15 Story Detective, April 1950 — page 97: what you’re looking at

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

Death—In the Bag years. That would mean real hard work. Beyond the winesap stood smooth maples, sturdy oaks, gaunt elms. It was strangely peaceful. The only sounds were the soughing of the wind, the rustling of the last dead leaves. Far in the distance a shot rang out through the wooded countryside. Trigger Mike Jackson did not flinch. He was amazed how still his tobacco-browned fingers were. Gone were last night’s shakes, the reefer-jag jumpiness that had sometimes given him the distasteful label of “Trigger-Happy.” Thanks to his boy- hood in these low-rolling Connecticut hills, he recognized that report as a No. 6 shot fired from a 12-gauge shotgun with modi- fied choke. It was the Indian Summer open season; already somebody was out after those fat partridges. From the sagging cot, he looked around the one-room shack. It was sparsely furnished with a cracked wood stove, a warped maple bureau, two spindle-legged chairs, a rickety table, a trunk and an old-fashioned foot-pedal sewing machine. The sole mementoes of a hard-luck family. After the farmhouse burned down, his pa had been planning to add another wing to this rebuilt chicken coop but pneumonia got him first. Young Mike cleared out after that first funeral. For five years his maw had lived alone in this dingy shack, raising Rhode Island Reds and peddling on that sewing machine. Trigger Mike had gotten word that the old lady had kicked the bucket just two days before the town buried her in Potter’s Field. He was on the lam then, hiding out in an East Harlem furnished room. It was six months before “the Jackson boy” showed up in town to put this shack and ten rocky acres on the market. Last Autumn he was glad no buyer had been found and now he was pleased again. It was a swell hideout. The State Police, with their campaign hats and yellow-striped trousers, and the 97 town constable hardly ever came up this. back dirt road. If they did, Mr. Jackson was merely an old resident, a property- owner in fact, returning for a bit of partridge shooting. He had been foolish to have the heebie- jeebies and get potted last night, especially after he had buried his loot in the flue-box of the old chimney, unused since the farm- house burned down. There was a bed of leaves in the ruins leading to it; no chance for telltale footprints. For weeks there had been no rain. Trigger Mike sprang out of the narrow cot, closed the window and blinked in the cracked mirror. His ratty face was sallow but, after all, allegedly he had been out here only a week. Or should he say just three days? One doesn’t acquire a tan in October. More important, he could hardly recognize himself now that his wax-pointed moustache was shaved off. The teller at the Whalers National Bank in Providence had gotten a good look at his face, couldn’t have missed its most distinctive attribute. Luckily, it had been grown only six months ago to please that stacked peroxide blonde of a cigarette girl. The townfolk here in Mashapaug always remembered him as clean-shaven. After dressing, starting a kindling fire and breakfasting, Trigger Mike went out with his 12-gauge slide action Winchester repeater. The old man never had any- thing better than an ancient Remington single shot. But Trigger Mike, having planned in advance on his hideout last year, had time to pick out this honey, a beautiful job of gunsmithing, a five-shot repeater, four shells in the magazine, one in the chamber. With a 28-inch barrel and a walnut stock, it weighed eight pounds, which meant much less recoil than a lighter gun. He wouldn’t have to eat canned goods for dinner. Not only were the birds multiplying in these pafts—the red foxes were virtually cleaned out—but the game and conserva- Gomichboo: KS) (E@)