As his hands clicked free, the officer relieved him of a third pistol, swinging from a hidden holster at his side.
The Dropper trembled, for fear the police would discover the bullet-proof vest. That would be something to connect him with Officer Reilly’s death. But the cop, after making sure that there were no more weapons, did not investigate any further.
“You get — an’ stay got,” he ordered shortly.
“This way,” said a sudden tense voice from the side of the car just beside them.
Little Goldie thrilled suddenly, as he recognized the unexpected voice. It was Harry Weiss, the little squirt!
Before another word could be said the anemic little gangster rose to his runty height on the running board, his face working palely. Before any one could guess his intention, he had placed a pistol against the Dropper’s chest and had pulled the trigger.
There was a roar and a flash almost at the same instant.
A brawny police arm knocked the man spinning across the road. Two officers were on him before he could rise. His face was all blood as they brought him back to the car.
The Dropper stared at him, shaken but uninjured. “Not that way,” he smiled stiffly. “The man ain’t livin’ can poke me off— So long, Sarge.” His mind was already working furiously. There was something still to be done at the vast shell of a house called Aiken’s Folly. So he disappeared into the murk of the dawn.
Gangster Stories, March 1930
The glittering people about whom you read in these rapid-action stories are a weird lot. Many of them might have easily stepped out of the pages of Charles Dickens.
A forlorn yet fantastic army of the underworld!
To believe in their reality would be stupid. After all, they are creatures of our writers’ imagination and nothing else. The test of a writer lies in his ability to make them seem real, but for us to believe all we see or even half of what we hear, would be permitting ourselves of but a fractional part of the brains given us by a wise Deity.
If we are shrewd we can read a great lesson from these pages, as well as be entertained by the machine-gun plots, the hair-trigger situations.
These characters are along the fringe of things. They live in shining splendor for a short time. They appear healthy. However behind them always are shadows sinister and weird: Death, Disease and Retribution!
Sooner or later, mostly sooner, their fantastic hours are over. They go forth to rot in prison cells. They are shot down by their enemies, their bodies left in alleyways and open lots. Their wealth is lost by gambling and reckless living. The haunts they once knew, no longer know them — in fact they are completely forgotten.
They pay dearly for their moments of high speed. Let us read of them but bear in mind that this army of the underworld is only a shell that glitters under the spotlight, but which is being crushed like a giant worm as it winds through the spotted darkness.
Faithfully yours,
Harold Hersey
Racketeer Stories, March 1930
Tinsel children of the darkness are the characters in these stories — wayward children — yet spawn of the Devil himself!
They dance — marionettes in dazzling finery — in the white spotlight our authors throw upon them. They dance the dance of death. Their thin faces smile, but it is only a set grin of pain when you examine them closely.
Their finery is as gay as their laughter sounds, yet we see that there are patches; their jewels only paste. Their lives are rapidly being snuffed out; they soon pay their debts to nature and to Humanity in full.
Read of them, yes! But follow them — no! They teach us to beware of the clammy touch of temptation and sin.
These stories are entertaining — smashingly so — but they are also object lessons to help us in life. For knowledge is power. If we know, then we are not apt to run innocently into trouble.
Harold Hersey,
Publisher
A Regular Moll
By Lloyd Eric Reeve
Gangster Stories, March 1930
Scar wouldn’t keep a skirt what wouldn’t blot anybody they caught giving him the double-cross! Scar’s skirt was regular!
Crouched beneath that dusty hall stairway, “Scar” Ladrone, gangster, was out to get the low-down on Fannie Duffin.
Fan was Scar’s regular moll, had been for two years; he’d taken her out of “Pipe” Hendrix’s “race-track” dance hall, fitted her up with a slick joint of her own, put her in the pink right. Then, only this morning, he got word that she was handing him the double-cross.
Money was Fan’s soft spot; she craved the stuff like a dope did his needle. That fat dick, Garlan, had promised her a roll — so the office stool had tipped Scar, and she came across.
Now, Scar wanted to wise up the details. Garlan would never take him in alive. Scar had too many friends at the office; besides, there was the opposing liquor gang, rival racketeers, who had greased Garlan’s palm.
Not alive; no, Garlan would bait a trap. Scar would walk into it, and before he could even touch his rod, their scatterguns would riddle him.
Then Garlan would make his smudgy report: “resisted arrest; officers fired in self defense.” All jake; Scar Ladrone would never hi-jack another booze truck; while Garlan — Garlan could retire on easy street. Soft, eh? Scar’s hand nervously twitched at his bright red necktie.
The hall door swung wide. With a wintry blast of snow and city coal smoke, two figures dodged in, Fan and the beefy, heavy-jowled Garlan.
Three feet from Scar, they whispered; Scar could pipe every word they uttered.
Finally, Garlan growled. “It seems jake. But there’s big money in this — two grand for you. You’re sure Ladrone’II come?”
Fan laughed a metallic laugh. “Damn’ tootin’ he’ll come. I’m his regular tart, see? Real soft on me, Scar is; just can’t resist my lures!” She made a swaggering movement of her hips. “I’ll raise an’ lower th’ window shade twict, see? That’s y’u’re low-down. Less’n five minutes, he walks out the door. Y’u fellers can’t miss; he won’t never have a chanct. Now how about that pin money y’u promised?”
“You get the jack,” Garlan rumbled, “when Scar Ladrone has cashed his checks — for resistin’ arrest, see? — an’ not before! All right; now watch your step; we’ll play our part.” He turned ponderously, and lumbered out the door.
Repeating that low, metallic laugh, Fan murmured, “Two grand! My God, think of it!” She climbed the creaking stairs, above Scar’s crouched body.
Listening, the gangster’s hand had closed on a hard object in his pocket. But Scar didn’t draw; instead, a sliver of a smile settled on his thin lips.
That evening, slouched at a table in Pipe Hendrix’s speakeasy, Scar awaited a telephone call. His hand twiddled constantly at his red necktie, a sure sign that he had something big on.
Finally, the telephone jingled. Pipe, himself, answered, talked a moment, then sidled up to Scar.
“Fan wants y’u come right over, Scar. Says real important.” The words seemed to dribble from a corner of his weasel face.
“Uh-huh,” Scar nodded, “expectin’ ’er to call.”
Pipe asked curiously, “Got a job on?”