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.
Mary Nason stood rigidly in the center of the floor, her young face taut and her mouth tight. A little .25 automatic trembled in her hand.
Casey frowned, made his voice casual. “Okey. If that’s the way it is.” He put down the telephone and came towards her slowly, the frown changing to a tolerant grin.
“You can’t go to the police until I know why he has gone,” Mary Nason breathed.
“Suit yourself,” Casey said. He stopped in front of her, glanced down at the gun. “Can’t you hold it steady?” he asked. And as her eyes dropped to watch her hand, he reached down quickly and twisted the automatic gently from her grasp.
The change in the girl was startling. She looked up at him and a whiteness came around her quivering lips. Then she was trembling, as though long, racking shudders passed through her. The sight of this raw emotion, the realization that her motive was so important that, knowing nothing of the game, she had forced herself to pull a gun, cracked Casey’s callous crust.
He was at once ashamed of himself; yet troubled now on her behalf. Because he knew now that he liked her, her simple genuineness, and he was afraid Les Boyden was involved more deeply than she dreamed. Drawing her back to the chair, he pushed her gently into it and said:
“Tell me the rest of it.”
She began to sob softly, and Casey let her alone until she had recovered some of her composure. When at last she looked up, she began to speak hurriedly.
“Last night a man came to the Hut. I didn’t see him at first because he talked with Les out in the foyer. When I went to look for Les and didn’t see him, I went to the door. He was just getting into a taxi.”
“Did you get a look at the man who was with him?” Casey asked her sharply.
“Not a good look. I just saw his back. He was about as tall as Les and slender. It seemed funny, his going out like that, but I didn’t think he’d want me to run out on the street after him. I thought it might be business.”
A dry sob interrupted her for a moment. “But he didn’t come back. He wasn’t at his rooms all night. And then I read about the Sorenson murder, and I’d heard Les say he was going to see Sorenson yesterday. So I didn’t dare go to the police until—”
“How do you know where Les is?”
“I recognized the taxi-driver. He gave me the address.” She gave a Randall Street number, adding: “And I thought you—”
Casey said: “All right,” and stood up, pocketing the little automatic and remembering that Sorenson had been shot by just such a gun.
“Promise you won’t tell the police,” Mary Nason begged.
Casey shook his head. The thing was too mixed-up for him to try and figure out now, but if he could find Les Boyden it might be worth a look. It would be a sort of backhand favor for the girl maybe; and there was a chance of finding where that ten thousand dollars went. But he’d have to tip off Logan. He knew that, knew he was in no spot to handle a case like this alone.
“I can’t promise that,” he said. “But I’ll look up this place, and then call up a personal friend of mine on the force. I’ll promise you this: I’ll get the best break I can for Les.”
“All right,” Mary Nason said weakly.
“If he’s in a jam he’s got to face it some time.”
“Yes.”
“You’d better run on home until—”
“I’d rather stay here,” Mary Nason said. “Can I?”
“Sure,” Casey said, making his voice confident. “And keep your chin up.”
VIII
The number Mary Nason had given Casey proved to be a three-story apartment house built in the shape of an inverted U with little patches of lawn crisscrossed by the walks that led to the three doors on each wing and the two doors at the end section.
Without difficulty he located the janitor, a squat, beetle-browed man with a thick Irish brogue, and learned that the renting agent had brought a tall, slender man to look at apartment 3-B the day before. With this information he went to the nearest drug-store and called police headquarters.
When he had talked with Logan, he came back to the apartment court and opened the second door on the right. The stairs mounted in short, square turns, and there were two facing doors on each small landing. At the third, Casey stared at the brass 3-B tacked to the panel and listened.
Here, right under the roof, it was hot and stuffy. Moisture glistened on his broad face as he took the little automatic out and palmed it. Below him, the stairwell was a welter of sound while three radios — a dance band, a political speech and a light opera — fought it out in a discordance that made it impossible for him to concentrate. After a moment he knocked.
He knocked again before he got an answer, and then a voice said: “Who is it?”
“ ’Tis the janitorr,” Casey said, trying to imitate the janitor’s brogue.
A lock clicked. The door swung back and Casey stepped quickly into the opening. The automatic flipped up in his hand and he turned sidewise, jabbing the gun into the man’s stomach as he slid up even with him.
For an instant as they stood there close together and immobile, Casey did not recognize this man. Then the handsome, dark face, the slender, immaculate figure clicked into place and he remembered. Norma Patten had introduced this fellow as her husband’s secretary.
He said: “Hello, Gilbert. Back up!”
Gilbert backed and Casey heeled the door shut. Gilbert wet his lips, made a grotesque effort to smile which was little more than a baring of the white, even teeth.
“What’s the idea?” he blustered finally.
“I don’t know,” Casey said flatly. “This is a big surprise to me; I was just looking for Les Boyden. Seen him?”
“Boyden?” Gilbert arched neat black brows, but his eyes weren’t in the effort. “I don’t think I know him.”
“I do,” Casey said. “Let’s look. Just keep your hands in sight and play nice. I don’t like trouble any more.”
Les Boyden was in the adjoining bedroom. He was lying on the bed with his hands and feet tied, and when Casey shook him he saw that the fellow had been drugged and was in a comatose condition.
Casey’s voice was hard and sultry when he pushed Gilbert back into the living-room.
“Well, that gives me one answer,” he said. “You’re the guy that called at the Hut for him last night. Why?”
Gilbert opened his mouth and shut it without speaking. His handsome face was very set and growing paler. His eyes were wary and uncertain and his hands moved nervously at his sides. Casey saw the bulge of a gun in one pocket, but he was content to keep this fellow covered until Logan arrived.
“You’ll talk pretty soon,” he added. “And then maybe we’ll see if you’re the louse that gunned out Ambrose and lifted that ten grand.” Casey sucked in his lips and his eyes took on a dangerous glint that was partly anticipation. He knew he ought to wait for Logan, but he hated to do it.
“Because if you are,” he added, “I’m gonna take a sock at you and even up for the grief and the raps you gave me. Suppose we go to Headquarters and talk it over.”
“Suppose you drop the gun!”
Casey’s nerves snapped taut at the curt authority in the new voice, and he stiffened rigidly, every muscle tense. Actually he was too startled to drop the gun. He didn’t drop it; he turned his head. In the half-opened door was the grim-faced figure of Sure-shot Patten; in his right hand was a .38 automatic.
Even then Casey did not drop his gun. He knew better than to argue, and he dropped his arm, but he continued to stare while Patten sidled into the room and shut the door.
“I said, drop it!”
This time Casey let go of the gun and blew out his breath.