Emperor Pic. and The Girl

ina Scarlet Tam

B.C. Police Assist in Capture of Head of Bootleg Ring in Alberta Wanted for

Murder of Police Constable—Young Daughter of Slain Officer Recognizes Girl

in Scarlet Tam as Murderer—Both Found Guilty and Sentenced to Hang—
Plea for Reprieve of Girl Is Rejected—Father and Daughter Pay Penalty.

THE GOLDEN beams of the afternoon
sun shone obliquely across the saw-toothed
Rockies, picking out the white-painted
buildings of the diminutive mining town of
Frank, Alberta, deep in the purple-shadow-
ed valley of the Crows’ Nest Pass. Within
the red-roofed barracks Sergeant J. O. Scott
of the Alberta Provincial Police snatched up
the jangling telephone and turned to Cor-
poral Day.

“It’s Constable Lawson at Coleman. Says
Emperor Pic’s running a load of bootleg
hootch in from the B. C. border Just high-
tailed it through with two McLaughlins’
loaded for fair. Come on—we’ll catch up
with him at Blairmore.”

With Day in the car beside him Scott
rounded the dangerous hairpin turns with
reckless speed. It was September 21st, 1921,
and the filmy mists of Indian summer were
winding gossamer scarves abuut the snow-
crowned peaks of the rugged Flatheads.

KING OF THE BOOT)EGGERS

So! Emperor Pic was getting pretty bold.
The Sergeant’s lips straightened into a thin
line as he swung the car sharply around an
elbow of rock. Well—this time the hulking
fifty year old Italian who’d made the Crows’
Nest Pass a place accursed with his bootleg
operations, and had risen in ten years from
a poverty-stricken ice-cream vendor to a
man of affluence with a cool half million in
the bank and a seat on the Blairmore Council
was going to get his medicine.

*Since the three train-robbing Cossacks
_ had run amok two years before, killing two
police officers and leaving a trail of death
through the Pass the West had looked ask-
ance at the unruly conditions in the Crows’
Nest. Hardly a month went by that the
press didn’t publish some scathing article
demanding police action and the cleaning up
of this black blot on Western Canada where
law did not exist, and where Emperor Emile
Picarello and his foreign-born rum-runners
ruled the roost, openly defying both the
Provincial Police end the Mounties.

“There he is!” Day’s hand shot forward
as the car zoomed down Blairmore’s Main
Street. Beside an empty McLaughlin park-
ed before the Alberta Hotel stood the broad,
powerful, gorilla-like figure of Emile Pic-
arello, surveying them suspiciously from
beneath the brim of his Homburg hat. Bring-
ing his car to a halt the Sergeant flashed a

WINTER EDITION

warrant.
told him.

Pic honked his horn. From behind the
hotel came an answering toot. On two
wheels a huge McLaughlin shot around the
corner, missed the police car by a hair’s
breadth and thundered west with open
throttle. At the wheel was Picarello’s twenty
year old son, Steve, and a fleeting glance
showed it was loaded high with liquor. Step-
ping on the gas Scott sped in swift pursuit.
“Into the Green Hotel,” he shouted to Day
as he slowed down, “and phone Lawson to
cut him off at Coleman. [ll keep on his
wally

A car flashed past. For a split second the
burning eyes of Emperor Pic locked with

“Tm searching your place,” he

“Emperor” Pic.

Scott’s in a malevolent grin of defiance then
the big McLaughlin Super-Six zig-zagged
ahead, taking up the entire road. In vain
the Sergeant attempted to get around the
obstructing vehicle. Twice Picarello jock-
eyed him dangerously to the precipitous
edge, and twice by a sheer miracle he es-
caped destruction.

Meanwhile Day’s mesage had sent Law-
son careening down Coleman’s Main Street
and west along the dangerous highway
leading to the B. C. border, eight miles
west, to which point Steve was obviously
making to escape the Alberta Provincials.

Where the trai! narrowed and fell away
in a sheer drop of two thousand feet he

By
PHILIP H. GODSELL

F.R.G.S.

Author of “Arctic Trader, The Vanishing
Frontier,” Etc., Etc:

swung his car diagonally across the road
and waited. The hoarse purring of the swift-
speeding McLaughlin smote his ears.
Around a green shoulder leapt the gleam-
ing auto, thundering along at a reckless
hundred miles an hour. Like a black pro-
jectile it shot towards him. With a defiant
honk it catapulted past, missed his car by
inches, straddled the ditch, perched precari-
ously on two wheels and hurtled on its way.

Pouring a stream of lead at the tires
of the fugitive car Lawson shot forward in
swift pursuit. As he emptied his revolver
it swayed, zig-zagged, skimmed the edge
of the precipice, then a loud report and a
sickening swerve that left his own car with
one wheel overhanging the valley told him
he'd got a flat.

“Come on, Steve—forget it.” A trim
humorous-eyed woman of thirty, Mrs.
Lawson vainly attempted to cheer the disap-
pointed Constable when he returned from
his unsuccessful chase. Steve’s frown melt-
ed as nine year old Pearl clambered on his
knee, broke open his revolver and spilled
the shells into a drawer. From the next
room came Mrs. Lawson’s call to supper.

The sun had dropped behind the peaks,
and lights twinkled in the windows of the
little hospital next door as Steve fitted a
handle into an axe-head.

“Daddy,” Pearl rushed in, “‘there’s a car
outside. They want to see you.” From the
dusk came a soft voice. “Can I see you,
Constable, for a minute?”

Striding to the parked car Lawson slip-
ped a foot on the running board and leaned
over with folded arms. “What can I do
for you?” he asked the two shadowy figures
etched against the stars.

A FouL MurbDER

Twin spears of flame and the whip like
report of an automatic was the only answer.
Ducking, Steve dived for the corner of the
building. Two sharp reports, an agonizing
cry and the car roared into the night as
Steve pitched on his face.

“Steve ... oh! Steve!” With a frienzied
cry Mrs. Lawson flung herself beside her
husband, entreating him to speak. But Steve
Lawson, struck in the back by an assassin’s
bullet, would never speak again. Carried
*The story of the train robbery by the Cossack
bandits will appear in the next issue of THE
SHOULDER StTRaP.—Editor.

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