10-Story Detective Magazine Cover — page 11: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

Millard glanced at his image in the big mirror behind the stacked rows of bottles, smiled crookedly. He was a lean figure of a man with smooth black hair under a tilted-back gray snapbrim. He had high cheekbones, a wide good-humored mouth. Finger- ing the stubble on his long jaw, he decided he needed a shave. He shook his head. “T’m not. Personally, I like a wide- open town. It’d be all right, maybe, if Eddie Fitz were still running things—but not with Bonelli in charge. He’s a fat crooked schemer; he couldn’t play it clean and straight and be satisfied with his percentage that way. “A district under his domination would only breed graft and vice and corruption. It would be a festering spot for crime. And I admire this new mayor. He’s sincere and he’s a fight- er, and he’s really cleaning up. If it comes to a choice between Peters and a guy like Bonelli—T’ll take Peters.” The bartender sneered audibly, an explosive snorting sound. He looked at Millard’s almost empty glass, snarled disgustedly: “You want another beer?” Grinning, Millard shook his head. “No. That slop you’re serving now is putrid. You used to have Sunshine Beer on draught. What’d you take it out for?” “We got too many complaints on it.” The bartender’s eyes were bleak and unfriendly. “If you don’t like what we got—scram! This ain’t no hangout for—” But Millard had already gone, stepping out and quickly sifting through the passersby. From his place in the doorway he had been watching the front of a building across the boardwalk. He had seen Lefty Reid step out of the door of that building, look the crowd over carefully, then ‘turn back to the door and nod. Bert Bonelli slipped out after that, holding his face low and wearing dark glasses, a straw topper riding his bullet head instead of the usual derby. THE CORPSE AT THE CARNIVAL——-—————————9 The dark glasses were a disguise, but it was impossible to mistake that squat form. Bonelli was a stocky, thick-set man, with loud, arrogant mannerisms. Right now, however, he was trying to be as unimposing and inconspicuous as possible. Only something very important would bring him out at a time like this, with Eddie Fitz on the loose. He melted into the moving throng, and his stooge—Lefty Reid—slid along behind him like a furtive shadow. Millard followed, filtering through the crowd and using it as a screen. Trailed at a distance by Reid, Bonelli turned in under the arched entry to the amusement pier, kept walking past the first roller coaster and the big HELL ’N’ BACK sign. Long necklaces of colored bulbs lined the lighted concessions. Guns popped in the shooting galleries, a merry-go-round made harsh music, and the strident voices of hawkers and barkers knifed through it all. Lots of noise and cheap glitter and a spirit of what-the-hell. BUNCH of high-school kids came yelling down the pier, and a fat mamma ahead of Millard jumped to get out of the way and dug him in the belly with an elbow, knock- ing the wind out of him. When he’d set the fat lady back on her feet and got straightened around himself, the high-school kids were on down the pier piling into the roller coaster, | and Bonelli and Reid had been swal- lowed by the mob. Millard swore, shoving his hat to the back of his head and glancing at the tower of the Dragon Slide which was up the line a little way. He looked down and around and was moving ahead again when he saw her. He stopped stock still. She was coming along the pier at the edge of the crowd and she was alone, a slim straight little figure walking purposefully. Most of her soft brown hair was tucked up under a ridiculous little turban-like hat; and S econniclnoolks. conn