The editor motioned to Gordon’s satchel with his chin. “That the story?”
“Yes, sir.” Gordon sat and put the bag on his lap.
“Where do you think it should go?”
“Sir, we uncovered a secret counterfeit ring that no one even knew existed. I spoke to Detective Wheeler. The HPD is already making investigations into the area banks to see just how far they’re infiltrated and how much money they stole. Along the way, this group killed at least three men, Peter Kingsbury, William Silber, and Victor Tompkins. There may be more. We don’t know. Only time and further investigation will tell. The story’s already on the radio, the other papers will have some information in their evening editions, but only the Post-Dispatch will have the exclusive. With my words and Lucy’s pictures, you are printing gold.” He paused and exhaled. “Where do I think it should go? Front page, above the fold. You’ll sell hundreds of copies tonight, sir. People’ll be buying these copies right off the trucks. You might even have to publish a special edition.”
Levitz pursed his lips, nodded noncommittally, and sighed. “You’re right, of course.” He indicated the photos strewn across his desk. “I’ve seen her pictures. They’re very good. I’ve got more than enough here to publish a photo essay. You know a picture is worth a thousand words. I can publish four of her pictures and none of your words.”
“Sir?” Gordon began.
“Miss Barnes, thank you for these wonderful images. We’ll certainly use them tonight and maybe tomorrow as well. And, as far as what we discussed, I agree. It’s a good idea.” He picked up a pack of Camels and lit one. “But if you’ll excuse us, the ace reporter and I have some things to discuss.”
Lucy stood and straightened her skirt. “Yes, sir. And thank you.” She offered Gordon a quick glance then left the office, closing the door behind her.
Levitz watched her go, then leveled his gaze on Gordon. He inhaled on his cigarette and watched his reporter through the haze. “They’re expecting me to yell at you, make a big scene, that kind of stuff. I know what y’all think of me. In fact, they’ve probably got their ears to the glass right now. But I’m not sure I’m going to do that. You know why?”
Gordon shook his head. He wanted a cigarette as well but feared moving an inch. All day long, he had braced himself for the tongue lashing he had expected. Levitz could go on a tirade with the best of them. Gordon had seen it, had been on the receiving end more than once, and could take it.
But this calm Levitz was something else entirely. This was a wild card.
“Because you did good work, Gordon. Damn good. All that stuff you said a minute ago? That’s the kind of passion I like—that I have—for this business. That was me twenty years ago as a cub reporter. That was me until I got promoted to this desk. Now, I’m stuck. I can’t go up, I can’t go down. I’m just here, and I have to live vicariously through all my reporters.”
He stubbed out the cigarette and lit another. “That’s why I like you so much. Johnny, too. Don’t roll your eyes. He’s good. You’re good. There are others, too, but y’all’re the best.” He leaned forward and jammed his forefinger on the desk. “But I can’t have reporters who think they can do whatever they damn well please and not let me in on the story.”
“But you would have said no.”
“I did say no,” Levitz blurted. “More than once I said no. And what did you do?”
Gordon shrugged. “I did what I thought was right because there was something there.”
Levitz pointed at Gordon. “Exactly. You have instincts. They pretty much got you in trouble this time. The only thing saving your bacon is the end story. Had this thing come to nothing, you’d be out of a job. Preston already talked to me. He wants you out no matter what. I went to bat for you and I earned you a reprieve.”
Gordon smiled. “Thank you, sir.”
“Don’t thank me yet. Not until you hear the end.” Levitz leaned back in his chair and put his feet on the desk. “This newsroom is a little like the military. I’m the captain and all the people here are my troops. If I assign a story to you, I expect you to do it. If I tell you not to, I expect you to comply.”
He waved at the door. “They’re expecting yelling because you disobeyed an order. If I just pat you on the back and congratulate you, what kind of message does that send to them all out there?”
Gordon remained mute because he knew the answer.
“It tells them they can do anything they damn well please. And I can’t run a newsroom that way and Mr. Preston can’t publish a newspaper that way.”
