They called Secret Agent “X”, the Man of the Thousand Faces. Armed with his irresistible gas gun, wearing impenetrable disguises, “X” infiltrates the darkest corners of the Underworld to crush all crime czars!
Black as night, black as hell itself, the “devil-dark” descended upon a fear-crazed populace! Men and women shrieked in agony beneath the lash of bloody, torturing whips. The mangled bodies of innocent children lay in the streets, while human fiends emptied the city of its wealth. And into this chaotic and hideous fog of darkness went Secret Agent “X” to wage a life-and-death battle with unseen criminals.
The enigma of enigmas, Secret Agent “X” has been deputized by a high government official to battle the darkest, most diabolical enemies of America before they sink their poisonous fangs into the nation’s healthy core.
At the end of the Depression year of 1933, tiny Magazine Publishers could see which way the pulp winds were blowing. Street & Smith had broken new ground when they launched The Shadow Magazine in 1931. Doc Savage came two years later. As did The Phantom Detective.
In the Fall of ’33 Popular Publications released both The Spider and G-8 and His Battle Aces. The public was obviously hungry for heroes. And editor Rose Wyn decided that her outfit had to offer one too!
With top writer Paul Chadwick, she brainstormed Secret Agent “X”, uncanny composite of Doc and The Shadow, with a dash of the Phantom thrown in. The first issue appeared at the end of 1933 with a February 1934 cover date. Coincidentally, the popular King Features newspaper strip, Secret Agent X-9, debuted that same month! But for that hyphenated X, lawsuits might have shut down one or the other hero.
Follow the Man of a Thousand Faces as he confronts the menace of Devils of Darkness, ripped from the pages of Secret Agent “X” magazine, March 1935 and read with chilling intensity by Milton Bagby.
Chapter 1: Terror’s Call
Chapter 2: Lashing Death
Chapter 3: Unheeded Warning
Chapter 4: Black Hell
Chapter 5: The Torturing Lash
Chapter 6: The Agent Trapped!
Chapter 7: Red Death
Chapter 8: The House of Menace
Chapter 9: Woman of Mystery
Chapter 10: Counterplay
Chapter 11: Clues to Danger
Chapter 12: Secret Orders
Chapter 13: Murderer’s Hideout
Chapter 14: Bluffing Death
Chapter 15: A Sentence Imposed
Chapter 16: Death in the Dark
Chapter 17: The Night’s Nemesis
Chapter 18: Blossoming Clues
Milton Bagby is a veteran radio announcer and voiceover specialist who first turned to audiobooks in 2010. Since then, Milton has worked on over two dozen audiobook projects as a narrator or producer. Drawing upon years of stage acting and the occasional bit part in films, Milton uses his experience to create characters that stand out in the ear of the listener.
“I am very much aware that a perfect stranger is going to invest eight or ten hours listening to me tell a story. I do my best to give the listener an experience in which the characters in that story come alive and sound real.”
When not behind a microphone, Milton is a writer. In addition to the well-received Rick Burkhart crime novels, Milton writes a line of 1950s style pulp stories, and is the author of dozens of magazine articles and two non-fiction books. Milton and his wife live in Nashville.
