Boy's Cinema (1933)

8 consequently remained hidden behind the pages of a newspaper in which he pretended to. be engrossed. Passing on, the detective entered the box-car that contained the shipment of gold from the mines, and, after satisfy- ing himself that all was well there, he started to retrace his steps towards the rear of the train. En route to the last coach he chanced to meet the conductor, a man known as Bennett. The latter was on his way to the front of the express, and, after pausing to exchange a few words of conversation with Matthews, he went ahead to a sleeping car that was divided up into private berths. The doors of these opened on to a corridor, and the conductor was hasten- ing past one of the compartments when a hand reached forth and gripped him unexpectedly by the throat. Next second Bennett was. dragged bodily across the threshold of the berth, and before he could utter a single cry a blow from a gun-butt struck him sense- less to the floor. Bennett was unaware of what ensued, but some ten minutes later the door of the berth was opened again and a man stepped out into the corridor. He was wearing the railway uniform; and his features were identical to those of the conductor who had been attacked and felled—yet the real Bennett lay huddled and unconscious in the compartment where he had been overpowered. With a.furtive glance to right and left the impostor strode towards the front of the train, and before he had gone many paces he encountered a negro Pullman porter. The unsuspecting manner in which the darkie greeted him was a tribute to the perfection of the man's disguise, and he walked on boldly. Not long afterwards the mysterious impostor appeared in the cab of the giant locomotive, now travelling at something over sixty miles an hour. As he showed up in the glow of the furnace he found himself covered by the armed plain-clothes' man who was riding with driver and fireman, but the latter spoke to the detective reassuringly. "It's all right," the fireman said. "It's only Bennett, the conductor. How are you, Bill? Seen anything of the Wrecker yet?" 'No, no sign of him yet," the dis- guised impostor answered in a muffled tone. The armed guard in the cab was thrusting his gun into his pocket, and Bennett's " double " acted the moment it was out of sight. With a quick gesture he snatched out an automatic and shot the detective through the heart at point-blank range. Then he turned the weapon on the fireman and pumped a bullet into his chest. Staggered and bewildered, the engine- driver nevertheless had the presence of mind to realise that this murderous assassin could not be the conductor, and with a yell he sprang from the controls and grappled with the man, knocking the pistol from his hand before he could fire it a third time. "The Wrecker, huh!" the driver ground out. "Well, you won't get away with it this trip!" He had seized the crook by the throat, but the man battled with him savagely, and, locked in each other's grip, the pair of them reeled from one side of the cab to the other. And, meanwhile, the ex- press rushed on through the night, none of its passengers realising what was afoot in the monster locomotive, for the tumultuous clangour of the wheels had drowned the sound of the gun-shots. The train roared through Plainville. A few miles beyond the little station, two men were standing near half a April 29th, 1933. BOY'S CINEMA dozen empty freight wagons at rest on the metals of a siding—two men who had switched the points so that the Hurricane Express would leave the main line and dash headlong to de- struction. They were hirelings of the Wrecker, a couple of thugs answering to the names of Mike and Sandy, and they were discussing their chief's project in low tones. Hurtling to Destruction, LARRY BAKER drove his car at a steady fifty miles an hour along the road that led to Plainville from Stoekfield. He was in civilian clothes, for that morning he had been formally dismissed from the airway service for the breach he had committed in the regulations by landing his 'plane with- out authority on the day his father had been killed. Larry reached Carson's cabin only a few seconds after the express had passed through the lonely station, and, drawing his auto to a standstill, he entered the signal operator's quarters. He saw no sign of Carson at first, but all at once he heard a slight movement behind a counter that extended across the cabin, and as he looked over he saw the signalman lying on the floor, bound hand and foot. Larry vaulted the counter and dropped to his knees beside the man. Carson seemed to be suffering from a blow on the head, for there was a bruise on his temple, and he was only half-conscious. But the youngster speedily aroused him, and, recognising him, the signal operator spoke in husky accents. "The Hurricane Express!" he panted. "Stop her! The Wrecker's aboard her! He's going to crash her and get the gold shipment. I can't tell you any more, Baker " A scared look came into his eyes, as if he were frightened