Boy's Cinema (1939-40)

10 Why, the wnoie Dusmess is rotten, ana we know it—and the sooher we get out of it the better. Re<J, we're getting out of it right now!" "Hov/?" asked Red. "How?" Steve banged a fist upon the desk. "By calling off every whisperer! By telling those racketeers the deal is off! By sending them back their money! Any- way, were through!" "Okay, boss," nodded Red. "But I've got a hunch it'll be like trying to stop a buzz-saw with our bare hands." "All right," gritted Steve. ""That's a chance we're going to take 1" REPARATION WHILE they were talking in the room that had been Laura's women were whispering in the streets, particu- larly outside shops where Kimball's milk was sold. "Are you still taking Kimball's milk?' the old lady of the knitting said to a young mother who emerged from a shop with a bottle in her hand and a child by her side. "The other milk costs two cents more a pint," was the defensive rejoinder. "I wouldn't give it to my children— I ve heard it's full of tuberculosis." That sort of slander, spread everywhere, had been doing a lot of damage to Kimball's already; but the racketeers who had forced practically all the other milk companies out of business were far too fond of strong-arm methods to leave matters entirely to the Acme Advertising Agency. That morning they had sent out a mob to use the rumourg as an excuse for violence, and in all the poorer districts of the citv Kimball milk-carts were being overturned, their roundsmen beaten up, and shop windows smashed. Red was sent out to call off the whis- perers; Steve was coasting round the streets in an open two-seater, for the same purpose, when he came upon a wrecked shop and a crowd of toughs outside it and heard a fellow shout: "On to Kimball's next!" The mob streamed off, and Steve got down from his car and dashed into a neighbouring drug store. "May I use your phone?" he asked urgently. " Help yourself," replied the proprietor. "Thank you!" Steve dived round a counter to a telephone on a shelf and rang up Police Headquarters. "There's a mob on its way to Kimball's dairy in Market Street," he informed the desk- sergeant who answered the call. "Yes, that's right. Better make it snappy!" The sergeant got through to the radio transmitter room, and within a couple of minutes a dispatcher there was sending out a wireless message to patrol cars 37 and 43 to go at once to Market Street and deal with an attempt to wreck Kimball's. Steve, by that time, was back in the two- seater and speeding after the gang. Market Street, however, was only a very little way from the thoroughfare he left behind, and as he shot across Union Square into it—under the railway bridge- stones were being hurled at the windows of the big depot, and cans of milk were being rolled off a loading platform. Women had gathered to watch the work of destruction, and some of them were taking part in it. Steve ran his car to the kerb and stood up in it to bellow: "Wait a minute! Wait a minute!" Faces were turned in his direction. "What do you want?" snarled an ugly ruffian with a brickbat in his hand. "I want to tell you the truth about Kimball's milk!" .shouted Steve. " We know already," shrilled a woman. "That milk is poison to our kids!" "That isn't so! You've been told that Kimball's milk is tubercular, but that's a lie! I deliberately spread that lie to put Kimball out of business! Kimball's milk is as pure as any milk on the market!" A helpless patrolman, who had been November 'J6th, 1?^" BOY'S CINEMA blowing his whistle, gaped at the speaker from an alley in which he had taken refuge. Across the square streaked a black saloon containing some of the racketeers who had paid the Acme Adver- tising Agency to spread the lie. ■' Boloney!" cried the leader of the mob. "He's a Kimball stooge! Cm on!" The hoodlums surged towards the two- seater. The black saloon came to a stand- still. " Wait a minute!" cried Steve. "I know what I'm talking about because I was hired by the racketeers to spread the lies!" "That's the last double-cross he'll ever pull!" roared an enoi-mous fellow in the back seat of the saloon, and he leaned out of the wiildow beside him with a six-gun in his hand and pulled the trigger twice. Steve clutched at the windscreen of the two-seater, but his hand fell away from the glass and he collapsed upon the floor, his head against the steering-wheel. The toughs who had been about to drag him down from the two-seater scattered in all directions. From Union Square two patrol cars appeared, and the black saloon made off at top speed. Steve was taken to hospital in an ambu- lance summoned by the police, but he was not seriously injured. One bullet had grazed his shoulder, the other had buried itself in the upper part of his left arm. The second bullet was extracted, his wounds were bandaged, and he insisted upon leaving the hospital within two hours of having entered it. That night Red Barrett set off for New York, and he took Virginia Daniels with him. He had a mission to perform on Steve's behalf, in which Virginia was con- cerned. Two days after he and she had left Kansas City they both stepped into the general office of the House of Crandall. "I want