Levitz shifted and put his feet back on the floor. He motioned to Gordon. “Let me see what you wrote.”
Gordon opened his satchel and handed over both versions of the story. “The second is shorter in case you needed to discipline me by shunting the story off page one.”
“Oh, it’s going on page one, above the fold, just like you said.” Levitz discarded the shorter piece and flipped pages and read.
Gordon sat in uncomfortable silence.
“What about Kernow? You were so dead set on talking to him. Where is he in here?”
“Turns out, he and Dr. Dickson went to medical school together. Dr. Dickson prescribed some powerful drugs to keep Tompkins loopy, told the poor guy to go see Dr. Kernow. That's what got Tompkins on that corner on that day. Kernow's got a gambling habit. He's in hock pretty bad. In exchange for making the debt disappear, Kernow agreed to break into Victor's house and steal back the drugs.”
“Why isn't he in the piece?”
Gordon grinned. “No evidence of B and E, can't tie Kernow to the crime, didn't want to rile up our ombudsman again but”—he held up a finger—“Dickson paid Kernow with counterfeit. The good doc's still in hock.”
Levitz smirked and continued to read. More uncomfortable silence followed.
“This is good. Lots of details. The public will eat this up.” He tossed the papers on the desk. “But you need to be an example.”
The lump in Gordon’s throat got bigger. The butterflies in his stomach started dancing. He was getting fired. He just knew it.
Levitz said, “Go get Johnny.”
Gordon didn’t move. “Go get Johnny!”
Gordon rose and opened the door. Most of the folks suddenly looked very busy and tried to act as though they weren’t listening. He walked across the room. Johnny watched him the entire way. “Levitz wants to see you,” Gordon muttered. He turned and went back to the editor’s office. He didn’t care if Johnny was behind him or not.
Johnny came in behind Gordon. “Shut the door,” Levitz said. Johnny compiled and stood next to Gordon. “Johnny, Gordon’s wrote a spectacular piece on the counterfeiters. His story is going to be on page one.”
Opening his mouth to protest, Johnny was cut off by Levitz’s hand slicing the air. “But you get Gordon’s desk. And you get it because you followed orders.”
It was Gordon’s turn to protest. “Sir, how can you do that? Don’t you remember our little talk last month?”
Gordon had seen the steely flint of Levitz’s eyes before but the look he now gave could have cut through anything. “Open your mouth again and you won’t even have a desk.” He kept the room locked in tense silence for a few more moments. “Effective when y’all walk out that door, Johnny gets the window desk and Gordon, you get Schultz’s old desk.”
It took Gordon exactly one second before he put two and two together. “The society page? You want me on the society page?”
“Yes. No investigative reporting from you for two months, maybe more. You only get to write about the high-society folks.”
In the corner of his eye, Gordon caught Johnny smirking. He stifled the urge to slug the other reporter. Barely. But, Gordon realized, he had dug his own grave.
And that grave was on the front page of the Houston Post-Dispatch.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Part of the public humiliation was, of course, Gordon having to clean out his old desk and move to his new one while John
ny firmly ensconced himself at the window desk. Johnny’s little cadre of fellow reporters all glad-handed him, slapping him on the shoulders, and giving Gordon the stink eye. One of them—Gordon couldn’t be sure which—actually had the audacity to mutter “loser” in his direction.
Others, including Barbara Essary, Levitz’s secretary, offered condolences to Gordon. He grinned as best he could and reminded them all to look at the front page of the evening edition later that day.
The society desk was off in a small alcove. Simon Schultz had been a long-time fixture, having made knowing Houston’s social scene his driving passion. Few other reporters shared that passion. He had fulfilled that role for nearly thirty years, but time, alcohol, and lots of excessive living had led to a heart attack that didn’t kill him, but sidelined him. He had to leave the paper. In the interim, a rotating roster of reporters had covered Schultz’s beat but none lasted long. As he plopped his box of personal effects on the desk, Gordon Gardner vowed he wouldn’t be the permanent successor either.
