The Big Book of Female Detectives
Page 36
He snapped: “Get back, Bernice!”
“But, dear, dear—”
His left hand struck her down.
Strang came walking in saying: “Well, I feel much better—”
“Look out!” Pat cried.
Strang’s face froze.
McGovern made a dive for his service gun and at the same time took a lunge toward the window. Hull pivoted. Cardigan fired twice through his pocket and both shots made but one hole in Hull’s side. Bernice screamed and Hull crashed to the floor and McGovern yelled: “Sweet work, Cardigan!”
Bernice ran across the office and fell on her husband, screaming again. “Oh, Hughie, Hughie…!”
Cardigan pulled his gun out of his pocket, fanned it up and down. Deep wrinkles were on his forehead. He made a face as though a bad taste were in his mouth. He grimaced.
He muttered: “I hated to do that.” Then he looked up at Strang. “Well, there’s your nephew, Mr. Strang.”
Strang pointed. “That man,” he said, “is not my nephew.”
“What?” McGovern exploded.
“That—man—is—not—Husted Hull.”
Bernice looked up, her face anguished, wet with tears. “What are you saying?” she cried passionately.
A tight, breathless silence fell upon the office, and then there came the low groans of Hull. Bernice broke into fresh tears and bent over him, cradling his head in her arms.
“What is this, what is this?” she cried. “What are they saying, saying, saying?”
Strang said to Cardigan: “You have been deluded, Mr. Cardigan.”
Cardigan’s face was dull red, a humid wrath moved far back in his eyes. He spun and took three strides and grabbed the smaller of the two manacled men by the throat.
“Spill it!” he rasped.
“Look out—”
“Spill it! What’s the hook-up here?”
“Ugh—look out—”
“Spill it! Where’s Husted Hull?”
“D-dead—”
“Where?”
“I—don’t—ugh—know—”
“When was he killed?”
“Ouch—over three years ago—somewhere—south—”
Cardigan swung away from him. “Mrs. Hull!”
“Yes?” she said weakly, sitting on the floor now, with her husband resting back against her breast.
* * *
—
His face looked ghostly, his eyes were haggard. He said: “It’s no use. I killed him over three years ago. I met him in Caliente and we chummed together, took a little shack up the Coast. I got to know all about him, his family, all the details. I knew he got a thousand a month from his mother’s estate. I knew he never saw them and they never saw him. I’m good at forgery. I was able to copy his signature. I—once—back East—did a little time for forgery. So we went out fishing one night and I clipped him and tied an anchor with a steel cable to him and threw him over. The rest was easy. No one knew us around there—it was a lonely spot. I just picked up and left, taking all his things and mine. I sent a wire to the law firm that sent him his money regularly, giving a change of address. I went to Seattle and became Husted Hull and got the monthly checks and no one ever found out. I met and married Bernice—as Husted Hull.
“Last week I met Proctor.” He pointed to the smaller of the two men. “I’d known him in prison back East. He wanted to come around to our apartment. I had to tell him I was married and living as Husted Hull. He was broke. I had to give him some money. He saw I was living well and wanted to know my racket. I refused. Then he said I’d have to tell him or else. So I told him. He wanted a cut monthly of five hundred. What could I do?
“Then you came. I was scared stiff at first—but then I saw you couldn’t have known the real Husted Hull. I was desperate. I knew the uncle’d run across me. I called Proctor up while Bernice was out to the store. I said I was moving to a new hotel. I explained what had happened and said that if I stayed at the same address Strang might show up and then I’d lose out and so would he, on the split. He said all right. So Bernice and I moved.
“Proctor must have come to the apartment after we’d left. Let himself in with a master key and waited for Strang. You can see it was a snatch. He knew I couldn’t say anything. He knew—he had me—where he—he—he…”
His head fell forward.
Strang murmured in a low, passionate voice: “Good…Lord!”
Bernice fainted and fell to one side on the floor. Pat ran to her. Now Pat was crying: “Oh, you poor, poor girl—you poor, poor thing.”
