The Tobacco Auction Murders & the Sound of Death

Armchair Fiction presents extra large editions of classic mystery-crime double novels. This double novel’s first story is Robert Turner’s whodunit thriller, “The Tobacco Auction Murders.” Her last footsteps were shrouded by a screen of smoke! Jake Krane came South in search of his oddly silent wife. Vickie’s last letter had been filled with a mysterious sense of desperation. So Jake headed for Wilsboro, N. C., but he got there just a little too late—for not even his shock and anger could bring Vickie back from her watery, swampy grave. Greed and the lust for easy money filled the air of that tense tobacco town, and Jake knew that somehow Vickie’s death was connected with it. But to force the real story into the open, to find the vile secret behind that supposedly “accidental” death, Jake would have to rip the mask off a vicious racket that turned a small Southern town into an inferno of violence and bitter conflict. This double novel’s second tale is “The Sound of Death,” by pulp writer exraordinaire, David Wright O’Brien. When a person enlisted in the service and went to war, those who had families prayed for their safe return. But that wasn’t the case with some, including Johnny Christopher. He came back alive but without a leg, a mother, a brother, and a fiancée. Johnny could wrap his head around the death of his mother and being dumped by his fiancée, but what gave him a lingering bellyache was the death of his little brother, Tommy. Everything about it had seemed fishy—a muffed grocery store robbery and a fatal bullet fired by a policeman. The case seemed all wrapped up with a perfect little bow on top. But Johnny knew his brother was no criminal. He knew there was more to the story than the bloody corpse of an armed bandit face down on the pavement. Johnny knew in his gut that Tommy had been the victim of a setup, but proving it would be a long, perhaps deadly task with an assassin’s bullet aimed straight at his heart.