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    The Face Behind the Mask: Race Williams #6 (Black Mask)
    The Face Behind the Mask: Race Williams #6 (Black Mask)
    The Face Behind the Mask: Race Williams #6 (Black Mask)
    Ebook59 pages59 minutes

    The Face Behind the Mask: Race Williams #6 (Black Mask)

    By Carroll John Daly

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    About this ebook

    Class was stamped on every contour of her body, but the faint wisp of fear clung to her person. Gladys Pervins was a woman who had slipped on the path and was paying the price. Her husband, a reclusive yet extremely jealous scientist who spends his nights alone in the laboratory, gave her nothing in the way of marital bliss. So, when an attractive, young man named Bertie enters her life, she cannot help but to give in to one forbidden kiss, destined to be forgotten after the sun rises. But, the flash of the camera is forever! Now, as Mrs. Pervins is being blackmailed by an unknown culprit with a picture of her fateful kiss, she is destined to relive her star-crossed kiss night after night. So, she hires Race Williams, Confidential Agent, to solve the case and save her from the wrath of her jealous husband. And although Race has the skills to solve any case set on his desk, one picture may soon spin into a collage of conspiracy! Story #6 in the Race Williams series.

    Carroll John Daly (1889–1958) was the creator of the first hard-boiled private eye story, predating Dashiell Hammett's first Continental Op story by several months. Daly's classic character, Race Williams, was one of the most popular fiction characters of the pulps, and the direct inspiration for Mickey Spillane's Mike Hammer.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBlack Mask
    Release dateNov 12, 2017
    ISBN9788827516201
    The Face Behind the Mask: Race Williams #6 (Black Mask)

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      Book preview

      The Face Behind the Mask - Carroll John Daly

      The Face Behind the Mask

      Race Williams book #6

      A Black Mask Classic

      by

      Carroll John Daly

      Black Mask

      Copyright Information

      © 2017 Steeger Properties, LLC. Published by arrangement with Steeger Properties, LLC, agent for the Estate of Carroll John Daly.

      Publication History:

      The Face Behind the Mask originally appeared in the February 1925 issue of Black Mask magazine.

      No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, without permission in writing from the publisher.

      Race Williams is a trademark of the Estate of Carroll John Daly. Black Mask is a trademark of Steeger Properties, LLC, and registered with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

      The Face Behind the Mask

      Chapter 1

      It was a night to be indoors; the wind howled and screeched through the trees without, and the storm-driven rain beat in great gusts across the roof of my little cabin at the foot of the hills. It isn’t a place for business, I’ll admit—too far from the city and too lonely for that, but I use it often in the summer and early fall, for the fishing at the lake is the best in the county. Besides, a two hours’ drive does the trick and puts me back in the rush and the tumult of things.

      But this time I was there upon the urgent request of a mysterious telephone message—the soft, trembling voice of a cultured woman. There was fear behind it too, and a touch of hysteria—the anxious plea to see me alone and far from prying eyes. Strange, that? Not exactly, most of my clients come to me in fear—few, until the dread of some unknown menace has eaten into their very souls and driven them to me in desperation.

      It was a professional call, so I straightened things up a bit in that long, one-roomed cabin—a touch of business here and there to inspire confidence. Over the blazing logs of the fire, I hung my sign. Its gilt letters stood out grotesquely in the flickering, dancing fire. It reads just a bit different now:

      Race Williams

      Confidential Agent

      That strikes me better, and gets away from the hint that I’m nothing more than a private dick. Them birds and me have nothing in common and that ain’t maybe.

      Perhaps the most crying need that put me in my unique position as halfway house between the cops and the crooks is the astounding number of blackmail cases that take place in our big city. There are in the city today men holding responsible positions—politicians, university professors, eminent doctors, distinguished lawyers, and even the clergy themselves periodically paying out hush money to the scum of both sexes. Indiscretions of youth, a thoughtless act, a foolish letter written in the passion of the moment—and even some falsely defamed. But one and all of these poor, deluded fools dread publicity, fear the glaring spotlight of notoriety. Once they begin to pay, it’s good-night; like eternity, the blackmailer goes on and on forever, or until his helpless dupe is sucked dry. Occasionally, a victim goes half mad with the mental agony of the thing and murders his persecutor, but most times it’s a bullet in his own head or a ten-story leap in the silent hours of the night.

      The cowardly blackmailer being legally, if not morally, within the law, is an evil that can’t be stamped out. The victim fears to face the music and go straight to the police—the police and the newspapers work too closely for that. As for the private detectives—well, they know a good thing when they see it, and most of them are not above shaking down a helpless client.

      One thing more. It’s not a half bad game, from my point of view. Nothing to worry about if it comes to gun-play with rats like that. I don’t think that I ever sent the soul of a blackmailer crashing the gates of hell with the slightest prick to my conscience. And that’s that.

      It’s a snug little cabin, with my windows so located that I can sit by the fire without a lad sticking a gun in and blowing me over the hurdles. Not that my little retreat is generally known, but there are a few of the Avenue boys with short terms and long memories who might feel inclined for a little lonely gun-play.

      A couple of times I go to the door and look out into the loneliness of the storm-swept darkness. There, thirty feet from my door, the lantern waves and flashes in the wind. The beacon light for someone in trouble, if you are sentimentally inclined. As for me—well, I need the jack and it’s figures that run through my mind as I look up and down the desolate stretch of road. Not a sound—not a light. I shrug my

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