The Devil’s Horns

CHAPTER II Crooks vs. Crooks

Oliver Groman, for forty years the real boss of Ashton City, was a lion grown old and infirm, but he was still indomitable.

About sixty-five years old, he was a big man in spite of the stoop of years. His iron-gray hair was a mane on his big head. His seamed face was squarish and rugged. It made a mock of the invalid’s dressing gown he wore, as he sat behind his big square desk while The Avenger walked toward him with crisp, quick steps.

Groman made his home in the first two floors of his palatial apartment building. It gave him about twenty-five rooms, which were made into guests’ suites, and suites for himself and his son and daughter.

Only the rooms for the family were in use now.

The old lion was infirm indeed. His big left hand trembled incessantly, and it had to be lifted with his right when he wanted to move it. The left side of his face had a peculiar droop. The left eye was staring and dull.

Groman had had a stroke, a while ago, that paralyzed his left side. Benson had heard about that. But, just the same, the man was up, seated at his desk, smoking a black cigar which he clamped in the right corner of his thin-lipped mouth.

His gaze took in Benson’s dead, white face and the colorless, icy eyes; No man could look at The Avenger without a great deal of respect, and respect showed in the old lion’s face now.

“You are Benson?”

“Yes!”

Benson sat down. Even seated he was dynamic, seemed ready to explode into instant action.

“I can see how you have earned your reputation,” Groman said, left side of his mouth drooping and slurring the words. “And it is because of your reputation, of course, that I begged you to come here, asking you to come late at night so that no one would see you or know of your arrival.”

“It seems someone knew. And I was seen,” Benson said calmly.

“Those shots, then—”

“My visit to you wasn’t liked by somebody.”

Groman’s face convulsed with anger and perplexity.

“But how could anyone know of your coming? I told only my son and daughter of my decision to call you here.”

Benson said nothing. The gray steel figure never wasted words. He listened.

“My letter,” Groman said, “told most of the story. But I’ll clear it up in detail now.”

His big right hand clenched. The left hand was a flaccid lump on his desk, resting near a curious little inkwell in the shape of a buffalo’s head, in silver.

“As you probably know, Mr. Benson,” Groman went on, “I’ve been the boss of Ashton City for a long time. For forty years, to be exact. I was a very young man when I branched into the contracting business, and from that to politics.

“I’ve ruled this town, and I’ve ruled the hyenas who live off it. A lot of hard things are said about me by the average citizen, and I guess most of them are deserved. I’ve taken my share of the taxpayers’ money. I’ve lost most of it, but that isn’t what matters. I’ve been the leader of the hyenas, and I’ve shared their loot, but there are sides to the picture that few know about.

“As a practical politician, I had to shut my eyes to a lot that even I didn’t feel like stomaching. But quite a few times I’ve stepped in and made the chiseling just a little less outrageous than it might othewise have been. There have been some things I wouldn’t tolerate. I say this just to show that my present attitude is not a complete reversal of my career — that I’ve had it in the back of my mind for a long time.”

The Avenger’s eyes were colorless diamond drills. But he kept his silence.

“I’m old, and sick,” said Groman. “The driver’s seat isn’t mine any more. I’m out of it. And now is a good time to do what I’ve had a mind to try for a long while. That is, to clean up Ashton City.”

The cigar clamped harder in the thin old lips.

“I’ve reformed, if you want to put it that way. Never liked the word much, myself. I want the crooks run out of my city, and the rats driven from the seats of power. I’ll help all I can, even if the men I want eliminated are men I once worked with.” His eyes flashed. “Hell, they’re after me, now, so I might as well turn them up by the toes.”

Benson spoke out of a profound knowledge of men and things.

“People seldom reform,” he said, lips barely moving in his white, dead face.

Groman’s one-sided smile appeared.

“Hawley!” he called.

In a moment the side door of the big room Groman had fitted as an office opened. A young man with sleek brown hair and mild brown eyes and a submissive, patient face, appeared.

“My secretary, Hawley, Mr. Benson,” Groman said.

Benson nodded. Groman ordered:

“Ask Miss Groman and Mr. Ted to come here, please.”

The secretary withdrew and in another moment a girl came through the hall door. She was about twenty-two, slim and lovely, with violet eyes and dark-brown hair. She looked questioningly at Groman with eyes holding a very curious expression.

“My daughter, Terry, short for Theresa,” Groman said. “This is Mr. Benson, my dear. You know about him.”

She gave Benson a slim hand. And the door opened again to admit a dark, tall, narrow-faced man of thirty with something of Groman in the set of his jaw.

“My son, Theodore,” said Groman to Benson. Then he looked at the two with a softening of his hard old eyes.

“That’s all, you two. Just wanted you to meet a man the like of which you’ll never meet again.”

The two murmured polite exchanges and went out. Groman waved his right hand to Benson.

“There are two of my reasons for wanting to end my career differently than I’ve lived it. Terry’s a fine girl just out of the best finishing school in the country. Ted’s a lad who’ll make his mark as a lawyer — has already started to make it. For the sake of those two I don’t want to die a crook even though I’ve lived somewhat like one.

“There are other reasons. Call them contemptible, if you like. You can say I’ve got enough loot to live my life out, so I don’t have to loot anymore and can afford to be honest now. You can say that as long as I’m no longer a leader in Ashton City, I’m making no sacrifice by wanting to clean up the town. Take it any way you like, the result is that rare thing, a man who really wants to reform.”

Benson’s pale, icy eyes dwelt on the shaggy, iron-gray mane of the aged and infirm lion.