Cardigan said bitterly: “There’s life on the button for you.”
Hunerkopf touched one of his eyes. “Yes, me, I always wanted a little farm—Can I do anything to help, Miss Seaward?”
McGovern was on his knees. He said: “Well, he’s dead.”
“It was either you or him,” muttered Cardigan.
McGovern stood up, said in a low voice: “Thanks, kid. You’re pretty good.”
“Oh, I’m not so good. There I had a red-hot killer under my nose all along and didn’t know it.”
“Well, yes, you were pretty dumb about that.”
Cardigan glared. “Oh, yeah! I suppose you would have known right off the bat!”
“Sure.”
“Yes, you would have! Why, everyone knows you won that sergeant’s badge at a raffle.”
McGovern glared. “Now, look here, Cardigan—”
Pat was standing now and glaring crimson-faced at both of them. “Oh, you idiots!” she cried. “You awful, awful idiots!”
McGovern grimaced bitterly and held a hand against his chest. “My indigestion again,” he croaked. “My—”
“See?” said Hunerkopf, pointing a broad index finger. “See?”
Cardigan was lifting up Bernice and saying in a low, muffled voice: “Come on, little girl. It’s tough. Cripes, but it’s tough.”
DETECTIVE: ELLEN PATRICK
THE DOMINO LADY COLLECTS
Lars Anderson
ONE OF THE STAPLES of the pulp magazine era was a plethora of costumed characters, largely due to the enormous success of the Shadow, who was soon followed by crime fighters using sobriquets that made them sound more villainous than heroic: Doc Savage, the Spider, the Phantom, the Whisperer, the Ghost, and the Black Bat, among others.
What was unusual was a female masked avenger, but the Domino Lady filled the bill. In her real life she was Ellen Patrick, a gorgeous twenty-two-year-old who swore vengeance on criminals after her policeman father was murdered. She is tall and has curly blond hair, penetrating brown eyes, and a stunning figure.
Her modus operandi generally finds her at a party or social gathering in a thin, low-cut, backless dress that clings to her every curve. When she discovers the item that she came to steal from her adversary, she slips into a bedroom or closet, peels off her dress and dons another one (both dresses so gossamer that they fit in a small handbag), puts on a mask, and returns to the party. Her disguise apparently works, just as Clark Kent removing his glasses appears to make him unrecognizable. When successful, she leaves a card bearing the inscription: “The Domino Lady’s Compliments.”
There were only six stories about her, five of which appeared in Saucy Romantic Adventures and one in Mystery Adventure Magazine. They are very much alike, and the prose style is distinguished mainly for its unbridled use of exclamation points!!!
Little is known of the author, whose career appears to have lasted only a few years in the 1930s and all of whose stories were published in the second-level pulps.
“The Domino Lady Collects” was originally published in the May 1936 issue of Saucy Romantic Adventures; it was first collected in Compliments of the Domino Lady (Bordentown, New Jersey, Bold Venture Press, 2004).
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br /> The Domino Lady Collects
LARS ANDERSON
CHAPTER I
GLITTERING SUNSHINE was vainly attempting to bore its way through the closely shuttered Venetian blinds protecting the bedroom windows of an apartment on Wiltshire Boulevard. Across the busy thoroughfare, the fragrant buds of a California spring were shooting into life in the tiny park.
A tousled blonde head, resting in a nest of soft curls sunk deep in a silken pillow, moved slightly, and brown eyes blinked drowsily. A damp, cerise mouth deliciously shaped, opened in a delicate yawn, and, under the coverlet, a shapely leg stirred, languorously.
The Domino Lady, Hollywood’s most mysterious female, was awakening!
A fair, pink-skinned arm, prettily rounded, drew aside the coverlet as she squirmed out of bed and glided to the window to pull up the shutters and let the sunshine into the room. Then, taking a cigarette from a silver and black box on her bedside table, she threw herself back on the bed where she lay outside the covers to enjoy the fragrant puffs of smoke that would serve to clear her sleep-drenched and tired brain.