Schultz’s desk—that’s what everyone still called it—sat opposite another desk. It had been years since anyone sat there, so large were Schultz’s needs. Effectively, Gordon now had two desks. He slumped down behind his box and looked at the newsroom. Most of his colleagues tried not to look at him.
Someone rounded a corner and sat at the opposite desk. “Hiya, Ace.”
Gordon looked up over his box. “Hey, Lucy.” He tried to give her a thousand-dollar grin. He only managed a ten-dollar one.
She nodded at him and ran her fingers along the perimeter of the other desk. “Tough break, huh? Being stuck way over here. It’s like newsroom purgatory.”
“At least we got the front page, huh?”
“You’re darn right we got the front page.” She folded her hands and leaned over the desk. “And you also got yourself a partner.”
He frowned. “What do you mean?”
She spread her hands. “You’re the society reporter, Ace, and words are only half the story on the society page. You need pictures. Maybe you need the pictures more than the words on the society page, but I don’t wanna bruise your ego any more than necessary.” She winked at him.
Gordon looked at her and marveled. Lucy was working on little sleep, just like him, yet she still looked fantastic. “Don’t worry about my ego. It’s pretty healthy. But what are you driving at?”
“I’m staying in town. Mr. Levitz offered me a job. I’m part of the main photographer group but I’m mainly assigned to the society page.” She wagged her finger. “We’re still partners. What do you think of that?”
Gordon’s ten-dollar grin just earned dividends. “Miss Barnes, I think that just might make this temporary demotion more than bearable. In fact”—he checked his watch—“why don’t we talk about it over dinner?”
“Gordon,” she said, “we’re working colleagues. We can’t date.” She reached down to the floor for her camera case. “But I’ll let you escort me back to the Clavell Club. You need to make it up to Mr. Clavell and I’d love to get some more shots. What do you say?”
Gordon Gardner stood and offered Lucy Barnes his arm. She stood, put one hand in the crook of his arm and picked up the camera case. Together, they strolled through the newsroom and towards the door. Giving in to the urge, Gordon steered them on a path that would lead him to his old window seat.
As he passed Johnny Flynn, Gordon leaned down and whispered, “Front page and I get the girl. Who’s the loser now?”
Introduction to “The Criminal Sleep”
One of the great aspects of historical research is locating original source material. When I was in graduate school at the University of North Texas, I wrote my thesis on the 14th Texas Infantry in the Civil War. Part of my research involved census research via microfilm. I found it utterly fascinating to see how folks in 1860 wrote and classified everyday life.
As interesting as microfilm research can be, it is still like looking through a window at a time long past. It doesn't beat the real thing. The 14th Texas Infantry fought in the Red River Campaign in April 1864. Back in 1994, I visited Louisiana State University, Shreveport, and was able to discover that the captain of Company A had written a journal, and they had it in their archives! To hold this small document, over a hundred years old, and realize the captain carried it with him into battle was humbling. And very exciting.
Imagine my surprise when something similar happened recently here in Houston. I am in the early stages of conducting research on the riots that hit Houston in 1917. It's a subject ripe for a novel and I aim to have one written by 2017. A first step is to read the newspapers of 1917.
Newspapers are a prime source of contemporary accounts of history. For all the historical information we know here in the 21st Century about a topic, to the people who lived in those years, those events were current events. The Houston Historical Society has a good number of old magazines and newspapers, all preserved in acid-free boxes.
Back in one of the storage rooms, there was an old box, a little dented along the edges. Imagine my surprise when I gazed upon the contents.
Inside were stacks of paper and carbons. Most of them were typewritten with numerous handwritten marks all over them. Some enterprising employee of the society had categorized them by date and title. The earliest piece was sitting on top of the stack. It was with trembling fingers that I took out and read the top sheet of paper.
It was a story written by Gordon Gardner. The date was February 18, 1939. The yellowed pages were slightly curled along the edges and some of the pencil marks had faded with age, but the type font was clearly legible.
