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.
Chapter Five
Duke Makes a Killing
The cab was gone. For a few moments he could see no sign of human life, then his sharp eyes picked up the outline of a man standing in the shadow of a tall tree. Even as Duke watched him, a second man — a short, fat fellow — eased out of the brush and joined his taller companion.
They held a whispered consultation, but their words did not reach the detective. However, their meaning was obvious, for both drew guns, examined them briefly and slipped them into convenient pockets.
Duke sized them up. The tall one — Nagel, if Dombey was correct — was swarthy, and vicious-looking. His close-set eyes, thin mouth and the way he carried his head low, like a bull, suggested that he would be a tough nut to crack. His squat companion, on the contrary, had a moon-face that looked soft and flabby. He had eyes that could easily cradle fear. Coupled with a killer of Nagel’s type, Tubby Arnison might conceivably commit murder, but if left to his own devices, Duke surmised that he would slide into rackets that carried with them a lesser chance of physical liability.
Nagel suddenly stepped into the clearing and approached the cottage; Arnison drew his gun, braced it against the tree and covered the veranda.
Duke’s teeth bared in a cold smile. So that was it? Nagel was going to lure him out while Arnison shot him from ambush! He melted back into the trees and silently made his way to a spot directly back of the stubby little gunman. Then he eased forward—
Tubby Arnison’s first indication of misfortune came when Duke pressed the cold muzzle of his revolver against his well-rolled neck.
“Not a sound!” Martindel reached forward and removed the gun from the tremulous fingers. “Now call to your partner and tell him to come back here!” He increased the pressure of the gun on Arnison’s neck. “Any tricks, mug, and I’ll part your hair from the inside!”
Arnison nodded, terror-stricken. He lifted his voice and jerked huskily, “Hey, Louis, come here a minute!”
Nagel glanced back, hesitated and then started to retrace his steps. When he reached a point about halfway across the clearing, he suddenly jerked to a stop. Perhaps some animalistic instinct warned him of danger, for his hand suddenly streaked toward his pocket.
Martindel saw it coming. He took a quick swing at Arnison’s head with one gun. As the squat hood toppled into the brush with a squeal of pain and terror, he jumped into the open.
“Don’t try it, Nagel!” he warned.
The St. Louis gunman flung a curse at him and brought his gun up shooting. Duke’s first shot was high. Before he got in a second, a slug from Nagel’s gun tore into his leg, turned him halfway around and dropped him on his hands and knees. He rolled over, braced one elbow on the ground and fired twice in quick succession.
Nagel was dead before he hit the ground!
Duke rolled over hastily, expecting trouble from Arnison, but the tubby little assassin was clinging groggily to a tree, trying to wipe the blood out of his eyes. Duke inched over to a sapling, pulled himself erect and tested his leg. It was numb now and refused to hold his weight.
He dropped Arnison’s gun into his pocket, picked up his own, and turned the muzzle on the fat man. “Snap out of it, Tubby,” he rasped harshly. “Amble out there and grab hold of your boy friend. Drag him into the bushes here. We may be having company. Step lively.”
Arnison wavered, wet his thick lips and looked at the gun. Duke let his thumb toy with the hammer. That decided the gunman. He mumbled something unintelligible and swayed across the clearing. He hesitated a long time before he could bring himself to touch his dead confederate, but at last he caught Nagel by the ankles and dragged him into the surrounding trees.
“Now,” commanded Duke, “we’ll go into the house where we can have a nice, quiet chat. Get going, mug!”
Arnison moved with surprising alacrity. Duke broke off a branch to serve as a walking cane and hobbled after him. It was painful work limping up the four steps to the veranda for he had to keep his eyes fastened on the waddling bulk of his prisoner. But at last he made it and, pushing into the cottage for the second time since his arrival, dropped into a chair near the door. He let his eyes settle musefully on the other’s flabby features.
Arnison stood with his back to a small table in the center of the room. He was a man close to forty with watery eyes that shifted constantly. His red, bulbous nose was criss-crossed with little purple veins and his puffy cheeks seemed to drag down the skin under his eyes like a St. Bernard’s. Periodically he opened his mouth as if to speak, but no words came.
It was Martindel that broke the stillness.
“Arnison, I’m not going to fool with you. I’m going to ask you some questions and I want smart answers. First, who sent you after me to make this kill?”
The prisoner wagged his head. “We weren’t goin’ to bop you, fella. You got us all wrong. This was just a heist, see! We saw you pass down the state highway an’ tailed you—”
The roar of Martindel’s gun drowned his words. He gave a shrill bleat of terror, clawed at the fleshy part of his leg and toppled on his face.
Duke’s voice was chilled. “That didn’t hurt you much, Arnison, but it’s a sample of what you can expect if you keep on with those lies. Now I happen to know you picked up my trail down in the city about the time I met Captain Dombey. Who sent you after me, Arnison?”
The hood sobbed, dragged himself to his hands and knees and crawled toward the detective like a cur dog. “S’help me, I don’t know,” he whined. “Nagel got the orders from somebody, but I don’t know who. Nagel’s dead now an’—”
Duke leaned forward. He cupped the gun in the palm of his hand and struck the hood across the side of the head. Arnison yelped and fell on his face, grovelling.
Martindel straightened. “I know different, Tubby. Talk, or I’ll shred you to ribbons. I’ve no compunction about killing you; none whatever. For the last time — who sent you two guns after me?”
Arnison slowly lifted his head and stared at Duke through a veil of blood. “I can’t, s’help me! He’d kill me—”
Duke raised his gun to the level with the other’s battered countenance. “O.K., Tubby, if you’d rather have it now.” He thumbed back the hammer.
Arnison hesitated until he heard the second click of the gun, then terror seized him. “Wait!” he bleated. “I’ll talk!” His head fell forward into his arms and he sobbed out the name so huskily that Martindel had to lean forward to catch it.
“Egan—”
Duke’s mouth contracted. “Why?” he rasped.
“He wanted you dead for the bank job!” choked Arnison.
Duke grunted, leaned back and contemplated the man on the floor. So his guess was correct — Egan had made a deal with these two rats to remove him. His scowl deepened. What good was this information? If he returned Arnison to the city, the stool-pigeon would deny his accusation the moment he was under the protection of the police. Even if he didn’t, it would be the word of a known criminal against a police official; Duke knew he could not get to court with anything as slim as that.
Duke pulled himself erect, hobbled across the room and picked up a telephone. He pulled it as far as the cord would allow, then placed it on the floor.
“Tubby,” he commanded grimly. “I want you to make a call, a very important call.”
Arnison lifted his head and stared. The detective canted his head toward the instrument. “Crawl over to it, Tubby. Call Inspector Egan, tell him Nagel shot me, but that he got it as well. Suggest that you found something of vital importance and ask him to come out here. The idea is, Tubby, that unless Egan comes to this cottage, you’re going out the hard way.”