The Spider #7 - "Serpent of Destruction" by Grant Stockbridge (Norvell Page)

April 1934: Prohibition has been repealed in the United States, much to the dismay of organized crime and less-than-organized crime alike. But if liquor is now legal, narcotics are not, so it’s an easy transition for criminals to transfer their focus. Richard Wentworth, aka The Spider, knows this is a new level of war and he’s willing to risk everything to fight it.

A national crime syndicate has its sights set on the upper crust of society, feeding them cocaine and heroine and never looking back. The Bloody Serpent gang has the market mostly sewn up by the time the story begins. Wentworth is already making moves in the war, but it is apparent he’ll have to pull out all the stops this time. I’ve read several Spider books before but this one seems to have really cranked it up a notch. There is a ton of action here, with knife fights, gun battles, and fisticuffs galore. Wentworth’s disguise kit gets plenty of workouts as well, as he infiltrates and surveils the bad guys. But it’s a far-reaching syndicate with powerful tools of their own as proven when Police Commissioner Kirkpatrick is removed from duty because of his supposed taking of bribes. A set-up of course, but it’s an important tool that’s now off the table for The Spider. (Although Kirkpatrick makes up for this as a total bad ass in several gunfights on Wentworth’s behalf).

The stakes get even bigger when Wentworth’s fiancé, Nita van Sloan, is kidnapped and held as leverage against The Spider’s actions. Fortunately, his old pal, Professor Brownlee is available and tapped to construct a cane with a hidden nozzle that shoots spider venom. This cane is an awesome, perhaps even iconic weapon that The Spider uses to inflict 24 hours of tortuous pain before the victim ultimately dies. Pretty cool!

First published in 1934, this is the seventh entry in the series, and the fifth by the prolific writer Norvell Page who, I believe, had really begun to hit his stride. The plot is nicely complex without becoming obtuse and the action is virtually non-stop. The Spider has no interest in bringing bad guys to jail or in rehabilitating them. He’s happy to annihilate them and simply remove them from any chance of a further life of crime. The ending was pretty sweet with a nice twist in the identity of the main bad guy, the Chief of the Bloody Serpent gang.

Two bonus short stories are included with this volume: “Deadlock” by Arthur Leo Zagat and “The Death Yacht” by George A. Starbird. Bold Venture Press does a fine job with these reprints and I look forward to my next adventure with The Spider.

The Spider Strikes by R.T.M. Scott

Richard Wentworth has been on the trail of a master criminal, an expert is disguise, for two years now, chasing him from one city to the next, from the US to France and back again, and now he’s finally getting close. But first he will have to go through a number of adventurous encounters including kidnappings, disguises, police suspicion, and plenty of gunplay before the final confrontation.

This very first novel in the Spider series is not an origin story. In fact, we get the impression that it’s been going on for years prior to this story. First published in October of 1933, this one and the second novel were written by R.T.M. Scott, the well-known creator of “Secret Service Smith” with the idea that his name would bring instant credibility to the new Spider character and drive initial sales. After that the reigns were handed over to “Grant Stockbridge”, a house name that was most often used by prolific pulpster, Norvell W. Page. The Spider character would change a lot over the course of the first several novels before settling into his most recognized persona. Here at the beginning, he is a fairly straightforward millionaire playboy but with a need to pursue justice as a criminologist. His vigilante streak is strong though, often taking the law into his own hands to dispense justice.

Even though the character would change a lot over the first several novels, many of the standards of the series are introduced here in the first book. Characters such as Police Commissioner Stanley Kirkpatrick, faithful servant Ram Singh, and girlfriend Nita Van Sloan are all present as are the Spider’s practice of leaving his mark on the forehead of his dispatched foes.

I enjoyed this one. Despite a rather basic premise, it was a fun romp of pulpy adventure just as I’d hoped. I understand the novels from Norvell Page are even better, as Wentworth morphs into a more interesting character, so it would seem my experiences with this character are just getting started.