10-Story Detective Magazine Cover — page 41: what you’re looking at

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

LONG-DISTANCE DOOM——-_—_———_——_———39 of his mouth, wrinkled his brows. “What of it?’ he wanted to know. “Something’s gone wrong,” Mar- tin said. “It didn’t work out the way we thought it would. So the guy that gave you the number to tell them to call has changed his plans. I’ve got to call that second number now. He told me what it was, but I’ve forgotten it. Thought I’d drop in here and get it from you.” The clerk waved a hand. ‘Beat it, bozo. You’re screwy. I don’t know what you’re talking about.” ge | S| ers “Scram! I'll call a cop!’ And the clerk moved toward the phone booth. One of Martin’s hands went into a pocket and came out with a bill. The clerk, looking back, saw it and stopped. For a moment he stood there, motionless. Then he turned and came back, close enough to see the denomi- nation of the money. It was a thousand-dollar bill. Lind- sey’s money. The clerk’s gimlet eyes bored at Hoke Martin. He seemed to be deliber- ating. Abruptly he shrugged, reached for the bill, and said, “Chatham 6936.” “Thanks,” Martin said, and let him have the bill. “Don’t mention it,” the clerk re- turned. “I’d kill a guy for that much money.” Grinning, Martin pivoted and went out to the street. The snatchers were pretty slick, he told himself as he climbed into the coupé. A dumb dick who didn’t know the business would simply have had this drug store watched, and nothing would have happened. The clerk would have an- swered the phone at once, given the second number, and Lindsey would have called the kidnapers there. It was a slick scheme, all right. The only trouble with it was that it wasn’t slick enough. HE trail led him to the worst sec- tion of the city. Helltown, it was called. From a dark alley across the dingy street Hoke Martin watched the lighted windows and the doorway of the greasy little café. It was five minutes until one. A biting wind whipped up the alley. Without a topcoat, Martin shivered, glancing at the luminous dial of his wristwatch. As near as he could make out, there were only two persons in the café— a Negro who was mopping the floor and a dark-haired man in greasy clothes who was cooking hamburgers. Neither of them would be the one who would answer the phone. Three minutes until one. Still the street was empty. Martin’s right hand rested on the butt of his revolver in his coat pocket. He had removed it from his shoulder holster to be ready for instant action. One o'clock. The wind whistled eerily, caught up a piece of newspaper in the gutter, blew it along jerkily, and slammed it against a lamp-post. Martin’s fingers tightened on his gun as he saw a man come from around a corner and hurry toward the café. As he recognized the man, the detective exhaled slowly—not because there was any lessening of the sense of danger, but because he knew he had doped it right. The man was Steve Durga. “Slick Steve,” he was called. Gambler, con- fidence man, one-time racketeer—all- around king-pin in the underworld. He would be just the kind to engineer the kidnaping of Nelsen Lindsey’s son. Durga was in the café about three minutes. He came out walking jaunt- ily, like a man completely satisfied with the way his affairs were going. Nothing furtive about Slick Steve Durga. Tailing him expertly for half a dozen blocks, Hoke Martin frowned as he saw the gambler turn into Tie- less Tony’s. Tieless Tony, so-called be- . cause he never wore a necktie, was a front. The eating and drinking resort which he operated was a screen for the gambling den upstairs run by Durga. It was a gathering-place for the Gomichbooks.com