10-Story Detective Magazine Cover — page 86: what you’re looking at

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

84——___—_—_———_—_—10-STORY DETECTIVE Gerry’s ears, and then he saw the body of Lasher suddenly grow still. One hand was doubled against his chest. In it was the hypodermic, tight- ly clasped. The needle was deep in the flesh. Gerry rose and staggered to the nearest upright chair. He reached for the phone and gave short directions to the desk man. T was an hour later when he felt well enough to talk. Hart sat be- side him, His face was set in ex- pectancy. “We got the woman,” he told Ger- ry. “She was just getting ready to blow. She had the stuff, too—a quar- ter of a million dollars’ worth of it. Maxon’s have a reward out for the stuff. It’s yours, I guess—if the com- missioners see fit to let you have it. But how did you get wise, boy?” Gerry grinned. He leaned back in the swivel chair that had been Lash- er’s and sighed deeply. “It looked all right,” he said, “until the dame—Mrs. Fisher—began to de- seribe the guy that was supposed to have bumped Mickey Laden. Lasher must have told her what to say, and she said it all right. Her description was exactly like Lasher’s. Every little detail. Even to a busted nose that Lasher said only a doctor could notice and that Mrs. Fisher said she saw right away. “T smelled a rat then. The guy with the scar didn’t exist. Lasher killed Mickey Laden, lugged him into the waiting room, and fastened him up- right with the knife. He wanted me to be with him when Mickey was found. Mrs. Fisher beat it with the stuff, and the stage was set.” “Lasher was in on the holdup, too?” Hart queried. “No,” Gerry told him. “‘Not as I see it, and Mrs. Fisher will probably verify this. Mickey Laden was shot during the holdup. He heard Lasher fixed up guys like that and said noth- ing, so he came here. Lasher must have told him he could get rid of the stuff or something. “Anyway, Mickey brought the whole business down here. The rest of the gang must have trusted him plenty to let him do it, or else Mickey had the stuff cached himself. When Lasher saw it, he couldn’t resist. He bumped Mickey and then, while I was here, he shot himself in the shoulder. He let the gun fall under the cushion of one of the chairs in his waiting room. He told me the guy that plugged him ran out the front door. “But he must have been kind of excited or something. He pulled a boner there. You see, [ came here in a squad car. The driver was sitting in the car and he could see Lasher’s door. He told me he hadn’t seen even a shadow run out of the door after he heard the shot. That set me thinking, | but when the dame came across with the same description, even the little details that a woman would never notice, then I knew Lasher was mixed up in it.” cComichbooks.;com —