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.
Across the pavement from the entrance of the club a cab waited. There was nothing unusual in that because the doorman or Francis always ordered a cab for me when I left in the morning, and any cab they ordered was safe.
So with scarcely a glance to either side I walked across the sidewalk and stepped into the cab. Then just as I seated myself I caught a glimpse of moving figures in the fog beyond the entrance of the club.
Before I could say a word the doorman, who was on duty late that morning, slammed the door and the driver let in the clutch. The figures in the fog grew plainer as they approached the cab, heads down, hands sunk deep in the side pockets of their coats.
I didn’t wait to see more. The cab started to move as I opened the door on the far side and stepped out into the street. Shielded by the slowly moving cab from the figures on the sidewalk, I slipped across the street and was partly concealed by the fog.
I hadn’t acted too soon, for as I reached the opposite curb guns crashed across the street. A man cursed, and the cab stopped with a sudden squeal of brakes. I counted five quick shots. Then the slap of running feet on pavement came to me.
Straining my ears to keep the running men within earshot, I started along the street after them. A moment later the fog parted and I got a brief view of two men. Instantly my gun was in my hand, but even as I raised it the fog closed in again and the men were lost in the half-light.
Then as I started to cross the street again I heard the low purr of a powerful motor behind me. At the same time there was a chorus of shouts from the Club Bijou as Francis and some of the late diners and drinkers piled out on the street.
Almost before I knew it a long sedan slid past me in the fog and swung in toward the curb. The sound of running stopped.
Thinking fast, I sprinted across the few yards that separated me from the big car and swung up on the trunk rack that jutted out over the gas tank in the rear as the car gathered speed.
Minutes passed while the car swung around several corners, putting plenty of distance between it and the Club Bijou. I had all I could do to keep my balance on my precarious perch during the first few moments of that ride, but finally the car settled down to a steady run.
A few minutes later the protecting wisps of fog became thinner and finally vanished. But the hour was early and the few persons that were on the street didn’t give me a look.
Then after about ten minutes of fast riding the car slowed down and slid in alongside the curb on one of the side streets uptown. I watched my chance and slipped off the trunk rack just before the car stopped.
I’d just gained the shelter of the doorway of a small apartment house when a rear door of the car opened and two men hit the sidewalk, moving fast. I raised my gun, then changed my mind.
They thought they’d got me in the taxicab. It wouldn’t hurt anything to let them continue to think that for a while.
The house before which the car had stopped was a two-story brick structure. The first floor was vacant, so I figured the boys were to meet Suds Garland on the second floor. He had lost no time in repaying the courtesy I’d shown him at the Club Bijou.
But I couldn’t tip my hand in broad daylight with no means for a getaway. So I put my gun back on my leg and watched the men go into the house. A moment later the car pulled away from the curb and disappeared around the next corner.
Five minutes later I was walking fast across town. I’d recognized one of the men who had tried to get me as the young fellow who’d been with Garland, but after being up all night I needed sleep more than anything else. I was going to have a lot of work to do that night.
Presently I caught a cab and twenty minutes later I was at my apartment. I had the driver wait for me while I packed a bag, and then went up to a hotel in the theatrical district.
It was almost three o’clock in the afternoon when I got up, bathed, dressed, and had breakfast sent up to my room. Then I phoned Francis at his apartment.
“God, Queen!” he exclaimed when he heard my voice. “I thought they’d taken you for a ride.”
“Almost did,” I admitted, “but I’m still alive and kicking. Get a couple of the boys and meet me at the club at five-thirty sharp. I’ve got work for you.”
Well, that was that, I thought while I ate breakfast and then took a cab across town to Simon Grundish’s office. I was going to need some airtight protection, and perhaps an alibi, and Grundish was the man who could fix it for me.
The political power behind the throne at City Hall didn’t keep me waiting. He met me at the door of his private office right after I’d sent in my name. His wizened face and pale eyes seemed almost joyful when I greeted him and closed the door.
“What have you been up to now?” he asked quietly, knowing that I didn’t waste time with social visits during business hours.
“Nothing much,” I smiled. “Suds Garland tried to gun me out this morning. That was foolish business on his part. Understand?”
“I think I do,” returned the little old man who had been instrumental in seeing that the old indictments against me had been dismissed. “Remember what I told you about Garland a month ago? Well, I still think he’s bad company. It won’t be any great loss if he—”
“Think you can fix it for me if there’s a flare-back after I get done with him?”
Grundish frowned for a moment, then nodded.
“Good,” I smiled. “Seems like a lady can’t even run a night club around this city any more without having some guy think he owns her. I don’t like it. I think I’ll have to branch out into something bigger just to keep the small-timers away from me.”
“Suds Garland isn’t a small-timer.”
“No, and he’s not so big, either. He thinks he’s tough just because he makes a lot of money out of the racket. Maybe he was tough once, but money and good living have made him soft. It’s ruined more than one good man, and dope doesn’t draw good men.”
“Well, Queen,” Grundish shrugged, “you branch out any way you want to. I’d be careful of Garland, though.”
“From now on I’m going to be,” I admitted. “Just pass the word along to the cops that I know nothing about the dope business. See?”
Grundish smiled his thin smile which was as near as he ever came to genuine mirth. I left him a few minutes after that, knowing that even if some bright cop did want to ask questions he wouldn’t get far. Grundish would see to that.
It was almost five-thirty when I reached the Club Bijou. Francis and four of the bouncers at the club were already there, waiting for me to give them the office. I did, starting first with the address of the house where the two men from the car had holed up.
“Drop out there after it gets dark,” I ordered, “and smoke the boys out. It’s a fairly quiet neighborhood so don’t make too much noise.”
“Leave it to us, Queen,” promised Francis. “Anything else?”
“I think that will be enough for one night,” I replied, and didn’t smile when I said it. That business wasn’t any joking matter, but I knew those two punks would never squeeze another trigger.
And they didn’t. Francis and the boys returned to the club around ten o’clock that night. I listened quietly while Francis told me how they’d trapped the pair in the upper apartment. Maxim-silenced guns had done the rest.
I figured that incident would make Suds Garland think twice before he tried any more funny stuff with me. The killing of Kate Travers had ceased to be of importance in my mind, because to me the quarrel with Suds Garland was nothing but a personal grudge fight.