Manhunt. Volume 2, Number 10, December, 1954

The color drained from Tony’s face. Rage showed in the white line around his lips, but he couldn’t renege. He was stuck with it. Welshers didn’t last long in the neighborhood.

When he wrote up the result of the 7th at Jamaica a moment later, Joe saw that his hand shook, especially when he wrote $20.20 for the place on Miss X.

Tony paid Joe $4,040, but his eyes were mean slits.

“You wouldn’t be pullin’ a fast one, would you, Pal?” he said.

“Naw,” Joe said. “I wouldn’t even know which end of a horse eats. You remember who picked Arab Dancer for me, dontcha?”

“Yeah,” Tony said. “Yeah!”

“Well,” Joe said. “See you around, pal.”

He walked out of Tony’s and headed east. He knew where Tony’s apartment was, and he knew about the drug store on the corner. You could see the apartment house entrance from there. He hurried there and waited by the telephone booth.

He didn’t have long to wait before Tony’s flashy convertible slammed to the curb in front of the apartment, and Tony erupted from it. He raced up the stone steps, and flung the door back with a loud crash as he entered the building.

Joe dropped a coin in the telephone slot, and dialed the police. When he got his connection, he asked for the riot detail.

“Yeah?”

“A dame’s getting the hell beat out of her,” Joe said. He gave the address and the apartment number. “Better hurry.”

He hung up, looked at his dollar watch, and grinned. He’d go pay Lew the six C’s. Then he’d pick Carmen up at the police station. He could afford her now.

She’d be marked up some, but hell, that wouldn’t hurt nothing.

The Hero by Floyd Mahannah

Mel had been framed once, and now he was out of jail. But somebody was trying to frame him again...

1

I drove the stolen Ford back into Santa Caralita; and when I came to an outdoor phone booth in a service station that was closed for the night, I stopped and called Julie.

There was the chance, of course, that the police had tapped Julie’s phone; but it was a chance I had to take. And after forty-eight hours without food or sleep, I was too tired to care much one way or the other. I knew this last, forlorn scheme of mine had less than a prayer of working, but you have to play out your hand.

“Hello?” It was Julie’s voice.

“It’s Mel.”

I could hear the sharp intake of her breath, then the break in her voice: “Mel — where are you?”

“No matter. Julie, I want you to do something for me.”

“Mel, you’ve got to give yourself up. They’re hunting you — with guns — I’ve been so scared.” She sounded close to tears. “Mel, why did you do it?”

“I didn’t kill Vince Dobleen. You’ve got to believe that.”

“Then who—”

“I don’t know who. There’s a chance, a very long chance, that I can find out. If you’ll help me.”

“I’ll do anything for you, Mel.”

“I want you to get in your car, drive out Twelfth Street to the park, make the loop around the lake, then go straight back to your apartment. That’s all there is to it.”

“But how will that help you?”

“No time to explain. Just do exactly what I said. Start in twenty minutes.”

“All right.” Tears were in her voice now. “Mel—”

“Yes?”

“I love you. Please take care of yourself.”

“Sure, kid.”

I waited until I heard her hang up, I jiggled the hook like I’d hung up too, then I waited, listening. After a while there was a click, but I don’t know enough about wire tapping to tell if it meant anything or not. I hung up.

I sat there a little longer, very tired, not thinking of anything but Julie now. I remembered how the dark hair framed her face — her face with its clear, unmarked quality that made her seem so young. It was a dark-eyed, full lipped, snub-nosed face that was on the edge of being plain, until she smiled. When she smiled, she was beautiful — it was as if somewhere in her a light started to shine, and the warmth and happiness of it came from her to you.

And she loved me. I think that’s all that kept me from going crazy those two long years in prison. And it was all that kept me from running away now.

I drove the Ford to within a block of the park, left it beside a big apartment house where it wouldn’t attract attention, then I walked the rest of the way to the park. At the entrance was a four-way boulevard stop, and a big overhead light. It was late at night, with very little traffic — none at all right now. I crossed the street and slipped into the shelter of the thick shrubbery and eucalyptus trees.

Fog drifted thinly past on a cold breeze setting in from the ocean. The surf was a faint, faraway boom not as loud as the brittle sound of the breeze in the eucalyptus leaves. The fog condensed on the leaves, and the cold drops fell on the back of my neck.

For the time, there was nothing to do but wait. Wait, and remember back to last Sunday and the picnic with Julie. It was the third day after my release from prison...