“It’s a good job — that of cleaning up a whole town,” Groman said persuasively. “I know quite a little about you — the things you like to do, and why you like to do them. I know about your wife and child”—Benson’s eyes blazed brighter, then dulled again—“and I know that you’ve devoted your life since your personal tragedy to fighting crime. Well, here’s a chance to fight it on a grand scale. There are a quarter of a million people in Ashton City. They’d all be eternally grateful, even if they never knew just who had turned their town from a crooks’ nest into a decent, clean place to live in.”

Still Benson was silent.

“Fortunately you’re a rich man,” Groman said. “I say fortunately, because I couldn’t afford to hire a man of your ability if you didn’t fight crime for idealistic reasons.”

“You couldn’t afford it?” The Avenger repeated, pale eyes steady on the old lion’s mane.

“No! I’ve taken a few million out of this town — about a tenth as much as the public thinks — but I’m a sucker in another man’s game, just as all the other smart guys are. Lost most of it in stocks. I own this building, worth half a million — if a buyer could be found for it. And I have a couple of hundred thousand dollars in bonds. That’s all— Well, will you take the job?”

“Yes!” said Benson.

Groman leaned back with a deep sigh.

“That’s fine. But it’s a whale of a job. Ashton City, under a lax police department, has become the national hang-out of notorious killers and crooks. They’re in a solid group, under Buddy Wilson, public enemy number two, with the crooked big shots you’ll be against. They’ll fight, too.”

“Rackets?” said Benson.

“The town is riddled with them,” admitted Groman. “Right now, the trucking racket is the most active. Half a dozen men have been taken for rides. Even a judge, named Martineau, was killed two weeks ago because he was too honest. The lid was kicked off when that happened. But so far no arrests have been made, and I think there will continue to be no arrests. Police Commissioner Cattridge is an honest man, but he is helpless with all the dishonesty at city hall and right around him in his own department. Most of the police force are honest. But they’re hamstrung by a few in high places, too.”

Dick Benson nodded, but he had something else in his mind.

The Avenger was a man able to see at a glance what others might take a day to really observe. Having seen, he could make deductions that most could never have arrived at, at all. Those colorless, awe-inspiring eyes had been very busy since he’d arrived here.

“I have seen three servants who looked very much like paid guards,” he said. “I have seen evidences that you — and your son and daughter — rarely leave this place. Why?”

Groman’s cigar twitched angrily in his one-sided mouth.

“The men I used to lead have gotten a hint of my idea,” he said. “They know I’m out to clean the town, now, instead of robbing it. So they want to kill me before that can be done. They’re after me for that reason — and for another. They think I have a great deal more money than I really own. They think some of it should be shared by them. So they want to wipe me out, and Terry and Ted, too, and take all the cash they think I’ve held out on them. For that reason, we live in here as if it were an armed fort, with guards around night and day. In spite of that, the gang has tried. Two have gone out of here feet first, to be found in ditches far in the country next day.”

“You’re being very frank,” said Benson quietly.

The sound right hand waved again.

“You won’t turn me in. I can be too valuable to you in the kind of job you live for. Even if you did — so what? I’m old. I’ve had a stroke, and I’ll probably have another one. I haven’t long to live. I don’t care much if I do go to the pen! I certainly wouldn’t go to the chair because I had the two killed in self-defense on my own premises.”

“Who are the ones at the top, as far as you know them?” asked Benson.

“A man named Sisco is the biggest big shot. He owns the Gray Dragon Club, and he is usually there. But he’s number one in alley politics, and he owns a big share in a couple of contracting companies that get all city jobs. Also, he’s hand in glove with Buddy Wilson and his gunmen.

“Another man to watch is Norman Vautry. He owns a newspaper which is always crusading against me. But I think he is in with the gang.

“Outside of Commissioner Cattridge, I’d suspect everyone in the police department till he’s proved himself honest, if I were you. And the judicial situation isn’t too good. There have been some changes since I lost control of the mob. But I know at least one judge who has done some funny things. That’s Judge Broadbough.”

The Avenger’s pale, icy eyes flared steadily at the scarred political veteran who wanted to end his few remaining days in some sort of decency.

The average American town, Benson knew, wasn’t a half-bad place to live in. The cops were square and the judges were respectable, if human. But now and then an Ashton City comes along, where misrule has been permitted for decades, until the very foundation stones under the city hall seem rotten and treacherous.

“I’ve been honest with you,” said Groman. “I’ve told you frankly all you have to face. It’s a tremendous job.”

“I’m taking it,” said Benson.

“The police will be against you — because the few rats in high places can lead the honest majority where they want it led. The underworld politicians and some of the big-business men will be against you. Even the bench, if you aren’t lucky, would be against you if the gang could land you in a court on some hand-picked charge.”

“I’ve said I’m taking the job!” was Benson’s quiet repetition.

Groman’s dressing-gowned bulk leaned back in the swivel chair from the elaborate teak desk.

“Ashton City has gotten more than it deserved,” he said, “when I was able to persuade you to fight for it. All the luck in the world, my son — and if what you turn up will have to crucify me along with it, just go right ahead. I’ll take my chances on the clean-up. Just so there is a clean-up!”

Dick Benson only nodded, quiet, sparing with words, a machine rather than a human being. A machine dedicated to the doom of the country’s shrewdest criminal leaders.

One man against a cityful of crooks and killers. Could such an unequal battle end in anything but disaster for the white-haired, dead-faced man? Only time could tell.