Black Mask (Vol. 22, No. 2 — Mary 1939)

“Let’s go,” snapped Baxter, pushing him toward the side gate, where Steward was firing at a lone guard. The big fellow broke into a run, and Baxter, leaping forward, slashed at his head with the revolver barrel. The running man missed a step and came to his knees. Baxter, not slowing down much, scooped up the other revolver and sprinted for the side door, now open.

A ring of keys hung at the door’s lock. Next to the door lay Warden Dodge, face twisted.

Dodge painfully crawled to the opening, but Baxter got away from his clawing fingers. Smoke was coiling from the windows of the warden’s house, and Baxter cursed violently. Rats, all of them! They’d added arson to murder just to give the law more trouble.

The garage door hung open, and Dodge’s car was backing out fast enough to throw its passengers forward. Baxter recklessly opened fire. The car sagged, a rear tire badly shredded by a bullet.

Lead slugs were coming back now; Baxter could hear their hum of death. He flattened out on the ground, aimed carefully at a figure in the car. His revolver kicked and roared, and a man in the car yelled.

A gun crashed somewhere behind him and a bullet smacked the ground near his head. He rolled over and over, wildly, until his eyes were aligned with the house. Silhouetted against crackling flames from a kitchen window were Steward and the girl.

She was kicking and screaming so much that Steward couldn’t aim at Baxter. But Baxter couldn’t shoot Steward, either, without endangering Joan.

A guard’s machine-gun began pounding out its song of death. Baxter, turning his head, could see Steward’s three surviving partners in a shaft of light, helpless. The machine-gunner found his range, and they all folded into inert heaps.

Baxter got up, ran toward Steward and Joan. Steward flung the girl aside and fired.

Lead tore into Baxter’s thigh, stopped him short. He flopped forward, his cheek grinding into cool sod. Pain burned through him, but he lifted his revolver.

Steward, driven completely mad, was running toward the blazing house when Baxter saved him for the State with a bullet. Steward’s revolver left his hand and fell ten feet away.

A search-light stabbed the dark lawn, finally picked out Baxter. The girl ran to him with a little sob and bent over him.

“Oh, I’m so glad you aren’t dead,” she murmured. “Stopping those men was the most courageous thing I ever saw. I... I’ll have my father take up your case with the State Board of Pardons.”

Baxter tried to grin. “Unnecessary, Miss Dodge. I’m not a convict at all, just a State investigator.”

“Oh!” Then the girl’s full lips drooped, and Baxter knew she was thinking of her father.

“Is... is my father dead?” she cried suddenly.

“Don’t worry,” said a calm voice behind her. “I’m here, wounded a little but all right otherwise.”

Warden Dodge, looking dignified despite the support of two guards, stepped into the light. “No. 7544,” he said coldly, “you have some explaining to do.”

“He’s not a convict, Father,” the girl broke in.

“Nonsense,” Dodge snapped.

Baxter tried to get up, but pain held him.

“He saved me,” protested the girl.

“Call the governor,” said Baxter. “He’ll tell you my job here is done, if you say your deputy was wounded or killed for trying to help the cons crush out.”

“Deputy Warden Gardner?” said the warden incredulously. “You’re out of your mind!” He turned to a third guard, who stood at one side. “Get some men and stretchers out here. And bring Gardner.”

“I don’t think he’ll come,” said Baxter. “I brought him down.”

“What! You shot him?”

Baxter nodded shakily. “I recognized his gait and shape when he ran toward a watch tower after shooting a guard who had a machine-gun. But I’d have shot anybody for that.”

Dodge shook his head.

“All right, don’t believe me,” said Baxter. “But I’ll give you the facts.” Briefly, then, he told about the unwarranted slugging of Steward by Gardner; about the loaded revolvers and McCall’s job of changing cartridges.

“McCall,” he added, “couldn’t have been Steward’s inside man because I’m still alive. He couldn’t have risked letting me live to say he didn’t follow orders.”

“Do you know what you’re saying?” demanded Dodge.

“Yes. I got suspicious of Gardner when I figured he probably slugged Steward to cover his friendly connections with him. And I was pretty sure of it when Steward, after cussing about him, tried to talk me out of beating him up. Maybe Steward thought I’d kill Gardner — something that might have wrecked the whole scheme.”

Half a dozen guards came. When they laid down their stretchers, McCall’s bony face appeared. There was a purple bruise on his jaw, with a red cut running away from it.

“All accounted for, Warden,” McCall reported, his voice slightly blurred. “We’ll take you two to the hospital now.”

“Did you send a letter to the governor?” Baxter asked.

“I phoned him last night Why?”

Baxter looked at Dodge. “That’s something we can easily check. It’s going to prove McCall wasn’t worried about getting involved in an investigation.”