#CKM Scanlon

[driveintheaterofthemind]

Vintage Pulp - Thrilling Detective (Dec1937)

Better Publications

[pulpman2]

Fight Crime

“Fascists! I might have known!” snarled Katy and pulled an automatic from the front of her dress where the small handgun had been tucked uncomfortably in her bra. As one of her ostensible bodyguards busied himself with trying to silence her ringing endorsement of democratic values, the young woman let of a shot that saw a bullet drill its way through the brim of the started man’s hat. Katy then whirled, adrenaline fuelled female fury in her eyes. The federal agent, booked to make a speech at The Law Foundation to describe her work in bringing gangsters to justice as one of the few female investigators in the City Central police department, under the banner headline of Fight Crime, to see Eugene, her civilian assistant and part time sound engineer, fall back, a thug’s hand clapped over his mouth. The woman seized the microphone stand and swung it hard at the gunman’s head, connecting with a satisfying thud! She turned to face the other right wing insurgent as he dropped the severed cable and lunged at her. As her burly foe closed with her, the female agent kicked out with her elegant stockinged leg to clip the traitor neatly on his jaw. Like his friend, the man collapsed in a heap.

*

Katy, after having tied both thugs up, binding their hands behind their backs with electric cable, then took great pleasure in tying them together on the stage back to back, gagging the first assailant with her Fight Crime sash. “Fitting eh, Eugene?” she asked her woozy assistant as he checked the taped up wiring from the mike to his amplifier. “Yes, yes, Kate, but will you start talking already?” he ordered his boss impatiently. The dark haired agent composed herself, stood in front of the microphone and looked out at the shocked crowd. She suddenly departed from her script filled with homilies about goodies and baddies. Instead she locked eyes for an instant with as many of her audience, none of whom had arisen to rescue her while she and Eugene were being assaulted, as she could. “You know when freedom dies?” she intoned to the silent great and the good. “When decent people stay sat down and let the bullies, the racists and the woman haters do what they want. It’s on you.” Katy dropped the mike, letting it clatter loudly to the floor and strode magnificently from the stage, while an amazed Eugene and two infuriated, helpless and bound and gagged fascists gazed after her.

My interpretation of the story behind the cover to Men of Treason by CKM Scanlon, G-Men Detective (Fall 1943)

[pulpman2]

The Warning

Gina slowly and deliberately pulled her gun from out of her bag as the handle to the door to her darkened living room silently turned and the door edged open. Gina tucked herself behind, holding her breath, her mouth dry, her body tingling with fear and excitement as the adrenaline coursed through her. A male hand appeared, clutching a revolver. Gina immediately brought her gun down on the intruder’s wrist. He cried out with pain, his gun clattered to the floor and his arm withdrew. The woman wrenched the door open, snapped on the light and stood in the doorway, both hands pointing her weapon up the hallway, fully expecting it to be empty, but the blue suited housebreaker was standing there, clutching his wrist, looking guilty. “Don’t move!” the female PI said and advanced on the discomfited man, patting him down in search of additional weapons. “Who sent you?” she demanded. “Let me explain, Miss Kane,” the intruder replied, almost looking hurt, “you’ve got this all wrong.” Gina gazed at him hard. She had that before. “On your knees!” she ordered. “And put your hands behind your back!” The man wearily did as she instructed. Gina placed her gun on the hall table, pulled down a thin scarf from her cloak stand and knelt behind her prisoner and began to tie him up.

“I’m not even working on a case!’ the detective told the stranger as she bound him. “You must be a blast from the past!” To her surprise her captive gave a short laugh. “I didn’t come to harm or threaten you, Miss Kane,” he said, “I’ve been sent by a friend of yours. I came to warn you.”

My interpretation of the story behind the cover to The Brink of Death by CKM Scanlon, G-Men Detective magazine (Spring 1951, Volume 38, No 1)