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.
Casey took out a five-dollar bill, and as he passed it to the driver his brain focused on one thought. He knew where Wade had been taken. He might have been moved since; he might not be there now. But it was a red hot lead.
The driver said: “I can’t change that.”
“Who said anything about change?” snapped Casey. Then, before the driver could do more than grin, the telephone rang. Casey answered it and a harsh baritone said:
“Casey?”
“Yeah.”
“You got a picture of that raid this afternoon. The kid buddy of yours says it hadn’t been developed when he left the office. Is it still that way?”
Casey was not long in making up his mind. Wade, knowing no one would believe him if he said the plate was smashed — that would be too much like a stall — had sold somebody on the idea that the plate had not been developed.
“Sure.” Casey hunched forward, then, seeing the taxi-driver edging towards the door, he motioned him to wait. “What about it?”
“I want it, that’s all.”
“Who’s talking?” Casey, grasping for some idea, tried to stall.
“Don’t give me that,” rasped the voice. “You got the plate. I want it. And if I get it, the kid’ll be okey.”
“What’s all the fuss about?” Casey made his voice bored, indulgent. “You can have the plate if that’s the way it is. We weren’t gonna use it anyway. I’ll bring it out myself if you say so.”
“You’ll do as I say if you know what’s good for the kid.”
“Sure,” said Casey.
“Then shut up and listen. You say the plate hasn’t been developed. Okey I’ll believe you because if you cross me, it’s your tough luck, not mine. I’ll have somebody pick up that plate. Don’t try to tip off the cops, don’t worry about havin’ this call traced because it’s a pay-station. If we get the plate and things are on the level, we’ll have it developed. If it’s the right one, the kid’ll be okey.
“We’ll hold him for a few days — to make sure you don’t shoot off your mouth about this — and let him go. But try anything screwy — give me the wrong plate — and do you know what’ll happen to this guy Wade?”
“I can guess,” said Casey bitterly.
“And with your experience you oughtta be pretty close.”
Casey glanced up at the taxi-driver and the germ of an idea caught in the recesses of his brain, expanded. He pulled a pad of paper across the desk, began to write hurriedly — a note to Potter, a leg man, telling him to take Casey’s roadster and go to the Alson Street address the taxi-driver had given him, and wait outside.
He could take no chances on that angle. That address had to be watched — until he could get in touch with Logan — and Potter could do that much anyway.
“What’s to prevent me from callin’ the cops and have ’em here waiting for your hoods when they come for the plate?” he said into the phone as he wrote.
“Just this. If my plan is okey — and I don’t miss many — my men are outside your door waiting for you right now.
“I’m timin’ it close. You’ve got thirty seconds to go out, get them — without an argument — and let one of them speak to me. I’ll hold the phone for that thirty seconds. Don’t hang up, because if you do; if I don’t hear from my men; if they don’t come back — I know I’ve got to run for it, and I won’t be takin’ the kid. Now make up your mind, and step on it. I’m startin’ to count.”
Casey put the receiver on the desk and jumped to his feet. The sweat was creeping out on his forehead now, because he knew the man on the telephone was speaking the truth. The idea was thought out in detail. It was wild, but that voice made it convincing.
In the interval that he stepped towards the taxi-driver, he thought of many things. He had — Wade had — from now until a fake plate was developed. Blaine — Fessendon, damn them, had ruined forever any possibility of bargaining with the real plate.
Logan had the picture. It might convict Handy. But that would be damn’ small satisfaction to Wade. It was too late for Grady, the private dick; for Alma Henderson. But Wade—
Casey grabbed the driver’s arm, spoke in a hoarse whisper. “Take this note out to the city room. Find Potter. I don’t know where he is, but find him. Give him this note. Then go out and wait for me. I’m gonna need you.”
He gave the driver a shove, waited until he disappeared down the corridor; then he walked quickly along the same path, stepped into the noisy, light-flooded city room.
Two men stepped close to him. One was tall, foppishly dressed, handsome in a thin, swarthy way. He had a mustache and he smiled as he spoke, and showed large, even teeth.
“You got a phone call for us?”
Casey glanced at the other man, saw that he was a long-armed, puffy-eared fellow with a bullet head and no neck; then he said:
“Yeah. Step on it, will you?”
“After you,” the swarthy man said.
Casey led the way. The men had apparently been warned to try no rough tactics. That alone showed how surely the layout had been planned. If they carried guns, they did not show them.
They hurried down the corridor to the deserted anteroom, and the idea in Casey’s head, in full bloom now, put a grim smile on his lips, hope in his heart. Potter could go to Alson Street. Wade had been taken there from the Henderson woman’s place; he was not necessarily there now. But if Potter covered that address, if he, Casey, could follow these hoods...
He grunted softly. He had pulled a stunt like that once, gone through a window to an adjoining two-story roof. And that taxi guy should be outside. He’d had some such half-baked idea when he told him to wait. The hoods would take the plate to the boss. If they went to Alson Street, he’d be sure; if not, he’d at least have two chances — and this time he could overlook neither.
The swarthy man said: “Watch him Russo,” and bent down to lift the receiver.
“Hello. Yeah — this is Jaeger. Yeah, looks okey to me. Sure, I know what to do.”
He hung up, smiled at Casey, and there was something hard, merciless in the smile.
“Let’s have the plate.”
Casey went to his platecase, took out a plate-holder which held one unexposed plate.
Jaeger took it, slipped it into his pocket. “Okey. I like the way you’re behavin’. See if you can keep it up.” He turned to Russo. “Get goin’. Out in the hall and see that she’s clear.”
Russo went out, and Jaeger said, “I’ll lock the door from the outside. Don’t make too much noise — too soon.” He stepped to the telephone and a vicious yank ripped the cord from the box at the baseboard. He did the same with the instrument across the room. Then he took the key from the door and went out.
Casey waited until the key clicked in the lock. Then he yanked open the drawer of his desk. Reaching far back, he drew out his .38 automatic, slipped it into his pocket. Then he crossed the anteroom to a green-shaded window and threw it open.
He’d hoped they’d forget the telephones. Then he could have called Logan, tipped him off. Well, Logan could get in on it later. Right now, and for the first time, he had something he could sink his teeth into, something tangible to work on. He had played his hand the only way he knew how, and the time left him depended on how soon that plate was developed. He did not think any more about Wade, because nothing but action could save him now, and Casey knew it.
He went through the window, and the staggered line of the downtown city looked as if it had been cut out of stiff black cloth and hung there against the muddy blue of the sullen sky.