Batman #10 - Story 3
February 11, 1942
"The Princess of Plunder"
The Catwoman is back, but we're still plagued by how to present her name. It's either Cat Woman or Cat-Woman in this issue. Also, she's still putting on a full cat head mask as though she were a furry when she's on the case stealing something. Other than that, this is a very good story and advances the idea of Batman and Catwoman being an item, something I'm seeing some corners comment that the 60s TV series really got started. I think this issue will put that idea to rest.
It's an interesting one as Catwoman poses as Marguerite Tone, a socialite who throws a party where she sends her guests on a scavenger hunt. Each guest has a specific list of things to find and there's a reason for this. She has her henchmen go out on a hunt too, to find valuable items belonging to the guests. They have an alibi if they are caught as they were engaged in the scavenger hunt. When Batman catches them, he calls Marguerite to confirm and recognizes Catwoman's voice on the phone.
Marguerite throws another party, a costume party, so Bruce goes dressed as Batman. He is started to see Catwoman in full garb at the party, but even more surprised to see a group of men dressed as Batman. One of them thinks he is a thug and tells him Catwoman is ready to meet with the men. She tells her thugs they will go as Batman acting on a tip of a crime and then rob the location they are sent to. If they get caught, say it was part of the scavenger hunt.
This is all well and good, but I think at some point, Commissioner Gordon would get tired of the "false alarms" and insist Marguerite stop her scavenger hunts. They missed a beat by not bringing him in.
Batman is found out and gets into it with the other fake Batmen. Robin joins the fray. The thing is, even though they are victorious, there is still the matter of having no real proof that Catwoman has done anything wrong. I guess he can't connect her to the crimes even though there is the series of coincidences. Also, I guess there is no crime to pose as a socialite. The Catwoman has never been caught by police so it's not like they have her identified. They just have Batman's word on it. So he and Robin leave.
And in an interesting moment, Catwoman muses on how unstoppable she and Batman would be if they worked together on crime. Shades of Batman 66!
With her scheme ended, Catwoman comes up with a new plan to rob the rich. She trains her thugs to be proper servants and has them hired out to her societal friends via the Ace Employment Agency. Bruce recognizes one of them, Silky, when he attends a dinner party. Bruce follows him to where others are also acting as servants in the home. He knocks out the one he recognizes and disguises himself as Silky and offers Bruce's apologizes for having to leave. (So, Bruce carries his makeup kit with him?)
Bruce leads the others to a quiet area of the house where he reveals himself as Batman and rounds the thugs up. He gets one of them to tell him where Catwoman is, leading another team of thugs in robbing the house of the Richardsons. Robin meets him there and they attempt to round up the rest of the gang, but Catwoman gets the drop on them by releasing sacks of flour which blind them.
