Boy's Cinema (1935-39)

12 "Whcrj you goin' ?" lie asked. "Thought we were going to have some dinner together. What's the matter? Don't you feel good?" She looked him straight in the eye, and she said coldly : "For the first time in a long while, Mac, I guess I don't feel at all, or rather, I'm beginning to feel sorry I've made such a fool of myself." "What're you talkin' about?" he asked in a puzzled sort of way. "We're wasting our time, Mac," she replied. "I'm wasting mine, and you're wasting yours". I had it all figured out once before—that night Danny Walsh died, but I didn't have sense enough to realise it. You don't go in for mush or sentiment or heart, Mac, and that's why this is no good." "Now wait a minute!" howled Mac, but she went on relentlessly: " At first I thought it was your job, this being an eternal policeman—a two- legged bloodhound. But it isn't; it's your nature, and you can't change that. But women are funny animals, Mac. You see, women are full of mush and sentiment, and they overlook a lot, but all of a sudden they can't overlook any more, and then they up and out—just like I'm doing now." "Aw," said he rudely, thrusting his hands in his pockets, "what you need is a powder." She opened the front door, and when she was out. on the top step she slammed it behind her. In the Dark SOME little time later Mac travelled up into the Bronx in (he police car he usually drove, and he found the Andersons' house in Tatum Place without any great difficulty. It was a frame building of no great size but with quite a pretentious porch, and it stood in its own neat little garden wall well back from the road. William Anderson opened the front door to him, and he would have shut it in his face had he not been denied the opportunity. Mac had called to question the small boy Tommy, and question him he did, in the presence of his indignant parents and his equally indignant grandmother. " Come on now, think hard," he in- sisted. "What did the guy with the gun look like?" "The cowboys," piped the youngster. "What would that child know about it?" stormed Grandma Anderson. "How can you expect a kid his age lo remember?" William Anderson demanded plaintively. "Bad memories run in your family, don't they?" sneered Mac, and turned to the boy again. "D'you know what happens to kids when they tell lies?" "Let go o' me!" whimpered the youngster. "All right," said Mac grimly, "that's that. Get your hat, Anderson, and his, too." "But Tommy shouldn't go out this time of night," complained the old lady. "It's past his bedtime now." "When I want information from you," Mac retorted, "I'll ask for it. He's going down to headquarters." On the other side of Tatum Place, as Mac went out from the house with Anderson and the boy, a dark blue saloon was standing. Tony Ricci was in it with another member of Berger's gang, and they wore watching the house. There were two men in the front seat. "What's the idea of takin' the kid?" growled Ricci's companion. "Forget the kid," returned the swarthy crook. "He don't know what day it is." June 20th, 1936. BOY'S CINEMA "If he gives that guy the works once more " "Shut up!" hissed Ricci. Anderson and Tommy were driven down to headquarters, but Mac got no farther with thorn than the switchboard in the oute? office, for there the officer on duty informed him that someone had just been trying to get him on the telephooue. "Male or female?" asked Mac, foolish enough to think that Sally might have relented. "Well, it sounded like a man-to me," was the reply, "but it could have been a woman with a bass voice. They said to tell you not to worry, they had Anderson's mother, and you could tell it to the guy that was with you." "My mother?" gasped Anderson. "How long ago?" demanded Mac. "I said just before you came in," replied the officer at the switchboard. "Berger's got her!" decided Mac. "Come on." Back to the house in Tatum Place McCaffery drove as fast as traffic and traffic lights permitted. The dark blue saloon had not moved, but Tony Ricci was on the sidewalk now, peering round the back of it and a six-shooter was in his hand. Anderson was out of the police car the instant it stopped, and Tommy jumped down after him. They were running along the garden path when Mac descended from the wheel, jumped a low hedge, and ran across a lawn to catch up with them. He heard a shot, felt something hit. him in the forehead, and went down with a thud upon the turf. Anderson looked back from the porch, and his wife came running out from the house; Tommy screamed. On the