[3] "She" was actually Richard Stanton, a handsome, pipe-smoking, dapper, middle-aged blonde Caucasian man who is exceptionally intelligent and intuitive, as well as being at the peak of his physical abilities.
He had made a vast fortune successfully playing the Wall Street stock market of the late 1920s, a time of economic unrest, which incurred the jealousy of many of those close to him.
As well as being a successful financial investor, Stanton is also a lover of theatrics and a world-famous stage, theatre, radio and film actor living in Manhattan, until his wealthy and prominent celebrity status brought unwanted attention from costumed villains.
As such, Stanton decided to take matters into his own hands after he deduced that the leader of the gang was John Carver, a crime kingpin who had been running extortion rackets in various cities.
[4] Stanton was able to infiltrate the John Carver gang due to his convincing acting and stage disguise as an old, helpless, red-cloaked woman with a yellow walking cane which doubled as a sly quarterstaff.
Stanton decided to retire from acting and continue down the path of a crime-fighter and bring other villains to justice, inspired by his first success, adopting the alter-ego Madam Fatal.
This same disguise also often raised Stanton above suspicion, and made him an expert in confidence trickery, infiltration, stealth, information gathering, and melting anonymously into crowds.
Madam Fatal often came up against criminal masterminds and supervillains such as Doctor Prowl (a black-masked, hat-wearing gentlemanly murderer with metal claws) and the Jester (a violent clown-themed thief who laughs at death) and their henchmen.