The Black Lizard Big Book of Pulps
- Автор: Anderson Lars, Barr Randolph
- Год: 2007
- Язык: английский
- Год: Vintage Books
- ISBN: 978-0-307-28048-0
- Жанр: Криминальные детективы
Электронная книга - «The Black Lizard Big Book of Pulps». Краткое содержание книги:
Weighing in at over a thousand pages, containing over forty-seven stories and two novels, this book is big baby, bigger and more powerful than a freight train — a bullet couldn’t pass through it. Here are the best stories and every major writer who ever appeared in celebrated Pulps like Black Mask, Dime Detective, Detective Fiction Weekly, and more. These are the classic tales that created the genre and gave birth to hard-hitting detectives who smoke criminals like packs of cigarettes; sultry dames whose looks are as lethal as a dagger to the chest; and gin-soaked hideouts where conversations are just preludes to murder. This is crime fiction at its gritty best.
“From a friend, for the needy of the parish,” he said.
Immediately the Rev. Mr. Parker accepted the envelope, the pugilistic gentleman turned and walked away. The darkness swallowed him up. Dr. Parker opened the envelope. Inside it he found a bundle of banknotes. They were bound by a single band of silver paper, and they amounted to $250.
Maude Betts was a widow with no work and three children. She lived in a tenement in the warehouse district of Great City. The stove in the kitchen was cold. There was no food in or on it. Her cupboard was bare. She was about to be evicted by a landlord who declared that the four months’ rent, past due, must be paid him at once. She was facing the county poor farm.
A knock sounded at her door. She dried her eyes, opened the door, and found a tough-looking young chap handing her an envelope. She took it as he said: “From a friend.”
He went away. Mrs. Betts opened the envelope and gasped with joy. From it she removed a pack of banknotes held together by a band of silver paper. They totalled just $200.
Ethel Knapp, twenty and not bad to look at, stood in her furnished room and peered at the gas jet. For ten minutes she had been peering at it, trying to summon the courage necessary to turn it on — without a lighted match above it. She had no money. She had come to Great City from her home in Ohio to work. She had no work. She had no way of returning to her mother and father. But she did have a way of saving herself from further hunger and humiliation. The gas jet.
She raised her hand toward it. Startled, she paused. A faint rustling sound came into the room. Looking down, she saw an envelope creeping under the door. She took it up, bewildered, and opened it. Inside lay money — currency held together by a band of silver paper — banknotes totalling $200!
She jerked open the door. The hall was empty. She ran down the steps. She saw a few persons on the street, and paused bewildered. She had no way of knowing that the money had been left her by the squatty, combative-looking young man who was just vanishing around the corner. But that money meant life and happiness to Ethel Knapp...
For the Rev. Edward Parker, $250.
For Maude Betts, $200.
For Ethel Knapp, $200.
Just $650 in all!...
Chapter II
The Moon Man Speaks
In their delight, neither Dr. Parker, nor Mrs. Betts, nor Miss Knapp noticed the oddity of the silver band which encircled the money that had so mysteriously come to them. None of them thought to associate it with the Moon Man.
Had they suspected, they might have thought the stocky chap to be the Moon Man. They would have been wrong.
Ned Dargan, ex-lightweight — he of the broken nose and cauliflower ear — walked along a dark street in a shabby section of the city. He glanced neither right nor left; he walked steadily; he knew where he was going. When he reached the black doorway of an abandoned tenement building — a structure condemned by the city but not yet demolished — he paused.
Making sure he was not observed, he entered the lightless hallway. He closed the door carefully and tightly behind him and trod up a flight of broken, uncarpeted stairs. Plaster littered them. Dust lay everywhere. The air was musty and close. Dargan walked along the upper hall to another door.
As he reached for the knob a voice called:
“Come in, Angel.”
Dargan went in, smiling. The room beyond was dark. A moment passed before his eyes became accustomed to the gloom. Gradually he was able to see a form standing behind a table, a figure that blended out of the blackness like a materializing ghost. The figure was swathed in a black cape. Its head was a smooth globe of silver.
“Evenin’, boss,” said Dargan.
A chuckle came from the silver-headed man. “You’ve distributed the money, Angel?”
“Yeah. Got it out right away. And it certainly was badly needed, boss.”
“I know... You realize why I selected Martin Richmond as a victim, Angel?”
“I’ve got an idea he ain’t all he seems to be.”
“Not quite that,” answered the voice that came from the silver head. “He’s quite respectable, you know. Social position, wealth, all that. But there’s one thing I don’t like about him, Angel. He’s made millions by playing the market short, forcing prices down.”
“Nothin’ wrong in that, is there?” Dargan asked.
“Not according to our standards, Angel; but the fact remains that short-selling had contributed to the suffering of those we are trying to help. I’ve taken little enough from Richmond’s kind, Angel. I must have more — later.”
Dargan peered. “I don’t quite get you, boss. You’re takin’ an awful chance — and you don’t keep any of the money for yourself.”
A chuckle came from the silver globe. “I don’t want the money for myself. I want it for those who are perishing for want of the barest necessities of life. What would you do if you saw a child about to be crushed under a truck? You’d snatch her away, even at the risk of your own life.
“I can’t bear to see suffering, Angel. I can no more help trying to alleviate it than I can help breathing. If there were any other way of taking money from those who hoard it, and giving it to those who desperately need it — if there were any other way than stealing, I’d take that way. But there isn’t.”
“Don’t think I’m questioning you, boss.” Dargan hastened to explain. “I’m with you all the way, and you know it.”
“Yes, Angel,” said the Moon Man gently, “I know it. You’re the only man in the world I trust. You know what it is to suffer; that’s why you’re with me. Well, you’ve been scouting today. What’s the result?”
Dargan wagged his head. “Things are pretty bad, boss. The regular charities ain’t reaching all the folks they should, and they’re pretty slow. I don’t know what some of these folks would do without your help.
“There’s a steamfitter out of a job named Ernest Miller. He’s got a daughter, Agnes, who’s sick with consumption. The kid’s goin’ to die if she ain’t sent to Arizona. Miller can’t send her — he hasn’t got any money, boss.”
The Moon Man nodded his silver head. “Miller shall have money, Angel — all he needs.”
“Then there’s the guy named Frank Lauder, I told you about.”
“Lauder will be compensated, Angel.”
“Then there’re two kids — Bill and Betty Anderson — a couple of sweet kids they are. Their mother just died. They ain’t got nowhere to go but to their aunt and uncle, named Anderson. The Andersons are barely gettin’ along as it is, and can’t take the kids in. So they’ll have to go to an orphanage if somethin’ ain’t done for ’em.”
“They won’t go to the orphanage, Angel. You’ve done your work well. I’ll have money for all of them tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow?” Dargan peered again at the small moon which was the head of the man in the black cape. “Boss, ain’t you takin’ an awful chance, followin’ up so close? Last night — and now tonight! Ain’t it gettin’ dangerous?”
There was a pause. “Yes, Angel, it is getting dangerous. The police now have my thumb-print.”
“Your thumb-print! Holy cripes! Now if they ever catch you they’ll be able to prove you—”
“I don’t think it will occur to Gil McEwen to look in the right place for me, Angel!” the Moon Man interrupted with a soft laugh. “Still, as you suggest, I’ve got to be very careful. At any time McEwen might accidentally find a print which matches the one he found on the Richmond bedroom door knob last night — and when he does—”
“Cripes, boss!” gasped Dargan.
The Moon Man straightened. “Don’t worry, Angel. Keep an eye on yourself. Report back to me tomorrow night, half an hour after midnight, here. All clear?”