other side of the road Tony Ricci scrambled into the blue saloon and the hum of its engine died away in the distance. Mac tried to raise himself as Anderson stooped over him, but sank down again with a groan. "Are you hurt" asked the Swede foolishly. "I feel fine," gritted Mac. "Get an ambulance." "But my mother—how about my mother ?" "Get an ambulance." Mrs. Anderson telephoned for an ambulance, and Mao was swept off to hospital in it. He was kept in a dark ward for two days, and then was taken home with a bandage not merely over the wound in his forehead, but over his eyes as well. For three days Mrs. Walsh suffered almost as much from his temporary blindness as he did himself, for he was afraid to be left alone even for a few minutes. In the evening of the fifth day after Ricci had shot him Danny's widow said several uncomplimentary things about Sally as she cleared away the remains of a meal. "She's a fine sort of a girl!" she fumed. "You shot, and her not coming near you to see how you are. I knew you'd pick out some lightheaded fool who wouldn't give a snap of the fingers whether you lived or died." Mac remained silent in his chair. His pride would not permit him to explain the true circumstances. "Well, aren't you goin' to say some- thing?" she snapped at him, sweeping towards the kitchen door with a loaded tray. ' Where you goin' ?" he cried out. "I'm only carrying these dishes into the kitchen," she replied. "Don't ba so jumpy." "How would you be," he demanded, tyy ittin' here wi Tuesday "if you were sittin' here \vith your eyes tied up, not knowing what's going on?" "Well, the doctor says you've got to stay there and not remove the bandage," she reminded him. "If you'd been shot a fraction of an inch lower " "Stop it, will you?" he burst out. "Why do you keep harping on that all the time?" The doorbell rang, and he leaned for- ward, listening intently as she put down the tray and i ent to answer its summons. Sally was outside. "Oh, come in," said Mrs. Walsh. "Why, we were just talking about you." "Who is it?" bellowed Mac. "It's me—Sally," replied Sally, entering the room. "How do you feel?" Mac relaxed in his chair. "Fine," he said with sarcasm. "I didn't know it was this bad," she murmured sympathetically. "Oh, it came near to being a lot worse," said Mrs. Walsh. "I'm so glad you've come. I haven't got a thing in the place for breakfast, and he won't let me step a foot out of this room." "You go ahead," urged Sally. "I'll stay here until you come back." "I won't be any time at all." The tray was conveyed to the kitchen and Mrs. Walsh shed her apron, put on a hat, and went off to make some pur- chases. "I thought you were all washed up with me," said Mac after a while. "Who said I wasn't?" Sally retorted. "I know," he drawled. "You just came around because you hate me." "Listen to me, Mister Detective- Sergeant," said she severely, "we've been through all that before. Why don't you just put it down to the fact that I want to bo friendly—that I want to help?" "I sure would like to be able to figure you out !'\' "If you'd just figure yourself out." she informed him, "you'd have no trouble understanding me." "Huh!" he grunted. "Got a cigarette ?" She had no cigarettes with her, and a box on the mantelpiece to which ho directed her was empty. "I'll go out and get you some," she said. "No, never mind!" he cried. "Stay here, will you?" " But it's only down to the corner, Barge. I'll be back in just a minute. Take it easy." "Take it easy?" he howled. "Take it easy? That's all right for you to say. You've never been like this! Suppose somebody was to take a crack at me, what could I do? I tell you it's liko having your hands tied! Anybody could do anything to you!" "But nobody's going to do anything to you," she said soothingly. "Now pull yourself together—I won't be a minute." She patted him on the shoulder, picked up her handbag, and went out. He heard the front door being opened and closed, and he sat bolt upright in his chair with every muscle tense. The flat was so quiet that the ticking of the clock on the mantelpiece beat into his ears. The window of the living- room was open, because the night was warm, and outside the window was a well on to which the windows of other flats opened. Across the well somebody raised a creaking sash, and Mac sprang up in alarm and whipped a gun from a pocket of his dressing-gown. "Say something!" he shouted wildly. "Why don't you say something? Say something, d'you hear?" He blundered against a little table, and (Continued on page 25)