The Black Bat Strikes Again by G. Wayman Jones

Book Details

The Black Bat Strikes Again – A Series of Mass Murders Sets Tony Quinn, Lightning-fast Foe of Crime, on the Trail of a Satanic Ring of Insurance Killers Who Make a Vast Profitable Business of Slaughter!

A midnight exhumation of a corpse leads to officers of the law being gunned down. That then leads to a trail of kidnapping victims being held for insurance death benefits. And that then leads to Tony Quinn setting aside his blind-man’s cane and donning the costume of the Black Bat.

The Black Bat Strikes Again (1939)
A Series of Mass Murders Sets Tony Quinn, the Lightning-Fast Nemesis of Crime, on the Trail of a Satanic Ring of Insurance Killers Who Make a Profitable Business of Slaughter! Follow the Black Bat as He Comes to Grips with the Most Vicious Gang of Criminals He Has Ever Encountered!
Chapter I – Graveyard Murder
Chapter II – Phantoms of the Night
Chapter III – Doubled in Death
Chapter IV – The Bat Moves In
Chapter V – Silk Meets Danger
Chapter VI – A Trap for the Bat
Chapter VII – Swing to Action
Chapter VIII – Ruse Against Ruse
Chapter IX – Brute Strength—and No Brains
Chapter X – Tony Quinn—At Home
Chapter XI – A Collector of Recordings
Chapter XII – Busy Bus Boy
Chapter XIII – A Nice Old Lady
Chapter XIV – To Save a Policeman
Chapter XV – The Truce
Chapter XVI – Secret of the Recordings
Chapter XVII – Silk Is Trapped
Chapter XVIII – Murder on the High Seas
Chapter XIX – The Chase Closes In
Chapter XX – All the Cards—Face Down
Chapter XXI – McGrath Names Himself

The Black Bat Strikes Again has 31 illustrations.

G. Wayman Jones was a “house name” for Better Publications. It was used by eight different writers including Norman A. Daniels (1905-1995) who wrote The Black Bat Strikes Again. Daniels was a cornerstone of pulp fiction and was the originator of The Black Bat series.

Files:

1. GWJones-TheBlackBatStrikesAgain.epub

Excerpt: The Black Bat Strikes Again

Chapter I

Graveyard Murder

A  CAR pulled up to the cemetery gates at ten minutes of one in the morning. Three men clambered out. All wore high boots and they proceeded to drag out several shovels and picks.

One of them stepped up to the cemetery gates, took a key from his pocket and opened them. Another rolled the car through. Then the gates were closed and locked. Slowly the car wended its way around the many turns of the cemetery road until the driver threw a spotlight on a serried rank of tombstones. But only briefly, for the moment he saw what he wanted, the light was doused.

Assistant District Attorney Lew Scott, one of the trio on some odd nocturnal mission, picked up a shovel and a pick.

He was an eager young man, ambitious, honest and well liked. He faced one of his companions, a man smaller and thinner than himself and much more nervous.

“For the last time,” he said softly, for the cemetery seemed to demand whispers, “you are sure? We’d be the laughing stock of the city if you happen to be wrong—and there might also be a nice little lawsuit in connection with this.”

Jim Fisher, the man addressed, licked his lips and loosened the collar around his throat. The third man joined them before Fisher could speak—Dawson, an assistant coroner, as young and alert as Scott.

Apparently, therefore, this grave-digging party was highly legal, even if stealthy.

“I’ve a signed exhumation order in my pocket so we can go right ahead,” Dawson said. “I’ll perform a rough autopsy on the spot, the moment the coffin is opened. The body has been interred only two days so that will be easy to do. All I need are samples of the hair, nails and the stomach lining. It won’t take more than fifteen minutes for my share of the job.”

Jim Fisher walked over to the car and sat down on the running board before he answered Scott’s question.

“I’m positive,” he stated with grim finality. “Ralph Galvin is dead—in that grave. The doctor claims he died of a chronic stomach ailment. I’ve been away, as I told you. As soon as I got back and found out what happened, I sensed that something was not right. Galvin never suffered from any stomach trouble. Why he used to boast of how strong his digestive organs were.”

LEW SCOTT nodded. “Yes, yes. You’ve told us that a dozen times. What I want to be certain of is that letter you got from Ralph Galvin. You destroyed it, remember. You have no written evidence.”

Fisher shrugged. “Ralph mentioned that he’d discovered there was an insurance policy on his life that he didn’t even know about. A policy to the tune of two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. In the first place Ralph couldn’t afford a policy as large as that.

“And he certainly would have had to undergo an examination to take out a sum of insurance so huge. I thought nothing of it until I returned and learned that Ralph had died—suddenly. I think that whoever insured him without his knowledge must have provided a substitute for the medical examination and then killed Ralph to collect.”

Assistant District Attorney Scott peeled off his coat and vest.

