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.
Firpo Cole felt a sudden surge of panic. Jugger Callahan in jail for incendiarism and insurance fraud was the last thing he wanted. Jugger had to be kept free — and very accessible. He said: “That fire was on the level.”
“What makes you think so, Firpo?”
“Jugger had over twelve hundred bucks in his desk when the place burned down. It was the take for three days and he was going to deposit it the next morning. If he would have started that fire he wouldn’t have left that much dough there.”
Mr. Hymer nodded. “That’s the story I heard, Firpo, but Callahan had a heavy property policy on the place and that more than made up for the money that burned. Besides,” he added with careful emphasis, “outside of Jugger Callahan’s business manager, we have no proof that the money was really left there.”
“What stinks about the fire?” asked Firpo.
“We found what looks like the remains of a few empty oil cans in the basement. In addition, it was a very profitable fire for Callahan. But what I’d like to know from you is where Ruth Bailey came in on it.”
“Don’t think you can frame her because she’s dead,” said Firpo tensely.
“Keep cool,” soothed Mr. Hymer. “I got as much respect for the dead as the next man. Only I know she was the last one in the dance hall before it burned down and I thought maybe she told you something she forgot to say to me.”
“She told me nothing you don’t know. When she got home that night she found out that she forgot her purse at the dance hall so she had to go back.”
“Why couldn’t she get it the next day?”
“Because the key to her apartment was in it,” said Firpo.
“I see. What’s the rest of her story?”
“When she got back the place was empty and outside of a couple of lights someone left on, she saw nothing suspicious. She got her purse and went home. That’s all she had to do with it.”
Firpo wondered what the insurance dick would say if he knew that Ruth had taken that brooch from Jugger’s office. Did it prove that Jugger Callahan had also come back after the others were gone and forgotten it on his desk?
Mr. Hymes picked at his nose thoughtfully. “That’s the same story she — the deceased — told me last night.” He stood up. “I guess I’ll mosey along.”
When the door was closed behind the insurance dick, Simms turned to Firpo. “It still looks like you’re the murderer,” he informed him cozily.
“I didn’t do it,” said Firpo Cole for the sake of the secretary’s record.
“My men have been checking all morning and they can’t find anyone who saw Ruth Bailey go out after you took her home last night. So you must have gone up to the apartment with her and killed her before she had a chance to get her clothes off and go to bed.”
Suddenly, Firpo Cole knew the meaning of the lipstick on the dead woman’s mouth. It was something no one could have noticed but he. He knew the kind of lipstick she always used — a deep carmine brand named Machavelli. On those rare occasions that Ruth had kissed him, he had never wiped it off. But the lipstick on her, when she was murdered, had a tangerine coloring — the kind that Mona Leeds, the torch singer, used. It could mean only that Ruth had gone out again to see Mona.
Firpo hadn’t been listening to Simms’ persuasive arguments for appointing him the murderer. He said: “Go jump in a sewer.”
Simms and Max came around to where Firpo sat. The stenotypist left the room. Firpo braced himself.
Simms sighed. “This is a hell of a case. I wish I knew what happened to that jewelry that was on Bailey’s neck.” Then he began to hit Firpo methodically, with semi-clenched fists.
A spasm of coughing shook Firpo’s spare body. The contents were heavy and deep from the lungs.
Max moved away. “Watch those damned germs,” he complained. “You oughta learn enough to cover your mouth.”
Firpo knew he was going to faint again. He struggled against it, for a few moments, then gave way.
When Firpo Cole came around, he found himself lying on a cot in the dispensary. He could see through an unshaded window ahead of him. It was dark outside. He must have been out for several hours.
The doctor who was bending over Firpo stood up and faced Simms and Max. “He’s all right now but if you give him another shellacking I’m not responsible.”
“Shellacking!” exclaimed Simms. “We hardly touched the guy. We just gave him a few slaps to help his memory and—”
“I’m not interested,” cut in the doctor. “All I say is that another memory course might bring on a much worse hemorrhage, so don’t try it.” He snapped his bag shut and stalked over to a desk to fill in a report.
“And that’s what you call cooperation,” muttered Max.
Firpo sat up on the edge of the cot and buttoned his shirt. The telephone jangled and Max took it. He listened a moment, then tendered the receiver to Simms. “It’s for you. The autopsy report on the Bailey woman.”
“Yes?” said Simms. He glanced covertly toward Firpo. “You say that Ruth Bailey was opened by the usual mid-line incision?... You’re some cut-up, ha, ha, ha... Now forget that scientific bull — tell me in plain, everyday American... I see... And how about her guts?... I see... Aha — the liver and spleen... and the markings on the body?... Good-looking, eh?... O.K., send up the report.”
Simms cradled the receiver and turned to Firpo. “That sawbones just hasn’t got any feelings.”
“I know,” said Firpo. “It’s the psychological angle, so forget it.”
“Wise guy. Well, what do you think about this? Ruth Bailey was gonna have a kid.”
Firpo found some kind of medicine bottle within his reach and threw it.
Simms ducked. “A lie like that,” he said darkly, “don’t give you the right to throw things at me. Watch your step or I’ll forget myself and give you the shellacking of your life. Now beat it.”
“Beat it?” said Firpo stupidly.
“Yeah. Get out of here. We know damned well you did the murder but we can’t prove it — yet. We’re just giving you rope, Firpo.”
Max emitted a sudden guffaw. “Maybe,” he explained, “we’ll give him more rope later — around the neck!”
Chapter Three
Requiem in Jazz
Leaving the Hall of Justice, Firpo Cole cut across to old Chinatown. He dodged into a dark alley and pressed himself against the wall. He waited thus for fifteen minutes before he felt assured that he was not being followed. The cops didn’t even have enough on him to put a shadow on his tail.
He removed his shoe and took out the brooch.
The sole of his foot was criss-crossed with cuts and his cotton sock was caked with blood. He bound the foot with a soiled handkerchief and proceeded up Main Street.
Some ten minutes later he reached a pawn shop just as the owner was closing up for the night. He put the brooch on the counter.
“I want you to look at this, Saul.”
“Firpo, when will you guys learn I don’t handle hot stuff?”
“I only asked you to look at it.”
The short, bald-headed man picked up the brooch and studied it. Finally, he said: “I wouldn’t touch it, Firpo, but it’s worth two or three hundred dollars.”
Firpo started. “For that little gold and a little piece of glass? Are you sure?”
“Not for the gold, Firpo. It’s for what you think is a piece of glass.” Saul held it back to let the light of a lamp fall on it. Small white rays seemed to radiate from a flaw in its sparkling sky-blue center.