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.
“Norma figured Les Boyden was still sort of soft on her and she gave him the thousand and had him go to Sorenson and collect the negatives and release. We found ’em locked in her trunk. They thought that would be the end of Sorenson and Boyden. They intended to have Ambrose be a phony contact man and they planned to protect his identity from Patten.
“Well, Patten gave her the cash. When he saw the S-mark on the pictures he called on Sorenson, and beat hell out of him. The break was that for some reason Norma had gone to see Sorenson and was in the hall outside the door when the trouble was going on. When she went in Sorenson was picking himself up; Patten had told him he’d been touched for twenty-five grand and Sorenson, knowing the truth, got nasty and wanted half from Norma. Well, she plugged him when he got too tough.”
Logan lit a cigarette and cocked one eye at Casey.
“That’s where you came in. She played innocent to you because she knew she could trust you and because she wanted to have some help if she got in trouble. Your act was just to cover up. If anybody accused her she’d have your testimony that you went down with ten G’s to buy the pictures, and that she didn’t know he was dead.
“That was smart — until you ran into Haley and he traced you to her suite. Then the cat was out. Gilbert ran into you when he went to see Sol Ambrose and Patten got there too late, when you were in the closet. Gilbert had to silence Ambrose and he knew you carried the ten grand so he lifted it to get you in deeper and keep you in debt to Norma.”
“I can guess the rest of it,” Casey growled. “Norma knew that Patten was on the warpath. She and Gilbert were out the twenty-five grand they expected to collect. So they figured the best thing to do was to get Boyden, get Patten and make a plant that they’d shot it out.
“You’d’ve believed it too,” he added. “You thought Patten was the guy you wanted, and you were looking for Boyden. If you had found them dead in that apartment with guns in their hands—”
“I guess you’re right,” Logan admitted. “It was a good plan at the beginning. Patten tracing Sorenson busted it wide open for them; and — I hate to admit it — you messed up the second idea. If you hadn’t busted in on Gilbert while they were waiting for Patten, it would have been too bad for old Sure-shot. She was a tough baby, that Norma, but” — Logan grinned — “she sure had your number.”
“Yeah,” Casey groused. “Me, I’m just a softie. A fall guy. She rubs out Sorenson and then sends me down to make her look innocent. For old time’s sake, she said, and I bit. That’s what burns me.”
“And let it be a lesson to you,” Logan cracked. “After this, keep away from women — or get a chaperone.”
“Yeah,” groused Casey. “And you, you louse! I do all the work and dump the job in your lap and what does it get me? Grief — and funny answers.”
Logan’s black eyes mirrored a smile that was part admiration.
“But think of the fun you have.”
“Yeah — and the dough I make.”
The telephone shrilled, checking Casey’s tirade, and when Logan answered it he said: “For you.”
Casey groaned; “Oh, me.” Then, accepting the telephone: “Two to one it’s Blaine.”
“I don’t like the odds,” Logan said, thereby proving his sagacity, because the city editor’s voice cracked in Casey’s ears the instant he answered.
“What the hell’re you hiding out down there for?” Blaine demanded. “I’ve been looking all over for you.”
“Why?” Casey said.
“Because I’ve got a job for you, you lug. There’s a three-alarm fire at Sherry and Walton. Eddie’s on his way down there with your stuff. Get going — and show something. You’ve been chasing around doing nothing for two days now, and I pay off on pictures.”
Casey hung up, cursing softly. Logan said: “Anything wrong?”
“Naw,” Casey said, buttoning up his coat in weary resignation. “Just the same old grief. That was the boyfriend reminding me that it’s about time I took some pictures.”
Doors in the Dark
Frederick Nebel
(Louis) Frederick Nebel (1903–1967) was born on Staten Island, New York. He began his adult life as a blue-collar worker, working on the New York docks and on a tramp steamer. He lived in Canada for a while, selling his first pulp fiction to Northwest Stories before becoming a regular and prolific contributor to Dime Detective, for which he wrote the long-running Cardigan series, and, most of all, Black Mask, for which he created the Donny Donahue series and his most important works, those featuring tough captain Steve MacBride and the wisecracking and drunken crime reporter Kennedy.
Nebel sold the MacBride series to Warner Bros., which made nine films. However, Kennedy became a female journalist, Torchy Blane, and MacBride the object of her affections. The first film in the series, Smart Blonde (1937), was based on the Black Mask story “No Hard Feelings,” though the remaining films simply used the characters without basing them on Nebel’s stories. Other films were also based on his work, notably Sleepers West (1941), which became a Mike Shayne film, based on Nebel’s novel Sleepers East (1934); Fifty Roads to Town (1937), based on his crime novel of the same name; and he wrote the story for The Bribe (1949), which starred Robert Taylor, Ava Gardner, Charles Laughton, and Vincent Price. The radio series Meet MacBride, based on the stories, made its debut on CBS on June 13, 1936.
“Doors in the Dark” first appeared in the February 1933 issue.
Everyone said it was suicide, but Capt. MacBride smelled murder, and went on the trail alone.
The sounds of motor traffic on Marshall Drive rose in a muted, not unpleasant medley to the topmost floor of Tudor Towers. Eastward, the glow of midtown hung like a will-o’-the-wisp in the crisp winter sky. A breeze plucked fitfully at the northeast turret apartment.
MacBride, admitted by the oldish maid, brought with him into the warm apartment a breath of the cold outdoors and a vital sense of his own personality. He shook his head when the maid reached for his hat. His windy blue glance flicked her frightened gargoyle’s face, darted away and leaped nimbly about the foyer as he trailed her short, rapid footsteps towards the living-room entry.
He saw Halo Rand standing at the far side of the room. The room was dimly, discreetly lighted. A parchment-shaded floor lamp stood back of the woman and built an amber halo about her amber hair.
“I’m so glad you came, Captain.”
The Aubusson muffled the blunt fall of his heels as he went towards her extended hand. His spare-boned head dipped; in his eyes was a candid, straightforward look.
“Got here as quick as I could, Mrs. Rand.”
The maid vanished with a breathless look flung over her shoulder.
Though Halo Rand’s tall, slender body was relaxed, one knee slightly bent, there was an air of repressed excitement in her face. MacBride, holding her hand for a brief instant, felt tension transmitted to his own. He was aware of a vague, well-bred perfume.
“What’s the matter, Mrs. Rand?”
She said: “Come.” She led the way across the dropped living-room, up three steps to a mezzanine; opened a door and motioned the skipper into a large room furnished with leathers and hardwoods — a man’s room.
“Dan’s room,” she said. “His den. Sit down, Captain.”