. Among those who studied the diamond was Bruce Wayne. He was thinking what the Durban could mean to any master criminal who conspired to steal it.
Two million dollars, as good as ready made. Sliced into parts, the Durban Diamond could be peddled sectionally for its full value. It wouldn't have to be fenced through the usual channels. In fact, it couldn't be. Disposing of that diamond would be as simple a task as stealing it, if the criminal chose a wise opportunity.
At present, however, Cynthia Crawford was unlikely to lose the Durban Diamond, unless an earthquake struck Gotham City. Smiling much more affably than usual, the brunette strolled about the salon, showing all the diamonds, and particularly the Durban, to everyone who wanted to see them.
Viewers kept a respectful distance, except for the detectives. They were almost at Cynthia's elbows, but she didn't seem to mind them. Her pose brought a slight smile to Bruce's lips. He had heard that Cynthia Crawford was a very sought after woman.
When Cynthia arrived near the elevator, the detectives left her with Bullock, who was standing by. The last of the models were arriving, and the detectives were needed back by the safe. Most of the guests flocked over to see the rest of the diamonds, and Bruce expected Cynthia to be uncomfortable, but she wasn't.
Columnists and the celebrity news programs, not that Bruce ever watched them, had been remarking lately that Cynthia's beauty was greater than ever. There were other brunettes who resembled her, had even been mistaken for the wealthy super model. Probably Cynthia Crawford had decided to outshine her competitors by using charm along with beauty.
Bruce saw her enter the elevator with Bullock. The door closed and the little car started upward. Bruce turned toward a wall and whispered over his open microphone, "The big one is coming your way, Wing."
"Boss? You gotta a minute?" Bruce heard a feminine voice come over his earphone. It was Oracle.
"Go ahead," he whispered, still facing the wall.
"I've done the background check on Helk," stated Barbara Gordon. "He was running Ajax Producers, a fake motion-picture business with a phony movie- star contest. Swindling people who thought they belonged in pictures --"
By then, facts had clicked home to Batman.
He cut her off by saying, "Understood. Send the file to the Batcomputer."
Out of a perfect lull, the present situation had suddenly become a proposition that was made to order for crime.
Something suddenly happened in the corner of the salon that made Bruce turn. A light was blinking above the band. The musicians looked puzzled, for it was the signal to start the platform show.
The signal was coming from upstairs. Who was sending it and why, the musicians did not know, for it was coming much earlier than expected. The leader shrugged, then snapped his fingers.
As the band opened with a chord, an attendant pulled the curtain. Then came a long shriek from the turning spectators.
Over the edge of the platform rolled a girl's figure, bound and gagged. She sprawled headlong into the band, where musicians lifted her and pulled the gag from between her teeth. As arrivals saw the girl's face, the shouts became louder. The girl was in a faint, but that didn't prevent them from recognizing her.
The helpless prisoner was Cynthia Crawford!
That fact, alone, was astonishing enough, but trivial compared to the rest. Cynthia was no longer dressed in black. In fact, she was rather scantily attired, mostly in fluffy pink. Her velvet dress had been taken by her captors.
Other than some men who had little interest in diamonds and were now enjoying a free eyeful of the super model, no one was interested in Cynthia's clothes. They were thinking of other things that she had been wearing -- the diamonds. As far as jewels went, Cynthia was utterly devoid of them. All of her glittering adornments were gone: ring, anklet, bracelet, earrings, even the huge Durban Diamond which had so recently graced the glamourous girl's neck!
Robbery had been staged in the presence of a hundred witnesses, on a gigantic scale. In one swoop, mysterious crooks had garnered a haul of four million dollars in a place that was under the law's complete protection!
How and when the mammoth crime was staged seemed a mystery as great as the deed itself. Yet among those who saw the present plight of Cynthia Crawford was one whose keen mind quickly traced the past.
To Batman, this crime was a paradox, not a mystery. It was a thing that couldn't have happened so suddenly and completely as the situation indicated. Crime's stroke had come, yet it was not finished. The schemes of master criminals could still be frustrated.
Bruce had seen Cynthia take the elevator to the floor above. He had just heard from Oracle and had learned the important link to Helk. His keen insight into the ways of criminals told him the rest.
Minutes, perhaps, remained wherein Batman could still defeat a game which everyone else believed that crime had won!
To be continued ...