GUN-CALL FOR THE LOST LEGION is the third and final full-length Silver Trent novel by Thomas Mount writing under the pseudonym Stone Cody. The pulp in which it appeared, THE WESTERN RAIDER, was cancelled under that title after the December 1938/January 1939 issue came out, although for publishing and mailing purposes, it was retitled for one issue as THE OCTOPUS and one issue as THE SCORPION, both featuring the crimefighter Dr. Skull.
But that has nothing to do with our purpose here, which is to pick up the saga
of good guy outlaw Silver Trent and his band of Hell Hawks. Any resemblance to
Robin Hood and his Merry Men is probably not coincidental. In the first two
novels, Trent battled his arch-nemesis Esteban Varro, also known as El Diablo,
and defeated Varro’s schemes even though the would-be dictator of Mexico
escaped both times. As GUN-CALL OF THE LOST LEGION opens, Trent and his men are
at a fiesta celebrating his upcoming marriage to the love of his life, the
beautiful Gracia Cary. But agents of El Diablo infiltrate the party, dope the
wine, and kidnap Gracia, taking her back to Varro’s stronghold in the mountains
where he has enslaved the local farmers and forced them to work in his secret
gold mine. Trent and the Hell Hawks recover from being drugged and give chase.
That’s the entire plot. The rest of the book consists of running gunfights,
ambushes, sneaking around, and a final epic battle. Gracia and El Diablo don’t
actually appear until the story is almost over. This is the same sort of thin
plot that weakened the previous book. However, I still enjoyed it quite a bit
because Mount is one of the best authors I’ve found at the sort of
over-the-top, thunderous, fast-moving Western pulp prose that I love so much. The
action just gallops along. Silver Trent is an almost superhuman protagonist,
and his sidekicks are colorful and entertaining. Mount really puts them through
the wringer in this book, too. The mental and physical torture Silver has to
endure reminded me of how Norvell Page treated Richard Wentworth in the pages
of THE SPIDER.
Following the demise of THE WESTERN RAIDER, Silver Trent appeared in ten more
novellas and novelettes by Mount that were published in STAR WESTERN. I don’t
know if the on-going story from the novels continues in the shorter stories,
but all of them have been reprinted by Altus Press and I have copies sitting
right here by my computer. I plan to get to the next volume soon. In the
meantime, if you’re a fan of pulp Westerns, I recommend the Silver Trent
series, all of which are available in very nice trade paperback editions. Just
be sure to read them in order.
No comments:
Post a Comment