“Very well. It seems to me a clear-cut case and we have the right to go ahead. Perhaps I should have consulted the deceased’s family first, but if things, are as you indicate, Fisher, we’d only be throwing in our hand face down. Apparently someone in the family stands to collect and before we act against that person, we must be absolutely certain that Ralph Galvin did not die a natural death. Man the shovels, boys. We’ll exhume the body, give Dr. Dawson a chance to make an examination, then we’ll bury it again until his routine is finished. If you are right, Fisher, we’ll officially exhume it tomorrow for the second time.… Let’s get it over with.”

All three attacked the newly filled grave with vigor. It took them almost two hours of back-breaking work to expose the surface of the metal lid of the outer casket. District Attorney Scott hauled himself out of the grave, hurried over to where the car was parked and took a gasoline torch from the trunk. He lowered himself into the grave again, pumped air into the torch and lit a match to it.

Applying the flame to the sealed lid, he melted away the lead that made the outer casket air-tight. With chisels, the other two men carefully opened the copper box until finally they raised the lid out of the grave. Ropes went down next and Fisher passed them beneath the casket. Carefully they hauled it up until it was swung out and placed on solid ground.

Scott used a screw-driver to open the casket, lifted up the lid and exposed the body within. Fisher shuddered and turned away hurriedly.

Only Coroner Dawson was used to this kind of grisly work. He handled it as a matter of course. From a doctor’s kit he produced the necessary instruments. Snipping a lock of the dead man’s hair, he carefully placed it in an envelope and sealed it. Then he cut portions of the finger-nails and stored them in another envelope for examination later.

A wind had sprung up as they worked. Dr. Dawson put the envelope containing the lock of hair on the ground. It was lifted by the wind and carried off a dozen feet. Scott scampered after it. He caught it as it fluttered down on another grave. He pulled a broken flower pot out of the ground and thrust the envelope inside it. To further insure its safety, he turned the clay flower pot upside down. “That will hold it until we’re ready to go,” he said. “Now Doctor, while you perform the actual surgery, I think I’d like to talk to Fisher again.”

DAWSON nodded and selected his instruments. He began working deftly. Near the car Jim Fisher was trembling despite himself.

“I’m not a coward,” he defended himself, “but this business is nerve-racking. Wouldn’t be so bad if I didn’t know the man, but Ralph and I— Well, we’d been pals since we were in the first grade. I tell you he didn’t die a natural death! If it had been an accident—or pneumonia—or an infectious disease, I wouldn’t have questioned it. But chronic stomach trouble! Good heavens, that’s impossible!”

Assistant District Attorney Scott drew the collar of his suit coat around his throat. It lacked only about two hours of dawn and the night had become chilly and raw.

“I know,” he told Fisher softly. “That’s why I fixed up this secret exhumation. If we’re wrong, no harm has been done. If you are guessing right—we’ve got a nice murder case right in our laps. I haven’t told anyone what we intended to do. Neither has Dawson, and I know you have not. From a study of the symptoms that Ralph Galvin betrayed, Dawson has already judged that he may have died of arsenical poisoning. Victims of that drug act as if suffering from chronic stomach ailments, especially if the poison is administered over a period of time—as is usually the case in insurance murders. Those samples the doc is taking will tell the story one way or another. I … Fisher, listen! Did you hear something?”

Fisher nodded. “Yes. Sounded like someone prowling around those bushes north of here.”

“Doc!” Scott called softly. “Hey, Doc—come over here.”

Dr. Dawson ambled over and grinned broadly when Scott voiced the belief that they were being observed.

“Nonsense. Your nerves are jittery. It’s the atmosphere that’s got you. Who in the world would be prowling around a cemetery this hour of the morning except a trio of ghouls—like us?”

He laughed at their discomfiture and headed back toward the open grave. Suddenly he clapped a hand to his chest. A low, strangled groan came from his lips. He reeled a step or two, carried more by his momentum than his muscles. He half turned around, as if to beg aid. Then he crumpled and fell heavily.

Assistant District Attorney Scott leaped from the running board of the car where he had been seated and sprang toward the fallen doctor. Fisher, eyes bulging in horror, saw Scott stop dead and slowly, like the work of a slow motion camera, fold up and topple to the ground ten feet from where Dr. Dawson lay.

Fisher gave voice to a wild, shrieking yell. There had been no sound, yet both these men had dropped as though a silent specter had snatched away their lives. Fisher raced over graves, vaulted a tombstone and tripped over a projecting pot of flowers. He scrambled up with a choked sob and raced on. Something smacked into the ground near his feet and lent impetus to his flight. Then he felt something else hit him between the shoulder blades. A searing, agonizing pain gripped his whole body. He staggered another dozen steps before he collapsed. Vainly he tried to pull himself erect, clawing at the edge of a stone for support. He turned his head to look back.

Excerpt From: G. Wayman Jones. “The Black Bat Strikes Again.”