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The Trojan Hearse
by Richard Prather
Category: Mystery/Crime
Description: "As far as I'm concerned, Richard S. Prather was the King of the paperback P.I writers of the 60s. Shell Scott should be in the Top Ten of any readers list of favorite private eyes."
--Robert J. Randisi
For four decades, Richard S. Prather published over 40 works of detective fiction, most featuring his clever, cad-about-town hero, Shell Scott. Known for their arched humor, punchy dialogue, and sunny Southern California locale, the Shell Scott books represent one of the greatest private eye collections ever produced.
THE TROJAN HEARSE
A Shell Scott Mystery
With a national election going on, Shell Scott's timing might have been less than perfect. Perhaps he did prevent the victory for the shoo-in candidate, but a lot of strange things were happening. There was Polly Plank whom he encountered in her psychiatrist's office in her birthday suit. What about the American singing idol, Johnny Tray, who turned up dead? And of course Joe Rice, leader of the West's underworld, who also wanted Shell under the world too--six feet under!
Honored with the Life Achievement Award by the Private Eye Writers of America!
"(Shell Scott is) as amusingly blithe a figure as the field has seen since the Saint."
--Anthony Boucher
eBook Publisher: E-Reads, 1964
eBookwise Release Date: January 2002
 
11 Reader Ratings:
Available eBook Formats: OEBFF Format (IMP) [273 KB]
Words: 62084
Reading time: 177-248 min.
CHAPTER ONEThey dug up Johnny Troy that day. Buried him--then dug him up. They rioted in the graveyard, a thousand of them or more. They tore at the still-soft earth with shovels and hands and clawing fingers. They lifted his coffin from the earth and rolled it over the grass. Then they took his body out of the casket and tried to tear it limb from limb. They pounded him and hacked him, ripped his flesh, broke his bones and gouged out both his eyes. There was very little left to bury--or rebury--when they were through with Johnny Troy. Then they went to the polls and voted. Because they did all that to Johnny Troy on the Tuesday after the first Monday in November, in the year of our Supreme Court, 1968. That's right, 1968, the year and the day of the Presidential elections which were to zoom us out of the muddle ages into the Secure Seventies. Johnny had been dead for three days then, and thus was dead as hell, but that wasn't enough for the people. Because he had been their idol. They had loved him "with a love that was more than love." So, naturally, now they hated him with a hate that was more than hate. Hell hath no fury like a nation screwed, and the nation had been screwed by Johnny Troy; at least, he was the symbol of the screwing. The people didn't know it, though, until that day when they hacked him into little pieces. They probably wouldn't know it yet if somebody hadn't told them. Who told them? Me. I told them.
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