This is a pulp that I own and read recently. That’s my copy in the scan. I think the cover is by Sam Cherry, although I’m not as sure of that as I sometimes am, and I find it pretty interesting. In all the books I’ve written, I don’t recall ever writing a shootout that involves a windmill. It doesn’t strike me as being a very good place to take cover, but maybe this hombre didn’t have any choice.
Range detectives Tombstone Jones and Speedy Smith are on hand, as usual, as the issue opens with W.C. Tuttle’s novelette “A Mixture of Mavericks”. The boys are assigned to a case where they’re supposed to settle a dispute over unbranded yearlings, but they wind up with another sort of “maverick”: a baby. And that baby is part of a case involving a mine payroll robbery, a kidnapping, and some fistfights and shootouts. Yep, it’s the old “heroes get stuck taking care of a baby” plot. I’ve used it myself. It nearly always works. It does so in this story, which is funny and action-packed, as well as pretty well-plotted. This is a strong entry in a consistently strong series.
Most of the stories by Lee Bond that I’ve read were parts of series, but “The Desert Builds a Noose” in this issue is a stand-alone, which finds a sheriff trying to discover the truth about the murder of an old prospector. This is a good story, and I like the title. The only problem I had with it is that I found the ending a little muddled, but that could always be just me.
I don’t know anything about John C. Ropke except that he published about 30 stories between 1950 and 1955 and nothing after that. A mixture of Westerns, sports stories, and jungle adventure yarns. “Boomerang” in this issue is a rodeo story about brothers who are both bronc riders. The younger brother is jealous of his older brother’s success. This starts out like a YA story in which lessons are learned. Well, lessons are learned, all right, but it turns a lot darker along the way, which was not what I expected. It’s well-written and packs a punch, enough so that it makes me interested in reading something else by Ropke.
“Devil in the Cook Shack” is by Robert J. Hogan, author of the G-8 series. Hogan did quite a few Westerns, too, and I tend to like his work. This one is a more lighthearted yarn about a young man from the East who inherits his grandfather’s ranch. It’s not really a tenderfoot-makes-good story like you might expect, though. Although the protagonist isn’t an experienced cowboy, he’s spent enough time on the ranch in the past that he’s not totally lost, either. The ranch cook has a man-crazy teenage sister who plays all the ranch hands against each other. There’s also a swindling horse buyer and a gunslinging gambler. It’s a mildly amusing blend of romance and action, a minor effort from Hogan but enjoyable enough.
“Sure Sign of Trouble” is by Donald Bayne Hobart, one of my favorites, and finds a young rancher in conflict with his older neighbor. The twist in this story is pretty easy to spot, but it’s interesting because the final shootout takes place with the protagonist on a windmill platform, just as depicted on this issue’s cover. When that happens, I always wonder if the publisher already had the cover painting and the editor asked the author to write a story to fit it. Hobart is a good enough writer that even though there’s not much to this story, it’s still entertaining.
The last novelette by Nels Leroy Jorgensen I read wasn’t very good, so I was a little wary heading into “Gunflame Survey”, which wraps up this issue. It’s not bad, though. The protagonist is a tough, two-gun surveyor who’s blackmailed into carrying out a phony survey for a land-grabbing villain. Things don’t play out exactly as the bad guy intends, though. Some of the writing is pretty rushed and awkward, and since Jorgensen had been in the business since 1923, I can only surmise that his talents deteriorated some with age. I know all too well how that can happen! Anyway, this story has some decent action and an interesting plot, even if the writing is inconsistent.
I was a little disappointed that there’s no Navajo Tom Raine story in this issue, since I’ve grown really fond of that series, but a top-notch Tombstone and Speedy yarn makes up for a lot. None of the other stories are exceptional, but they’re all entertaining. This one’s worth a look if you have a copy.
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