10-Story Detective Magazine Cover — page 36: what you’re looking at

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

ee Hoke Martin deliberately chose the gloomiest side of the Lindsey estate for his entrance. He did not want to be seen. The chain-store magnate’s only son had been kidnaped. The snatchers had warned Lindsey against calling in the police. While Martin wasn’t the police, he had an idea that private detectives might be equally distasteful to who- ever had kidnaped young Lindsey. So he proceeded cautiously. Half a block ahead of him loomed the stone wall which bordered the Lindsey property. It was about four feet high. He saw that he could easily vault over it, drop to earth inside, and make his way through the trees and shrubbery to a side door which would admit him to the wealthy man’s study. Suddenly, without warning, Hoke Martin felt powerful arms grab him from behind. There had been no sound of a footstep, not even a remote sense of anyone’s presence. The red-haired detective was neither small nor weak. He was tall and sinewy, with long, well-trained arms, but at the first attempt to resist his attacker he felt the futility of it. Great hands had forced themselves under his biceps, locked near the base of his neck. He was lifted bodily from the sidewalk and hauled, kicking and squirming, into a clump of bushes. He could not even see the giant who held him prisoner. Those hands were like steel. Mar- tin’s arms were pinned against the barrel-like chest. He used his feet hard enough to have broken the shins of any lesser antagonist, but the giant did not appear to even notice the pounding heels. And then one of the hands loosened, came out from under Hoke Martin’s right arm. He half-whirled, flashing his bony fist upward. He was fast, but not fast enough. The giant’s right fist crashed arainst the base of his skull. Martin had never been knocked out by such a blow, delivered by a human fist, be- 10-STORY DETECTIVE fore. He would have sworn that no man could have put him out of com- mission that way. But in a split moment of conscious- ness he knew that he was going un- der. Streaks of light shot across his vision, converged before his eyes, and exploded into a sheet of purple that brought oblivion. When he recovered consciousness he was flat on the ground, on his belly. There was a peculiar strain in his limbs. He tried to blink and became aware that a cloth was tied tightly around his head, across his eyes. Try- ing to move, he felt rough circles of rope biting into his wrists and ankles. He was. spread-eagled on _ the ground. How had the kidnapers known that he had been called in on the case? Guesses tumbled through his brain. Perhaps they hadn’t known. Perhaps they had just been watching the estate and had spotted him approaching it. There was no way for him to know where he was or how long he might be left in this position, They might have taken him miles away from the scene of the attack while he was un- conscious. Then the sixth sense that had failed him on the sidewalk asserted itself. Hoke Martin knew that some one stood over him. He heard nothing, but he knew that some one was there. He tried to mumble through a gag which he felt in and over his mouth. The answer was hot breath— against his ear. Lips that whispered huskily. An unpleasant odor. “Looking for trouble, weren’t you? Wanting a fight? Well, you got one.” The whisper ceased. Martin tried to answer and found that he could make nothing but soft unintelligible noises. “No use trying to talk,” the low voice came again. “This is just a little lesson for you. Stay out of the Lind- sey case. You get it? Stay out of the Lindsey case.” Gomichbooks com