The Robert Lowndes edited pulps were well down the publishing
food chain but he was always able to manage some quality on a
shoe string budget. I've purchased a few copies recently of
"Famous Detective Stories" from the early 1950s.
The most recent (via eBay) was the February 1952 issue.
All but one of the eight writers were unknown to me and I
suspect most if not all were house names for Columbia
Publications.
The one known byline made up for the others as the "Feature
Novel" in the issue is by Hunt Collins, one of Evan Hunter's
many pennames. The story (and at about 15,000 words it is
hardly a novel) is "Dead Freight" and it is the cover story
of the issue. I would not at all be surprised to learn that
the nifty cover art came first and Hunter wrote the story to
fit the illustration as was fairly common in the pulps.
It is a first person private eye story featuring Guthrie Lamb
who carries a
.45 in a shoulder holster and drives around New York City in
a 1942 Ford with 1948 engine. He likes to drink milk. "I
always keep three or four bottles in the office. Some guys I
know keep rye instead. Milk is cheaper, and I see straighter
when I'm not drinking rye. Not that I'm a teetotaler; far
from it. I just think alcohol and guns don't mix well." He
says he once smashed a man with the butt of his gun because
he made fun of a grown man drinking milk.
Lamb is hired by a mortician to find a corpse in a coffin
that was stolen from his funeral home. The dead man was
killed by a hit and run driver and the mortician was quite
proud of his work. But now the family wants its money back.
There is a good description of the undertaker: "His eyes were
sad, brown and deep, like two cavernous pockets of sorrow dug
into his face."
The story is not an undiscovered masterpiece but I enjoyed
it. The concept was a good one and there are some good turns
of phrase. Guthrie Lamb was a series character because this
issue carries a plug for the next in the series
"The Body Beautiful" set to appear in the May 1952
issue.
I do not have an index that covers the pulps. If anyone has
(or if they have a Hunter bibliography) I am curious if there
were stories published in this series.
Richard Moore
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