at having said so much. But Larry had no desire to delay longer by filing questions at him, and, without even stopping to release the man, he scrambled to his feet and turned towards the counter again. In that very moment he came face to face with two rascally-looking men, one of them a tall, powerful individual who was grasping a coil of rope, the other a small, wiry fellow armed with a revolver. " Stay where you are, pardner," said the man with the gun. "You ain't goin' anywhere." Larry slowly raised his hands, and the two rogues edged their way through a gap in the counter. Then the gunman spoke again, addressing his accomplice. "Tie him up, Craig," he jerked. "Right, Barney," the other rejoined, and moved close to Larry to obey his confederate's command. Larry saw his chance, and, lunging desperately, bundled Craig against the gunman with a force that sent both of the crooks sprawling. Then he plunged through an open window in flying style, picked himself up in the twinkling of an eye, and tumbled into his car. The starter turned the engine at a touch, and an instant later the young airman was driving his auto on to the road again. He was a hundred yards away when a gun barked, and, looking back, he saw Craig and the man Barney standing outside the signal cabin. Barney fired three shots in swift suc- cession, but all went wide, and, in the meantime, Larry was putting distance between himself and the gangsters. "He's gettin' away, Barney," Craig snarled. "Come on—after him in the roadster!" They darted round to the other side of the signal cabin, and reappeared a few seconds afterwards in a six-cylinder touring-car. Craig was at the wheel, and he was soon driving the automobile Every Tuesday at full throttle, but Larry's foot was crammed hard down on the accelerator of his auto, and with the speedometer needle quivering at the seventy-live mark he kept ahead. Barney had reopened fire with the re- volver, and bullet after bullet sang past the fugitive, one of them splintering the windscreen in front of him. But he remained unscathed, and had covered two miles of highway when he skidded furiously round a bend and sighted the Hurricane Express in front of him.- i Larry turned his car off the road, drove it across a strip of broken ground, and then swerved parallel with the railway track. Craig followed suit, Barney still blazing at the youngster, but without a scratch Larry raced on at top speed, and yard by yard he Over- hauled the train. He came abreast- of the rear coach, and gradually made up on the other cars till he was level with the engine cab. Then he looked up to. see the Wrecker and the driver at grips on the footplate, and with a fierce wrench'on the steering-wheel he pulled the auto hard over so that it was almost in contact with the loco. With a burst of acceleration he thrust his car a yard or two ahead of the engine cab, and next instant he was on his feet. He clutched the handrail of' the railroad giant before the auto could drop behind again, and, hauling himself upward, he reached the footplate even as the Wrecker flung the driver out to his death. Larry stumbled over the bodies of fire- man and detective, and lashed at the crook with his bunched knuckles. The Wrecker dropped to the floor, and the youngster was standing over him when he felt the express swing off the main line. Then, peering round the edge of the cab, he saw that the train was thundering along a siding to what seemed certain disaster—for at the end of that siding, hard against the terminal buffers, was the t column of empty freight wagons by which the two men, Mike and Sandy, had been standing a little while before. Larry blundered towards the engine controls, but ere he could lay hand on them the Wrecker had straightened up, and with all his force he brought down a coal-shovel on the back of the airman's skull. The youngster sagged with a groan, and in hot haste his antagonist clambered from cab to tender and thence to the roof of the box-car im- mediately behind. At the same time he raised his glance towards the starlit sky, and, to his satisfaction, he saw a 'plane swooping low over the train. A rope-ladder trailed- from it, and, as the machine dipped "to within twenty feet of the express, the Wrecker raised his hands to his throat and tore off a pliable rubber mask that had covered his features from crown to neck—a mask that was an exact representation of Bennett's head and face. He flung the contrivance to the roof of the box-car and reached up to grab the rope-ladder, and he had no sooner made his grip secure than the 'plane swept onward, carrying him away from the train. The Hurricane Express stormed along the siding, and from the thickets where they had gone to cover Mike and Sandy watched her onrush with tense interest. "Here she comes!" Mike breathed. "Another thirty seconds an' it'll be all over!" (To be continued in another exciting episode next week. By permission of Ideal Films, Ltd., starring John Wayne, Shirley Grey, Tully Marshall, and Conway Tearle.)