Black Gate

So, last year, as the Pandemic settled in like an unwanted relative who just came for a week and is still tying up the bathroom, I did a series of posts for the FB Page of the Nero Wolfe fan club, The Wolfe Pack. I speculated on what Stay at Home would be like for Archie, living in the Brownstone with Nero Wolfe, Fritz Brenner, and Theodore Hortsmann. I have already re-posted days one through twenty-seven. Here are days twenty-eight (April 17) and twenty-nine (April 18). It helps if you read the series in order, so I’ve included links to the earlier entries.

DAY TWENTY EIGHT – 2020 Stay at Home

“Good morning, Archie. I trust you slept well.”

It was Nero Wolfe’s standard greeting to me when he came down from his morning session with the orchids. Pinning to the floor the only chair in the world built for him, he continued his verbosity. Yes, I learn a lot of big words working for Wolfe.

“That was a well-done article in the Gazette today. It should provide at least a temporary increase in business.”

He was referring to the Gazette’s piece on three high-end restaurants which were trying to keep afloat. Rusterman’s got the lion’s share of quotes and coverage. Lon had certainly come through aces. “I assume we will be having Mister Cohen over for dinner when that is once again an option?”

“You may assume that, yes. You may also invite the reporter, as well. It was a thoughtful piece, not the kind of sentimental drivel a female would have written.”

I grinned. “She’ll be happy to hear you liked it. Though I’ll leave out that last sentence.”

“She?”

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So, last year, as the Pandemic settled in like an unwanted relative who just came for a week and is still tying up the bathroom, I did a series of posts for the FB Page of the Nero Wolfe fan club, The Wolfe Pack. I speculated on what Stay at Home would be like for Archie, living in the Brownstone with Nero Wolfe, Fritz Brenner, and Theodore Hortsmann. I have already re-posted days one through twenty-five. Here is day twenty-six (April 16). It helps if you read the series in order, so I’ve included links to the earlier entries. You really need to read Day Twenty-Six before this one. Trust me – I wrote it!

DAY TWENTY-SEVEN– 2020 Stay at Home

“Dammit Goodwin, let me in.” Inspector Cramer was standing outside the front room window through which I’d conversed with Doc Vollmer earlier. I had refused to the open the door for him after the body had been removed and the area decontaminated by the professionals.

“No sir. Somebody with the virus died on our stoop. He touched the front door, which I’ll be cleaning later. You examined the scene. Yes, you had gloves on, and that mask, which, by the way, looks terrific on you. But the answer is still ‘No.’”

“I am a police official and this is a crime scene. Open the goddamn door.”

Wolfe had been sitting in a chair, though none of the ones in that room are comfortable for him. He arose and came over to the window, and I moved away.

“Nonsense, Mister Cramer. That man was never in this house. The front stoop is certainly a crime scene; do with it what you will.”

Purley Stebbins had been over near the stoop, talking with a cop in uniform, but he came over.

“Hi, Purley. That’s not proper social distancing.”

Stebbins has a pained ‘You’re not funny expression’ which I think he only uses for me. Like he did right then.

Wolfe went on. “You may ask your questions from there. That man did not come inside, or in any way communicate with Mister Goodwin or I.”

“So, you’re saying you have no idea why a man, stabbed and carrying the virus, desperately wanted to see you before he died?”

Wolfe sighed, though he didn’t really mean it. “Really, Mister Cramer, how many times have we done this before? Perhaps the man was passing by on the sidewalk, was assaulted, and ours was the closest doorbell to ring. Confound it. Even during this lockdown, must you badger me and assume that I am concealing material relevant to a homicide?”

I bet Cramer wished he had a cigar instead of a mask right now. He pulled his mask down and I saw that his face was flushed. “Like I haven’t had good reason in the past, Wolfe.”

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You’re the second guy I’ve met within hours who seems to think a gat in the hand means a world by the tail.” – Phillip Marlowe in Raymond Chandler’s The Big Sleep

(Gat — Prohibition Era term for a gun. Shortened version of Gatling Gun)

And I take a break from the world of Nero Wolfe to bring A (Black) Gat in the Hand back to Black Gate.

The first image graven onto my Hardboiled Mt. Rushmore is Dashiell Hammett’s. The Continental Op and Red Harvest, The Maltese Falcon, The Glass Key – I think he did the genre better than anyone. Very narrowly going up second is Frederick Nebel’s. I’m a fan of Cardigan, MacBride and Kennedy, Gales and McGill, and much of his other pulp stuff. Steeger Books has made a plethora of his material available, and I’ve got most of it.

My third choice isn’t one of the expected names, like Raymond Chandler (it’s taken me a couple decades to warm up to his stuff), Erle Stanley Gardner (I do LOVE Cool and Lam), or Carroll John Daly (Race Williams has grown on me a bit over the years). Or a worthy name like T.T. Flynn, W.T. Ballard, Paul Cain, Roger Torrey, or Stewart Sterling. Nope – it’s Norbert Davis.

And Davis is right up there with Nebel, but there is much more of the latter’s work available, and I think he produced a greater amount of ‘better’ writings. But the five Max Latin stories rank among my favorites in the genre. And I’m a big Bail Bond Dodd fan. In the longer format, the Doan and Carstairs novels are arguably the best in the comedic-hardboiled school. I believe that Davis is probably the most under-appreciated pulpster of them all. And I think that with the Jo Gar stories, Raoul Whitfield may well be able to press that claim as well.

Davis grew up in rural Illinois. Good ol’ Abe Lincoln, at 6’4”, towered over his contemporaries. Davis was 6’-5”, and that would have been almost a foot taller than the average American male around him back then. That’s a significant difference. He moved to the West Coast and enrolled at Stanford’s Law School: Davis was no dummy. While a student, he began writing pulp stories, and he was selling them. By the time he graduated in 1934, he was an established pulpster – which of course, wasn’t exactly as lucrative as a successful law career. He had appeared in Black Mask for the first time two years earlier, with “Reform Racket.”

Erle Stanley Gardner was a practicing lawyer as he built his writing career; finally giving up law. Davis took a different approach. An AB (the Latin designation for a BA) and LLD in hand, he never took the bar. Lawyering was not to be Davis’ career path. He would be a professional writer – though, sadly, for not nearly long enough.

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