The elderly custodian of Carter Hall's science club describes, to Carter, a terrifying encounter he has had with a ghostly archer and a monstrous bull, appearing in the woods, in a nimbus of red light. The archer’s voice (which the custodian recognized) had commanded him to bring the minutes from the science club’s meetings, to a particular place, under threat of death. These notes contain unpublished secret scientific data. He’s borrowing Hall’s telephone to call the police, but Carter stops him and suggests a better plan ...

Carter changes to Hawkman, and borrows the old guy’s overcoat and hat, and puts on a rubber facemask, then goes out to the designated meeting place, in the woods, where he meets up with crime-boss Rangles and two henchmen. Discarding his disguise, Hawkman reveals that he’s brought a mace to this gunfight, and sets about winning it. Suddenly an armored, mounted knight and a Roman charioteer appear, in a nimbus of red light. Hawkman flings his mace at the charioteer, something breaks with a “pop,” and the charioteer vanishes. That’s all it takes for Hawkman to figure out what the scam is, here, but while he’s announcing that, he gets head-konked unconscious with a blackjack. Without even bothering to tie him up, they toss Hawkman into a small, dumpy, laboratory building, with a stout door and no windows, but just as Hawkman is starting what looks like an easy escape, the building starts to sink into the ground! But Hawkman quickly mixes up some chemicals and makes an explosive, which blows out part of the door, through which he escapes.

Meanwhile Rangles and his henchmen are driving toward the Science Club, to steal the notes the old-fashioned way. They break in, if that’s even the term for it, through an open window, and are suddenly confronted with two monstrous alien figures, appearing in a nimbus of red light, and are momentarily frozen in fear. That’s plenty of time for Hawkman to get among them, guns or no guns, and start punching them out. Once again Rangles manages to get behind him and score a head-konk, with a chair this time, but Hawk’s wings catch most of the chair, which breaks, and he knocks down Rangles with a thrown ashtray. Then he activates a built-in security device which flings the other two hoods out through the open window. The three mooks run for their car but are quickly overtaken and carried into the sky by Hawkman.

Later Hawkman explains to the police how the illusion was created, using car headlights with red clip-on lenses and painted figures, and how he was able to fool the criminals with a similar device at the clubhouse. Later still, Carter Hall passes along his good friend Hawkman’s explanation, to the (still unnamed) Science Club custodian, and learns that Rangles is the custodian’s brother.

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