Legion of the Living Dead by Brant House

Book Details

Legion of the Living Dead – From nowhere hurtled that black death car. And from nowhere came its grisly occupants. They were not of the earth, for their human flesh was immune to bullets. They were not of the grave, for they manned the wheel and a blasting machine gun…

Secret Agent “X” made a desperate maneuver to block their invasion of the land of the living. And in that weird terror trap, he came face to face with a man he knew—a man he knew had died five years ago.

A Complete Book-Length Novel Based on the Records of Secret Agent “X”

Chapter I – Hell On Wheels
Chapter II – Green Eyes
Chapter III – Torture
Chapter IV – Framed
Chapter V – The Dummy
Chapter VI – Krausman’s Secret
Chapter VII – Alias, The Corpse
Chapter VIII – Night Attack
Chapter IX – Shadow Of The Shroud
Chapter X – Beneath The Shroud
Chapter XI – The Bargain
Chapter XII – Battle Of The Titans

Brant House was a “house name” of Periodical House, Inc., the publishers of the Secret Agent “X” magazine. There are four recognized authors that used the pseudonym Brant House. The author of Legion of the Living Dead was Paul Chadwick (1902–1972), the originator of the character Secret Agent “X,” the man of a thousand faces.

Secret Agent “X” is a master of disguise and his true identity is never revealed. He adopts several different identities in each story. What we do know about “X” is that he served in the War (World War I) in intelligence and was wounded from which he got an X shaped scar. He is a dedicated crime-fighter working undercover for the U.S. government, although this is unknown to local police who consider him an outlaw. His true role is known only to newspaper reporter Betty Dale and his mysterious Washington controller, K-9.

Legion of the Living Dead was published in the September, 1935 issue of Secret Agent “X”.

Legion of the Living Dead has 6 illustrations.

Files:

1. House-LegionOfLivingDead.epub

Excerpt: Legion of the Living Dead

Chapter I

Hell On Wheels

IT was an afternoon in late spring and from a cloudless sky, the sun beat shimmering rays on the stream of motor cars that flowed sluggishly along the narrow canyon between the rows of tall buildings. Along the sidewalks, men and women, many of them richly attired, hurried about their business and pleasure. It was a street of wealth, a main stem of American finance.

But the men and women in the street seemed oblivious to the criminal monster who preyed like a vampire upon this veritable artery of wealth. Had they noticed the faces of the men in the great black touring car that cruised along slowly with the traffic, they might have lost some of their sense of security. For these men were grim-faced police—one of many specially picked squadrons that had been patrolling the streets day and night, waiting for the radio call to duty—and probably to their own destruction.

The man at the wheel of the squad car was young for a position that involved so much responsibility. His face told of many anxious moments, of the torment of trying to fathom the unfathomable. He steered the car without apparent effort, yet his every nerve was keyed to a high pitch. His brilliant eyes strained ahead; yet sometimes sought the rear vision mirror, watching for that with which human forces seemed powerless to cope.

Suddenly, from the radio speaker came the voice of the police announcer. At the first word, the driver of the squad car detected a different note in the man’s voice. The drab monotone was gone; rather the announcer’s voice was colored with a tremor of excitement and dread. He was exercising his duty in transmitting the message that had come to him, but he seemed to know that in doing so he was sending some of his companions to their doom.

“Special cruiser twenty-four… Calling special cruiser twenty-four,” came from the loudspeaker. “Proceed at once to the Krausman store. Robbery going on. Robbery going on at Krausman store… Number one-three… Number one-three.”

The last group of figures was simply a code which the department used to identify the activities of a mysterious criminal gang which had terrorized the city with daring thefts accompanied by what amounted to nothing short of wholesale butchery.

As the driver of the squad car set his siren going, another very human appeal came from the radio loud-speaker. For a moment, the vast police organization was forgotten. It was simply one anxious father speaking to his son: “For the love of God, watch your step, Jimmy!”

The jaw of the young man at the wheel of the squad car was thrust far forward, as his foot came down heavily upon the accelerator. The police announcer was an elderly man who had been pronounced unfit for active service. It was his son who manned the wheel of Special Cruiser Twenty-four. Duty had made heavy demands upon father and son. The anxiety of the father could well be imagined. He might just as well have pronounced his own son’s death sentence.

A wide lane in the traffic appeared miraculously before the speeding, screaming squad car. The police sat on the edge of the cushions. Their knuckles whitened as they clenched the butts of heavy revolvers. Now and again one of the men would send a strained glance back through the rear window.

Suddenly, the man beside the young driver pinched his companion’s arm.

“It’s coming!” His voice was hard and brittle, strained to the breaking point. The driver’s lower jaw protruded a bit more. He uttered a heartening oath through clenched teeth. His eyes flashed upward toward the rear vision mirror. The stretch of cleared street behind them was broken by a sinister blot of speeding destruction. A long-nosed streamlined roadster, black as midnight was rapidly overhauling them.

THE police car was still three blocks from the scene of the robbery and the car behind them seemed to have no speed limit. Nor did the driver of the black roadster have any compassion for human life. The police cruiser swerved sharply to avoid hitting a careless pedestrian. A split second later, the black roadster bore down upon the frightened man. The pedestrian became panic stricken, put out both arms in a ridiculously futile effort to halt the speeding car, and in the next moment was knocked flat—a piteous blot that lay deathly still on the pavement.

The roadster was within a few feet of the squad car. Through the rear window, the police could see the two men crouched low and motionless in the cockpit. With a dexterous yank on the wheel, the driver of the police car sent the cruiser far to the left, trying to block off the black speed demon. But the driver of the roadster was a match for any man. As the police car swerved to the left, the roadster swung to the right. With a sudden almost unbelievable burst of speed, the roadster pulled alongside. The ugly black snout of a machine gun protruded over the door of the racer.

“Let ’em have it!” shouted a policeman. He leaned out so far that he almost touched the black destroyer. His revolver blasted at the noxious face of the man at the wheel. At such short range he couldn’t have missed.

The staccato voice of the machine gun shattered the roar of the two overtaxed motors. Leaden hell raked the police cruiser from stem to stern. One policeman, who had been daringly balanced far out over the door of the car, pitched over the side and beneath the grinding wheels of the black juggernaut. The young driver jerked suddenly upright. A slug had drilled his chest. His teeth ground together with a nerve-shattering sound that he never heard.

Excerpt From: Brant House. “Legion of the Living Dead.”