But now Detective Martin was out on the toughest job of his life–the Smith Pier mob. They would be only too glad to square things with him for that bungled bank stickup.

Finally it was time for Grandma to retire to her room upstairs. She undressed Steve hurriedly and hustled him off to bed with a hasty goodnight and a reassuring smile that Daddy would be home soon.

Then she was feverishly tuning the radio in the bedroom again! "Cars Fourteen and Twenty to Zebra Head …"

Car Twenty–that was her Johnny's! There was plenty going on down at Smith Pier all right!

A sudden youthful shriek from the bedroom raised her hair on end. It was Steve's voice … he was crying as though in danger! She rushed to the bedroom to see him twisting and turning in his bed.

"Don't shoot–don't shoot!" screamed the boy.

Mrs. Johnny Martin heaved a sigh of relief. It was only a nightmare. "You shouldn't have eaten so much cake, youngster," she said, stroking the boy's forehead.

"I–I dreamed that somebody was gonna shoot Daddy," he murmured, settling back on the pillow. "It–it was just a dream, wasn't it, Mommy?"

"Of course, Steve," she soothed. "Nobody's going to shoot Daddy."

She rushed back to the radio, her heart again pounding wildly. If Steve only knew where his Daddy was at that very moment!

The first transmission of the police dispatcher on the radio brought an involuntary gasp from her:

"Send four Joes to Zebra Head at once!"

"Joes" were the code word for ambulance! There'd been fireworks, allright. And maybe her husband had gone the way of Patrolman Danny O'Brien and Pete Hazlewood, who'd fallen before bandit bullets last month!

Mrs. Johnny Martin snapped off the radio and took her vigil by the front window–there would be no sleeping tonight. She'd sit up until she at least got some kind of phone call from headquarters.

Suddenly she heard a police siren as a big sedan careened around the corner and came to a halt in front of the house.

A long-legged, broad-shouldered man in snap-brim hat jumped out of the back door and bounded up the front steps two at a time.

It was her hero … Detective Johnny Martin!

And then he was hugging her with his powerful arms.

"Just dropped by to tell you we cleaned house on the whole outfit tonight, honey," he said.

Then he was off for headquarters to complete his report.

Mrs. Johnny Martin watched the sedan speed away with the trace of a tear in her eye.

It was tough being a policeman's wife, all right … but she knew her husband could be happy no other place in the world but on the homicide squad.

The End