5 Detective Novels Magazine Cover — page 84: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

84 swered dryly. “And thanks for taking such good care of my two ships. I hope an ex-Army officer turned rodent did the aoe with my pilot and the kid with im “That fellow who came in here looking for water?” Joe asked. “Don’t worry about him or the kid, Mead. They’re locked up safe inside. Don’t cause us any trouble, and they’ll get out okay. Let’s all get inside. It’s hot out here, and I can use another cooler offer from Mr. Hor- ton’s private stock.” ELEN HORTON and Duval had said nothing. Now, as they all walked up a curved concrete driveway toward a grilled iron gate in the high white wall, she fell in beside Sam Mead. “Scared?” he asked, looking down. “A little,” she admitted. “But if it’s money they’re after, Dad will pay up. I’m just afraid that the law will inter- fere and cause somebody to get killed. If it happens, it will be all my fault.” “Hardly. You were pegged three months ago, before this business with your—ah—fiancé broke. They’d have got you some other way. I’m the guy who’s ona spot.” He grinned as they went through the gate and into a “yard” of green that stretched for more than a hundred yards to the big white columns supporting the front veranda. Flower beds of a dozen hues threw color into the white of the house and the lawn’s greenness. It was - a veritable castle, a paradise costing at least a half million or more dollars. Mead guessed that the water for all this came from a big spring up back of the house, a spring which had turned a desert into a garden. “Nice little log cabin vour folks have here,” he said to Helen Horton. He said it more to reassure her than anything else. “Greenhaven? Father built it just be- fore the war. He liked to come down here in the fall for a couple of months and putter around.” “That’s a word for it,” Mead said and walked on. Two Mexican gardeners, working with wheelbarrows and tools, looked up as the party passed. The men were frightened —under strain. Mead could tell from the FIVE DETECTIVE NOVELS MAGAZINE expressions on their dark faces. He noted the tools again. “Where do they live?” he asked casually. “In quarters back of the house.” “Tool house close by ?” She gave him a startled look. “why, yes, but—” Joe moved in alongside Mead. “Burke and Choo-Choo will take care of the others, Mead. You'll come along with me.’ Thev were at the porch entrance now. A frightened Mexican woman servant, probably the wife of one of the garden- ers, stood at the door. She said some- thing in Spanish that Mead didn’t catch and ran to the girl. Sam Mead followed Joe around the corner of the west side and for a mo- ment‘tasted the chance. But too much distance separated them, and he thought of the others inside. Better not, he thought; maybe later. Somebody might get killed. Concrete steps led down through an opening, cellar doors laid back, and Joe nodded for Mead to descend. “Thought you might want to see your friends,” he said half sardonically. “It’s almost supper time. You'll eat upstairs in the kitchen—under guard.” A strong oak door, braced and bolted, barred Mead’s way. From above, Joe took a big key from his pocket and tossed it down. 7 “Open the door, go in, toss me the key, and close the door,” he said cryp- tically. “I’ll come down and lock you up.” Obediently Mead stepped into a big cellar room with concrete walls and saw Tobie Ralson, slim, blond, and twenty- eight. staring in open-mouthed conster- nation. On a bench beside him sat the seventeen-year-old air student. “Well!” Sam said. “Imagine meeting vou here, Tobie.” “What the devil!” Tobie cried out. “What are you doing at this place?” “Hoping you’ve got a match,” was the reply. “I used up the last one in the book, flying Helen Horton, Duval—the guy I don’t think she’s going to marry—and a guy named Burke down here for a little deal in Big Finance. With a gun in my 99 He lighted the cigarette and elabo- CoOMmiclooo S (C@)