Spring Street

ring into the camera with an upraised fist. "Action stuff," it was called by P. Q. Gibson was in his office in a downtown business block when Brennan and John found him. "How are you, Gallant?" he asked, smiling and brisk. "Glad to meet you, Brennan. Step right into my office, boys. I suppose you're after a story. Well, I'll give it to you." He handed them each a typewritten statement. "Read that through and if you have any questions I'm here to answer them," he said. Two pages of the statement contained a hot attack on the police department. He charged that the department was disorganized, honeycombed with graft, tolerating and protecting vice conditions, inefficient and negligent. He cited the operations of bunko swindlers, gambiers and bandits and declared that the city was "wide open." "The fair name of Los Angeles is being dragged in the mire by grafting politicians, crooks and police grafters," one sentence of the statement read. In another page and a half he pledged himself to a crusade to clean up the city, announcing that he had been assured of the support of the churches and various business organizations as well as, he believed, "every self-respecting and upstanding citizen of the city." "I intend to hew to the line, let the chips fall where they may," the statement said. "I'm in this fight to the finish. Vice, gambling, banditry, lewd women and graft must go. Without having received the slightest intimation that the mayor intended ... --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.