A nightgown of sheerest green silk was but scant concealment for her gorgeous figure. A chastely-rounded body and a slender waist served to accentuate the seductive softness of her hips and the sloping contours of her slim thighs, while skin like the bloom on a peach glowed rosily in the reflected sunlight.
Abruptly, a musical tinkling broke the stillness of the room. It was the bell of her telephone, which had been specially installed since she objected to the usual jangling one, and, without raising her shining head from the pillow, she picked the instrument up, and answered:
“Yes!” Her soft voice throbbed melodiously with a peculiarly emotional quiver, a little trick of hers. She never knew who might be at the other end of the wire!
“Oh, hello, Eloise!” Her voice resumed its normal tone. “I had intended calling you this morning. Anything new?”
“Not a thing, Ellen!” responded Eloise Schenick, despondently. “This affair has me desperate! If he does as he threatens, and Lew learns of…”
“Sh-h-h-h!” cautioned The Domino Lady in a sibilant whisper. “Not over the telephone, dear! You can never tell who might be listening in, you know!”
The sound of a sob came to her over the wire. “I’d forgotten!” murmured her caller, contritely. “I’ve been so worried that I’m almost crazy! If you can’t help me…”
The other laughed soothingly.
“Don’t take it so hard, kiddo,” she advised softly. “You know I’m going to help you. Never fear, that precious husband of yours will not find out a thing. I’ll have those letters back before morning, and safe in your hands, or my name isn’t Ellen Patrick!”
“Oh, you darling! If you only can…”
“All right!” agreed Ellen, quickly, decisively, “I’m taking immediate steps in that direction! And, should they fail, I’ll be seeing your friend this evening! So, either way, I promise you results, Eloise! Now, perk up, so Lew Schenick won’t smell a mouse…’Bye!”
As she cradled the phone for a moment, a tight little smile played about the corners of her luscious mouth. Then, lifting the instrument once more she spoke briefly:
“This is Miss Ellen Patrick, Apartment 422…Please send a boy up in fifteen minutes.”
Sliding from the bed, she peeled the silken nightrobe from her and ran into the ornate bathroom. A needle shower quickly stung her rose body into a state of hot-blooded energy. After a brisk rubdown with a big towel, she slipped into a black velvet negligee which hid her youthful body more completely than the silk nightgown had disclosed it!
Slipping pink-toed feet into black suede slippers, she glided into the living room where she sank into a straight-backed chair before a walnut writing desk. For a long moment she was busy, writing in her usual perfect flowing chirography which was so indicative of her impressive personality. The note she handed the boy a few minutes later was inscribed in white ink on smooth black stationery, and was addressed to “Mr. Rob Wyatt, The Franklyn Arms.” It read:
“This is your last chance to come across. If certain letters are not returned to their rightful owner before midnight tonight, I shall be forced to call and pick them up myself.”
The distinctive epistle was signed, The Domino Lady!
CHAPTER II
Owen Patrick had been one of the most feared politicians in California at one time. An assassin’s slug had put a period to his career three years before, and there were those who believed the killer to have been a hired gunman in the employ of the state machine. The big Irishman’s dauntless spirit and keen wit had been transplanted in his only child, Ellen.
Before her father’s untimely death, the girl had lived a life of comparative ease as befitted the child of Owen Patrick. She had spent four years at Berkeley, a year in the Far East, and then—a cowardly bullet had robbed her of the one who meant more to her than life itself. Small wonder then that she pursued the life of a ruthless, roguish adventuress, at times accepting nigh impossible undertakings simply for the sake of friendship and the love of adventure. At other times, she was coldly involved in hazardous schemes merely to embarrass the authorities, whom she blamed for her father’s death, at the same time earning an adequate income wherewith to obtain the luxuries to which she had become accustomed. Of late, she had become well-known and feared as The Domino Lady!
