Boy's Cinema (1939-40)

ibis Every Tuesday Vivid drama and high adventure surge through the pages of this pulsating serial story of the men who keep watch and ward on the American Coast READ THIS FIRST Boroff, creator of a deadly compound k?iotV7i as disintegration gas, and head of a ruthless organisation, has contracted to supply quantities of that gas to Moro- vania, a Central European potocr. Operating in America, he has fallen foul of the authorities there, and is ivanted for the murder of a young coastguards- man, named Jim Kent. The latter's brother Terry, a lieutenant in the Coast- guard Service, has sworn to track Boroff down, and possesses three firm friends who are eager to help him. They are his fiancee Jean Norman, a reporter on a promi7ient newspaper; her brother, Dick Norman, a rising young scientist; and Snapper McGee, a Press photographer on the staff of the publication Jean repre- sctits. Terry ascertains that Boroff and his confederates are located at a remote chemical manufactory on the seashore, but though a detail of coastguardsmen is despatched there, the crooks escape before the bluejackets can close in. Meanwhile, Terry has learned that the gang's hide-out has been mined, and he hustles his comrades out of the building. Then, looking back, he sees Jean Norman and Snapper McGee entering the premises, and, returning hot-foot, he has scarcely warned them of their peril tvhen a deafen- ing explosion occurs. Now Read On. A LUCKY FIND WITH the shattering roar of the ex- plosion resounding in their ears, and with a blast of flame sweeping into the laboratory to which they had retreated, Terry Kent and Jean and Snapper believed that their last moment had come. Yet, as it happened, the havoc wrought by the mine was almost entirely confined to the western portions of the building. True, the door of the laboratory was ripped off its hinges, and a couple of rafters crashed down from the ceiling of the room amid a quantity of plaster. But the walls stood firm, and the two men and the girl who were encompassed by those walls escaped injury. In the profound silence that ensued as the echoes of the detonation faded away, the three of them looked at one another in an awe-struck fashion, each marvelling at the fact that they had gone unscathed. Then Terry found his voice. "Talk about charmed lives!" he breathed fervently. "But, come on, let's get out of here. This room's liable to cave in even now." The laboratory was filled with clouds of smoke and dust, and he propelled Jean and Snapper thi'ough the haze towards the doorway that opened on to the landing- stage of the kelp plant—was hurrying them in the direction of that doorway when he came abreast of the threshold of the room which had been Boroff's office. He chanced to cast a glance into the office as he was in the act of passing it, and he immediately caught sight of a cardboard carton standing on the desk that occupied the middle of the apartment. It was a carton that bore the inscription "Electric Light Bulbs," and on the instant Terry stopped abruptly, his thoughts hark- ing back to that day at Pier-Port station, when three of Boroff's minions had at- tempted to despatch a consignment of gas-bombs across the Border by rail. Those bombs had been cunningly manu- factured so as to represent electric light bulbs, and had been packed in cartons identical to the one which Terry now per- ceived on the infamous scientist's desk. With a glitter in his eyes, the revenue officer darted across the threshold of the BOY'S CINEMA 10 room that had been Boroff's sanctum, and, following him automatically, Jean and Snapper joined him as he pounced on the cardboard box and ripped open the lid of it. A number of neatly packed globes were disclosed, and Terry addressed himself to his companions exultantly. " This sure is our lucky day!" he de- clared. "Here's a box of gas-bombs. The Boroff gang must have overlooked them when they flew the coop." "You're right, Terry," Snapper ejacu- lated. "Leastways, them bulbs are dead- ringers for the globes that all went up in smoke at Piei'-Port station the other afternoon. Oh, boy, now Jean's brother Dick will have something to work on! We can take these here bombs to him, and he can analyse the disintegration gas an' find out just what's in it." Terry nodded briskly. Then, gathering the cardboard carton in his arms, he led the way out of the office and resumed his course towards the door that gave access to the landing-stage. He and Jean and Snapper had soon gained the pier, and as they emerged from the half-wrecked kelp plant they were seen by the detachment of coastguardsmen whom Terry had hustled out of the build- ing a minute or so previously, and who were now retracing their steps to the damaged premises. But those coastguai'dsmen were not the only ones who set eyes on Terry, Jean and Snapper as the trio issued on to the land- ing-stage. For the two men and the girl who came stumbling out of the kelp plant were also seen by the inmates of a plane that was circling high above the partially ruined establishment. The machine in question was the cabin plane in which Boroff and his party had made their getaway. It was climbing rapidly into the blue vault of the heavens, but with the aid of a pair of field-glasses Boroff was able to obtain a clear impres- sion of Terry Kent, Snapper McGee, and EPISODE 10 :— The Acid Trail RALPH BYRD AS TERRY KENT Jean Norman. Moreover, he perceived dis- tinctly the box that the Coastguard lieu- tenant was carrying, and as he recognised that box he gave vent to a savage oath. Next moment he had swung round on Rackerby, who was seated beside him in one of the bucket-seats of the cabin plane. " You fool!" he snarled. " You forgot to bring away the carton of gas-bombs that was on the desk in my office!" His assistant chemist started. "The carton of gas-bombs?" he echoed in an anxious tone. "Yes, imbecile!" Boroff rasped. "The bombs we made only this morning! Yoa left them in my office, and that fellow Kent has them now!" He glowered at Rackerby murderously, and the latter cringed under the concen- trated malignity of his stare. "Don't look at me like that, Boroff," he whined. "After all, you're as much to blame for the oversight as I am. You told Thorg and me to load the arnatite aboard the plane, but you never mentioned a word about the bombs, and I didn't give them a thought." Boroff clenched his right hand, as if tempted to hit out at Rackerby. But with a visible effort he controlled his wrath, and, perhaps admitting to himself that he was indeed as much to blame as his assis- tant chemist for having overlooked the carton of gas-bombs, he lapsed into a brooding silence which he maintained throughout the remainder of the flight. It was a flight that led northward, the pilot of the plane steering the craft in that direction when he had attained an altitude of ten thousand feet, and it was a flight that covered a distance of about fifty miles, the machine finally descending on a lonely headland that jutted out into the Atlantic. Boroff rose from his seat as the plane came to a standstill, and after peering through the windows to satisfy himself that the coast was clear, he spoke to the other passengers in the craft. "Krohn," he said, "you come with me. Degado, you and Rackerby and Thorg un- load the arnatite and bring it to the hide- out. And don't waste any time. I wpnt the pilot to take off from here and make himself scarce as soon as possible." A few seconds later Boroff and the November 18th, 1939.