The Black Lizard Big Book of Black Mask Stories
- Автор: Adams Cleve F., Babcock Dwight V.
- Год: 2010
- Язык: английский
- Год: A Vintage Crime/Black Lizard
- ISBN: 978-0-307-45543-7
- Жанр: Криминальные детективы
Электронная книга - «The Black Lizard Big Book of Black Mask Stories». Краткое содержание книги:
Black Mask was the apotheosis of noir. It was the magazine where the first hardboiled detective story, which was written by Carroll John Daly appeared. It was the slum in which such American literary titans like Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler got their start, and it was the home of stories with titles like “Murder Is Bad Luck,” “Ten Carets of Lead,” and “Drop Dead Twice.” Collected here is best of the best, the hardest of the hardboiled, and the darkest of the dark of America’s finest crime fiction. This masterpiece collection represents a high watermark of America’s underbelly. Crime writing gets no better than this.
“Well, it was thinking back to this spot that finally brought Terence O’Day into it. He arrived at Stengel’s place just a couple of minutes ahead of the cops. At the time, it looked as though he had helped me to escape. But later on it began to appear that he might have done this, knowing I would run smack into the arms of his two hoods.”
Canavan stared down at O’Day.
“It was really the car that did it. When I got outside there were only three at the curb — yours, mine, and the cops’. The hoods used mine. Why? Because they had to leave yours and couldn’t start the prowl car. But the point I got to thinking about was how did the hoods get there in the first place? Certainly not in my car, or with the cops, and probably not in a taxi, because they were expecting trouble. That left only your car, and that meant that you knew them.”
O’Day exhaled a great cloud of smoke. “What happened to the hoods, Bill?”
Canavan almost told him. Then he decided that this was one more point he could use to sew up the case. “I got one of them cold. They’re sweating Reefer now, and he’s sore at you because I told him this was a million-dollar snatch and he was getting paid in pennies.”
O’Day closed his eyes and a spasm of pain twisted his mouth. “That was smart, Bill. I always said you were smart, remember?” He wiped the back of a hand across his lips. “So you called Kleinschmidt and had him drop a hint to me that you might be at Kolinski’s. He was to follow me if I fell for it.”
Canavan shrugged irritably. “It was a show-down. My only hope was to—” He broke off, coloring. “I mean, aside from cracking Reefer—”
O’Day grinned. “So you killed them both! In other words, your only hope was to trap me into some kind of admission.”
“I’ve still got the key,” Canavan said.
“But you might not have had,” O’Day said. “I figured I’d beat the cops here and clean up.” He looked at a hand reddened with blood from his legs. “Well, nuts to it. I may as well give you the works. Stengel and I did a job together when we were just kids.” His eyes crinkled in remembrance. “He was a smart guy too, Bill. He made me sign a joint confession. Oddly enough we became friends after that, but there was always that thing between us. After a while I decided to go straight. Ed kept on hitting the high spots.” He smiled tiredly. “Funny, after all the chances he took that he should just die — of stomach ulcers.” He looked faintly embarrassed as Hope uttered a little cry. “Sorry, sister.”
Kleinschmidt snorted. “Sorry! What about Luis Renaldo? You sorry about him too?”
O’Day looked him straight in the eye. “Not a damned bit, copper. The guy caught me prowling Stengel’s place and tried a squeeze play. He got what all chiselers ought to get.”
There was a lot of noise out in the hall now. Apparently Kleinschmidt’s platoon had really arrived. Maury and Big George Kolinski were in a close-mouthed huddle. Kolinski evidently trying to dissuade Maury from committing a neat job of murder.
Kleinschmidt glared at Canavan. “I’m not through with you, Bill. You knocked me cold in front of strangers.”
“And I’m not through with Kolinski!” Canavan yelled. “I’m seeing what makes the Morticians’ Protective Association tick. But for tonight—”
Miss Hope Carewe touched his arm. “Yes, Bill? For tonight — what?”
He put a big hand under her chin. “For tonight, hon, or at least for the rest of it, I’m going to try forgetting that your old man has got seventeen million dollars.”
Miss Carewe said she would like to forget it too.
The Bloody Bokhara
William Campbell Gault
William Campbell Gault (1910–1995) was born in Madison, Wisconsin, and attended the University of Wisconsin. He was the manager and part owner of a Milwaukee hotel before serving in the army for three years during World War II, after which he moved to Southern California to become a full-time writer.
Although one of the most highly regarded writers in the mystery genre, he was even more revered as the author of scores of sports books, many for children. His earliest stories sold to sports pulps, where he was highly successful before his first sale to a mystery pulp, Clues; “Marksman” appeared in the September 1940 issue. He wrote several hundred additional mystery stories before his first novel, Don’t Cry for Me (1951), which won the Edgar Allan Poe Award. His most famous character is Brock “the Rock” Callahan, a former football player, who made his debut in Ring Around Rosa (1955); he also appears in Day of the Ram (1956), about the murder of a football player, and ten other novels. Gault used sports as a background for many of his stories and novels, including The Canvas Coffin (1953), about the boxing world. He also wrote novels under the pseudonyms Will Duke, Dial Forest, and Roney Scott.
“The Bloody Bokhara” is one of the few Gault books not set in California, using the antique rug business in Milwaukee as background; it was published in the November 1948 issue. Gault later expanded the plot and milieu into a novel, The Bloody Bokhara (1952).
Cut-rate carpets were Kaprelian’s business, but when an Oriental prayer-rug turned up with a corpse wrapped in it, that was more than he’d bargained for.
Chapter One
It had been a slow winter. Cleaning and repairing had kept us going, but there isn’t the money in cleaning that there used to be. Not if you’ve got any respect for rugs and if you clean them the real Armenian way.
It was spring and the door to the store was open. The shop was bright with color. In the window we had an eighteen-foot Sarouk, a lovely piece with a sheen like silk — a floral design on a deep rose background. Usually, when Papa is unhappy he can get a lift out of just admiring a rug like that. But not today.
“Why,” he said, “did I ever get into this business?”
Ever since I’d known him, Papa had asked himself that question. Even when business was good, he asked it. He didn’t expect an answer.
I said: “The only thing wrong with this business is the people who are in it. It’s your competitors who give you your gray hair, Papa.”
“Competitors?” he said scornfully. “Competitors — huh! I’ve got no competitors. Contemptoraries, I got.”
“It’s contemporaries,” I corrected him.
He shook his head. “For them, I have nothing but contempt. They are my contemptoraries.”
I started to laugh, and then an elderly couple walked into the store.
The frown on Papa’s face was replaced by a smile as he rose and came forward to greet them.
“Good morning,” Papa said. “A beautiful morning, Mr. Egan.”
Years ago, the Egans had been good customers. Then they’d had their entire house carpeted wall to wall, in the fashion of the time.
Mr. Egan said: “Good morning, Mr. Kaprelian. I’m surprised that you remember me.”
Papa’s smile was beatific. “I never forget a friend,” he said earnestly. To Papa, friend was synonymous with customer.
Mr. Egan looked faintly uncomfortable. “Our carpeting,” he said, “is pretty badly worn, Mr. Kaprelian. We’re thinking of having the house done over. Frankly, it’s a choice between recarpeting and orientals. I wondered how prices were on orientals these days.”