to see Miss Crandall," Red said to the girl behind the inquiry desk. "Have you an appointment?" asked the girl. "No, but it's very important." " She's busy—but I'll see." Bernice was in with Laura, and it was she who answered the private telephone. "A Mr. Barrett to see you," she re- ported. "He says it's very important." Laura frowned and took the receiver. "Tell Mr. Barrett that I have nothing to see him about," she said into the trans- mitter. The girl clerk delivered that message in a slightly different form: "Sorry, but Miss Crandall can't see you." "But it's very important," persisted Red. "Miss Crandall said she had nothing to see you about!" " Thanks," gritted Red, and he went out with Virginia in a state of dejection. But Virginia was not beaten. "I thought you wanted to see her," she said. "So I do," said he. "But she " "Are you going to let a mere ' no' stop you?" She tugged him along the corridor. "There's her door, and I'll bet you a nickel it isn'L locked!" Bernice was on her way out from Laura's room when Red invaded it from the corridor, and Laura was too surprised to say anything until the secretary had gone. She sprang to her feet then, and she said frigidly: "Well, what is it?" Red held out a large envelope. "Stephen Brewster told me to see you and give you this," he told her. "It con- tains some formulas he planned on mar- keting, before he was forced out of business." She rejected the envelope and he laid it on the desk to fish a folded cheque from his breast-pocket. "He also told me to give you this." She took the cheque, opened it out, and saw that it had been made payable to herself and was for forty-five thousand dollars. Every Tuesday "What is this for?" she questioned. "That's the exact amount he received for—for whispering against you," said Red in a shamefaced sort of fashion. "He figured you'd need it." "How nice of him!" She would have torn the cheque to pieces, but he caught hold of her hands. "Wait a minute," he pleaded. "Don't do anything foolish. That money will keep you in business. And—er—there's just one other thing. He wants you to give Virginia Daniels a job—she's outside right now—and he told me to ask you for a job for myself. You see, I happen to know the cosmetic business from A to Z. I think I could help you." "This is all very nice of Mr. Bi'ewster," she said with a toss of her head. "His formulas—his cheque—and now even your valuable services! But, tell me, why didn't he come here himself?" "Because he's in jail," blurted Red. ' He went to the District Attorney's office and confessed. It was the only way he could stop that milk campaign." "In jail!" she faltered, and all he^ resentment and all her scorn fell away from her like a cloak that had been dis- carded. "He did that?" "Yes," nodded Red. "And he got him- self wounded first-by the racketeers he had been working for." She closed her eyes for a moment so that he should not see the pain that was in them. Then, in a voice that was none too steady, she said: " Bring Virginia in, will you? I'd like to see her." A PRISON PLOT LAURA was present at Steve's trial, which took place at the Hall of Justice in Kansas City. She was horri- fied to find that he had not engaged any attorney for his defence, and did not even attempt to defend himself. The verdict v/as a foregone conclusion: the jury found him guilty of conspiracy and criminal slander. The judge postponed sentence over the week-end, and on the Sunday was sur- prised to receive a very beautiful visitor at his home. No m.ention had been made in coiu-t of the original whispering cam- paign that had di-iven Steve into retalia- tion, and the name of Laura Crandall did not convey anything to the judge when his butler handed him Laura's card. She was ushered into a book-lined study and she was very graciously received; but when she stated the object of her visit the dignified judge looked scandalised. "This is all very irregular, my dear young lady," he protested. "By rights I should not listen to a word you have to say. The jury have delivered their verdict, but it is very wrong indeed of you to try in any way to influence me. However, since you're here I'll listen to what you have to say." She murmured her thanks, and then very earnestly she said: "Judge Williams, I think Stephen Brewster's conscience is punishing him more than any prison term ever will. He went to the District Attorney and made a full confession of his own accord. He's spent practically every cent he ever had in the world trying to blot out the harm he's done. Doesn't all this entitle him to some- leniency?" The judge shook his head. He was moved by her beauty, but not by her plea. "I wish I could grant .vour request," he said gravely, "but I can't I feel that you are wasting your sympathy on the m.an. In my opinion he's a racketeer, and not a bit better than those other racketeers we sent up to prison for shooting him. If I were to minimise his sentence in any way I'd be betraying my public trust. I'rh very sorry." In court on the following morning Steve was sentenced to three years' penal servi- tude, and later in the day he was conveyed with other prisoners to the State penitentiary at Lansing.