Books › Blue Book v055 n01 [1932-05], 1932 › scan 77
Scan 77
Blue Book v055 n01 [1932-05], 1932
50 lines. Read by computer on 18 September 2026. No printed page number was found. See the scan on archive.org.
1A Tartar on the Spot
3Our pioneer forefathers would have known how to handle racketeers. Here a young man from the West, with the pioneer tradition strong within him, proves anything but an innocent bystander when the big-town machine-guns get going round him.
5By SEVEN ANDERTON
7Illustrated by Joseph Maturo
9THE large tan leather suitcase he carried was heavy, a fact that was not betrayed by the careless ease with which the tall young man handled it. Emerging from the railway terminal, he crossed the sidewalk and stood for a moment at the curb. His gray eyes flicked over the traffic stream. His left hand went up to beckon a cruising taxi. Entering the cab, the tall youth placed the suitcase between his feet and gave the driver an address on Fourteenth Street.
11As the taxi swung out into the stream of vehicles, a big closed car which had halted to pick up a small, swarthy, black-eyed man who had followed the tall youth from the station, pulled in behind it.
13Besides the driver, there were two other men in the car which had picked up the black-eyed man. All were well dressed and well groomed, but they were nevertheless unsavory-looking citizens. Their faces bore a common stamp of brutality; their eyes were hard and wintry. One, the largest, spoke to the little dark-eyed man as the latter jerked shut the door of the big closed car.
15"Sweet luck, Blacky," said the big one, "spotting him on the rattler. The chief was tickled pink when your wire came! This little trick will make Steve Capri dizzy—teach him to import his rod artists in armor-plate boxes if he wants to get a look at 'em alive." A cold gurgle that was meant to be a chuckle followed the big fellow's speech.
17"Yeah," agreed the little black-eyed man. "Where's the hand-organ?"
19"Under that blanket on the floor," answered the big man. "It's all ready to go."
21The little one nodded. The driver was tooling the big car along behind the cab in which the tall young man was riding. Both machines were now rolling southward along Seventh Avenue.
23"Look sharp, Bert," said the big man to the driver. "Pull past at the first chance you see for a run."
25The driver nodded without taking his eyes off the cab ahead. The traffic was heavy along the Avenue, and the men in the big car wanted a reasonably open path for their get-away after they had murdered the unsuspecting youth in the taxicab. It was broad daylight—two o'clock in the afternoon; but the bleak-eyed killers in the closed car did not care about that. Once they had filled their victim with machine-gun slugs, they would speed away from the scene, dodge around a few corners and then abandon the car. It had been stolen half an hour before, a mile or two away. They would take the murder weapon with them in a violin-case, and report as finished the job on which they had been sent.
27The taxi turned west on Fourteenth Street. There was little traffic here as compared with the busy Avenue. The little black-eyed man bent over, flung aside a blanket and took a Thompson submachine-gun from an open violin-case thus exposed. He laid the "tommy-gun" across his knees. The big man had lowered the window on the right-hand side of the car.
29Seventh Avenue was several blocks behind. The driver of the trailing machine stepped on the gas, and at the same moment the taxi pulled up to the curb before a flight of steps leading up to the entrance of a three-story brick building. Beside that entrance was a placard announcing that rooms could be rented by the day and week.
31"Hold it!" growled the big man.
33The driver of the closed car halted it abruptly. Some twenty yards ahead, the tall youth had stepped from the cab and was paying the chauffeur.
35"Let the cab pull out," ordered the big man. "Then slip past and we'll burn him down. All set, Blacky?"
37The little swarthy man nodded. The cab pulled away, and the tall young man, carrying his suitcase easily, turned toward the flight of worn wooden steps. A dozen children were playing on the sidewalk. One was pulling another in a toy wagon. Another was preparing to slide down the banisters beside the steps.
39"What about them kids?" asked the driver as he started the big car in second gear and hurled it ahead.
41"To hell with 'em!" snarled the big man. "Miss 'em if you can, but burn him down!"
43The tall young man had reached the foot of the steps when the sound of tortured gears came to his ears. He turned his head toward the sound, and saw the big car leaping ahead as its powerful engine answered the suddenly opened throttle. Then he saw something else. The ugly muzzle of the machine-gun was thrust through the window of the speeding car, now abreast of the stairway!
45Like a flash the tall youth whirled to face the danger, and in the same movement swung the big suitcase up as a shield for his body. He was not a moment too soon. The street suddenly echoed to the spiteful clatter of the machine-gun. It seemed to the tall young man that somebody was striking rapid blows on his suitcase with a heavy hammer. Something stung his shoulder. The blows on the suitcase forced him off balance, and he sprawled backward onto the steps.
47The deadly sputtering of the machine-gun had suddenly ceased but screams of pain and terror were coming from the children. Something fell across the tall young man's face. The five-year-old boy had tumbled from the banisters; blood was drenching the neck and shoulder of the man upon whose head he had fallen.
49The big car with its four occupants was whisking around the corner as the tall youth squirmed from under the little
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