Detective Comics #420

Issue Details

Synopsis

FORCAST FOR TONIGHT...MURDER Batman waits under the gang plank for a man known as the "Nemesis" to disembark from a freighter recently arrived from South Africa. But when Batman captures the final figure to leave the boat, he discovers it is not the man he is looking for. Instead, thanks to a Geiger counter he is carrying (the man he is after has worked years in a radioactive area), Batman realizes that his quarry is in a coffin that was just unloaded off the ship and sent out in a hearse.  While following the hearse, the Dark Knight recollects the week long events that brought him to this point: Commissioner Gordon contacting Batman to protect a diamond merchant named Piet Van Doorn, who has been receiving threatening letters from a man called the "Nemesis", a man thought dead 10 years ago when he attacked Van Doorm over a mutual diamond "find". Batman waits until the man in the coffin rises and captures him. He reports to Van Doorn that the man is in custody, much to the relief of the man who has been keeping himself in an impenetrable diamond vault since receiving the letters.   Later that night, Van Doorn is visited by Batman, who later reveals himself as Allan Trevor, the "Nemesis". Trevor manages to get Van Doorn to admit that he stabbed Trevor in his sleep and threw him in the river all those years ago and only with the help of savages did Trevor survive. The real Dark Knight arrives and tells Trevor he was aware that the man that was arrested earlier was a "ringer" and Trevor admits he has been in Gotham for months watching Van Doorn. The Dark Knight stops Trevor from stabbing Van Doorn and both are astonished to find the diamond merchant suffering from a stroke. Later, Batman tells Gordon he realized Trevor was not the man in the coffin when he saw that "Trevor" did not have a weapon on him when he arrived in the States. TARGET FOR MANANA After aiding Batgirl in bushing up a narcotics operation in Gotham City, Jason Bard tells Batgirl that Commissioner Gordon and his daughter Barbara (who Bard doesn't know is really Batgirl) are traveling to Mexico to help police there dealing with drug operations. Traveling with her father to Mexico, they are unaware that their arrival has caught the attention of drug dealer Odd Layton.   Upon their arrival in Mexico City, Commissioner Gordon begins his meeting with Mexico City Commissioner Garcia Da Vega, while his son Carlos takes Barbara around to see the sights. At a Jai Alai match, Barbara first becomes aware of Odds, and how he knows Carlos by name (Carlos is in debt to Odds for gambling.) Later, when driving the Commissioner and Barbara to their hotel, Carlos' car is stopped by armed assailants. During the struggle, Commissioner Gordon manages to push Barbara to safety before being knocked out and captured. X MARKS THE MYSTERY THE MAN WHO ROBBED A THOUSAND MINDS