Norvell W Page

There was no way to crush Judge Torture, the mad legalite whose weird court had strewn the city with broken, dismembered victims. But there was one individual-Richard Wentworth-who, in the guise of the Spider, dared steal the thunder from Judge Torture's terror reign by assuming full responsibility for the master murderer's crimes ... Never before has the Spider become so vulnerable to death-at the hands of policemen, blood-thirsty vigilantes and gunmen... alike

Out of the dim recesses of the past came Munro, Man of a Thousand Faces, to corner America's gold with a sinister agency for devouring flesh... and with a mysterious power to control mass emotions at will Only one man was equipped to fight him-Richard Wentworth, alias The Spider. But The Spider was being stalked by three rich fearless adventurers whose one aim was to destroy him as ruthlessly as in the past they had trapped and killed beasts in the jungle

It was a weird, new weapon in the annals of crime. It sucked screaming people, automobiles, huge buildings-everything-into its hungry vortex of destruction, while its owner, a monster called the Brand, safely conducted his awful reign of terror Such was the enemy Dick Wentworth sought to destroy. But how could even the inimitable Spider hope to win, when Kirkpatrick assigned a human bloodhound to the sole task of eliminating... the Spider

How could a lone man, ceaselessly hunted by the law and a deadly Underworld alike, hope to save the terrified city from the Iron Man-a super-being whose cohorts were giant, unconquerable robots of steel Read how the Master of Men rose up to crush the invincible killers who dealt destruction at every step. Another dramatic, pulse-quickening Spider novel

Another Spider adventure: Can even the Spider successfully combat the flame master who has no face, yet who masks himself with the features of a thousand victims-as terror spreads throughout a great city?

How could a man, enslaved and blinded, still strike terror to the hearts of his captors? How could that man, apparently helpless, remain the only hope of a city laid low by crime? Read here how the Master of Men cast off his shackles and led a populace to redemption and vengeance The most gripping, dramatic Spider novel ever published

The Master of Flame and Burning Death held New York fast in unholy worship of his strange god. For thousands had fled their doomed churches, lest they perish by fire-and the Spider alone remained to face this monstrous cult-leader from hell

Out of the shadows of nocturnal Manhattan came the Master of Darkness whose Underworld rule was bloody and absolute. For when this butcher unleashed his Hounds of Hell, defenseless citizens were blown, one by one, into extinction

Transformed by an Underworld sadist into a city of man-made, outlaw cripples, New York faces the gravest criminal threat of all time. Can the Spider, already robbed of his most loyal assistant, successfully meet this new menace?

An epidemic of strange and sudden death had placed New York in the ruthless grip of an Underworld master such as the world had never seen. The Law was powerless against this night-time Nemesis. But Richard Wentworth, as the Spider, had one more blow to strike before surrendering a shuddering city to the powers of hell

Over New York had swept the Master's dread Black Police-wiping out the last organized resistance to their ruthless Underworld rule of the Empire State Only Richard Wentworth, his forces scattered, could hope to succeed where thousands had failed-and, attired in the Spider's somber garb, strike one last desperate blow at the master-murderer who had sacked a state to make a fortune out of dead men's bones

Deeper and deeper New York had sunk in the grip of the Underworld monarch-until the law was licked at last But in that moment of desperation, Richard Wentworth, as the Spider, resolved to fight the underworld with its own savage weapons. With New York's own police commissioner at his side, the Spider raised a fighting legion of honest men sworn to take the law into their own hands

"Your souls are mine-when I speak, you will obey " From the bowels of the shaking earth itself rose the satanic ultimatum that threatened to send America's greatest city up in flames For the hordes of Hades, ruled by a devilish dictator, had turned New York into an Underground Kingdom of Crime, and helpless thousands died, strangling, when Hell's emperor loosed his slaying devil-dust Reeking of sulphur and brimstone, it floated over Manhattan, leaving death in its wake. Only one man-Richard Wentworth, as the Spider-could hope to battle this Mephistopheles of Murder-who had blasted a city and whose satanic laughter was the signal that loosed the kill-maddened Legions of Lucifer

No criminal dared testify against another, while the Whisper was crime-emperor of New York-and the forces of the law were powerless against the ravages of the Underworld For when the Whisper's eerie warning fell over Manhattan men died, slashed to bloody bits by a weapon that was invisible but killed horribly In that awe-struck city of riotous crime, where a murmuring voice brought instantaneous death, Richard Wentworth, in the Spider's strange garb, took up a doomed people's cause-fighting a Whispering Fury that loosed its thunderbolts in a tornado's teeth and slew foully to pile up a fortune in streamlined corpses

Collected for the first time: prolific pulp writer Norvell W. Page's stories of private sleuth Jules Tremaine and his battles with the Catrini crime family from the pages of Black Mask magazine. Witnessing their cruelty first-hand, Tremaine sets out to whittle the Catrini down to size-violently. Over the course of three consecutively published stories, Page built a compelling narrative of gut-wrenching crimes and brutal street justice.Among the earliest detective stories written by the future author of The Spider magazine, the popularity of the Jules Tremaine series likely helped Page in snagging that prestigious Spider assignment. Also collected in this edition are several other detective stories by Page from the same era, including his backup story from the first issue of The Spider. Includes an all-new introduction by pulp historian Will Murray.