Take the present case, for instance. Eloise Schenick, former dancer and wife of Lew Schenick of Trianon Films, Inc., had been a classmate at Berkeley in the old days. Married to a man years her senior, she had been indiscreet, and compromising letters were being held over her head by a well-known Hollywood character. This man, a big game hunter and sometimes character actor, was noted for his triumphs in the wild places, but his hunting was not strictly confined to the carnivore! And his parties were the talk of the town!
Wealthy in his own right, Rob Wyatt’s exorbitant demands were but an indication of the inherent cruelty of the man. As a last resort, the tearful Eloise had confided in her old chum, never dreaming that she was addressing the notorious Domino Lady, herself, or that Ellen knew the formidable Wyatt in person. And, as usual, while pitying the victim for her foolishness, the adventure-loving Ellen had unhesitatingly accepted the issue, gratis!
Pretty, shapely, talented, the “young avenger,” as Ellen liked to style herself, was in great demand in society. Many proposals of marriage had fallen to her lot, but she had thus far remained free of marital bonds. At twenty-two, she was known as one of the most beautiful girls in California’s Southland. Of medium height and willowy, there was something about her radiant, Nordic beauty that captivated all with whom she came in contact. And, as far as the sex of her was concerned, its appeal had long since been granted!
* * *
—
Lifting the champagne glass to her cerise lips, Ellen Patrick’s great brown eyes flitted over the bronzed features of Rob Wyatt, who was leaning toward her in the conservatory of his penthouse atop the sumptuous Franklyn Arms. He was frowning slightly, but she couldn’t help admiring his rugged handsomeness, square chin and mouth, the well-knit masculine figure. He was tall, with a finely drawn, rather nervous face, a high-bridged arrogant nose, and lips that were strangely full and impetuous; a man of queer charm and strange moods, admired for his nerve and his attainments in the wild game field, feared for his inherent cruelty of nature, loved hopelessly by many women in his life of whose existence he at times seemed utterly unaware. Ellen had always liked him, though the liking was not unmixed by a strange fear!
“He might be a rounder, a roué, even a blackmailer!” thought Ellen, “but there’s something darned compelling about him just the same! And there’s plenty of ice and iron beneath that velvety exterior, I’ll bet me!…”
She took a test sip of the wine, breathed: “Heavenly!”
He
leaned closer. “The champagne?” he questioned pointedly. “Or the toast?”
She laughed softly as she remembered that he had said: “To you…and me…and tonight!” just before he had drained the glass.
“What do you think?” she parried pertly, brown eyes narrowing, languorously.
“Why, the toast, of course!” he responded, boldly. “Since it is asking too much that I believe you to be as coldly indifferent as you would have one think!”
Again, her tinkling laughter sounded. “It was a lovely thought!” she admitted; then dropped her eyes before the intensity of his gaze.
During the afternoon, Ellen had worked the magic which had gotten her the invitation to Wyatt’s party. But that had been easy. Merely a call on the telephone, since the hunter had been wanting her to come to his penthouse for months without success.
In the sanctity of her luxurious apartment she had prepared herself for the adventure, bathing her gorgeous body and dressing it into a thing altogether lovely to behold. The frock, a smart creation of brown satin, fitted snugly about her white throat after the Russian fashion, but did not prevent the flaunting of her perfect body. Long, brown earrings she had fastened in her tiny pink ears to dangle bewitchingly below her shining coiffure. A bit of exotic perfume, scarlet for her lips, coloring for her smooth cheeks…A white silken cape trimmed in white fur…why, Rob Wyatt’s eyes were but paying her the homage she deserved!
“Why haven’t you visited me before?” he was asking.
Ellen recovered quickly: “Perhaps it was only because you didn’t impress me as really desiring my company!” she teased, impishly.
“Not a chance, my dear!” he objurgated, firmly. “And I’m sure you’ve realized the truth after my persistency!”
“But you are reputed to have the pick of Hollywood,” she charged, softly, “so you couldn’t have missed my presence to any great extent!”