I sat and read the tale, right there in the historical society’s research room. Gardner had written a basic private eye yarn, complete with nefarious bad guys and a spit-shined hero. I was quite entertained by it. On the last page, in his own hand, Gardner had written “Submitted to Detective Fiction Weekly.” Next to that, the word “Rejected” appeared. Underneath, he had written, “Submitted to Detective Book Magazine” with the word “Rejected” alongside it. Thus it continued to the bottom of the page.
An entry dated May 7, 1940, caught my eye. The story’s title was “The Nazi Menace.” Instead of a submission notice, however, next to this entry were the words “Confiscated by E. Donnelly, U.S. Army.”
The next story on the list was “The Criminal Sleep.” On the title page of this tale, Gardner had written possible titles, most of which he had crossed out. An interesting note accompanied this story. It seems that he knew a couple of detectives from the Houston Police Department, Chet Tinsley and Sam Baker. He promised them that he’d use their names in a pulp story. Turns out, this was the one.
As before, the last page lists all the magazines to which Gardner had submitted this story. All the big-name magazines passed. A small outfit, Sensational Detective Monthly, accepted the story. The byline was by a pen name Gardner used to hide his true journalist identity. A few months later, however, before magazine went to press with Mr. Gardner’s story, the magazine folded and all the stories therein were lost to time.
I think it a good thing to present Gordon Gardner’s lost story here with The Phantom Automobiles. They belong together, and they belong under Mr. Gardner’s name.
So, for the first time in seventy-five years, Quadrant Fiction Studio proudly presents “The Criminal Sleep” by Gordon Gardner.
Chapter I
At the moment the bank alarm sounded, big, burly Chet Martin was giving a leggy blonde the once over. She turned at the sound but he didn't. She caught him staring at her figure and flashed a steely glare. He offered a lopsided grin and angled his own gaze to the bank.
The bells inside the structure clanged mercilessly. Pedestrians outside put hands to ears to soften the tintinnabulation. Chet didn't bother. He focused on the door. He expected a gang of thieves to burst out at any moment. What he saw confused him.
A scrawny man, his clothes draped across his frame, emerged from the bank. In
one hand, he held a canvas bag full of money. In the other was a gun. His face was sunken and hadn't seen a razor in at least a week. The hat was too large for his head. His semi-toothless grin shone dully in the sun. No smile entered his eyes. They looked distant and not a little scared.
The man laughed, a guttural thing, and shouted, “There ain't none of y'all can catch me.” With that, he waved the gun in the air, uttered a “Yee haw,” and galloped away.
“I'm gonna catch you,” muttered Chet Martin. He pulled the brim of his fedora lower on his forehead and set off in pursuit. The leather soles of his shoes thwaped the pavement loud enough that pedestrians moved aside at the sound. The cut of his suit coat, big enough to contain his muscles when at rest, strained under the burden of continued pursuit.
Chet rounded the corner of the next block and expected to see the suspect fleeing. He saw that, but he also saw something else. The robber was running towards a car. As Chet continued the pursuit, a man exited the vehicle. He was tall, with a prominent jawline, and wore a dark blue suit with a dark hat shadowing his eyes.
The fleeing man slowed and gave the satchel to the blue-suited man. Chet closed the distance running full steam. He was close enough to see the blue-suited man’s smile. He said something to the thief who immediately turned and ran away from the car.
The blue-suited man jumped back inside the car and it was moving even before the door was closed. With the peel of rubber on cement, the car varoomed down the street. Chet knew he had no chance to catch it.
But he could catch the skinny bank robber. Chet changed his angle and set off in pursuit. Despite his bulk, the big police detective was a fluid runner, the muscles in his legs effortlessly speeded him to his quarry. Up ahead, the street was alive with speeding cars, buses, and the streetcars.
Chet smiled as he continued to run. The crook was trapped.
The bank robber turned around while running and fancy if he didn’t have a grin on his mug as well. “You can’t catch me, flatfoot. The cars, they’re all ghosts, and I can run right through them.”
The Phantom Automobiles: A Gordon Gardner Investigation Page 11
