Hot Money and Hot Diamonds

 

Read/Watch 'em In Order #165

The third Dan Fowler novel--Hot Money--ran in the December 1935 issue of G-Men. George Eliot Fielding, writing under the house name C.K.M. Scanlon, continues as the writer.

This one builds on an interesting premise. 100 grand in cash was paid as a ransom in a kidnapping. The kidnapped lady was released, but the crooks got away with the money. That money, though, is hot. The serial numbers are known. If its spent anywhere, the Feds will swarm down on the spendee.

But the action soon moves out of the United States. In Paris, an Apache (the name used in the early 20th Century for Parisian street thugs) was arrested and found with a bill from the ransom in his possession. Dan Fowler is sent to the City of Lights to check this out.

Dan comes up with a plan to psych out the Apache and get him to talk, but this lead takes them to a murdered man. While chasing a suspect, Dan is briefly captured by the villains. He gets the best of his guard, killing the man, but the main villain gets away without being identifed.

Another bill has turned up, this one used by a snotty rich woman who is known for trying to sneak jewels past Customs whenever she returns to the States. Both Dan's attention and the attention of various bad guys turn to the jewels she is currently carrying. This brings the action back to New York City, though before arriving, Dan is knocked on the head and tossed off a passenger ship.

The action scenes in a Dan Fowler novel are always great--Dan swimming until exhausted, then getting ashore to be pursued by gunmen, is wonderfully intense. But the novel also works as a police procedural. When the jewels are eventually stolen from the snooty rich lady, the number of suspects expands and the G-Men pursue various leads in a logical, step-by-step manner. 

There's still plenty of action, though. A raid on the gang that pulled off the original kidnapping leads to a wild gun battle and the bad guys escaping on a boat equipped with a heavy machine gun. Later, there's a raid on a society wedding using tear gas, which involves Dan in a tussle to take a gas mask away from one of the villains. The climatic action scene has Dan holding off a quartet of bad guys, running out of ammo while trying to survive long enough for help to arrive. 

It's great stuff, perhaps the strongest of the series so far. Of course, I couldn't help noticing that Dan Fowler--supposedly the best G-Man in the business--gets himself captured a lot. You would think they would warn against that sort of thing when you are training at Quantico.