Speed Saunders versus The Spider, Part 3: A Plan Unfolds

When last we left Speed, he was using his silhouette powers to break into Miss Rogers' house.

Actually, Speed, there is: you. You are highly suspicious.

I guess Speed's shadow-powers allow him to... see in the dark? I can't think how else he'd able to pronounce that there's Nothing Suspicious Here in a room where all the lights are off. 

But there is a solution to that problem.

And that solution is armed and a member of the Supergirl Fan Club.

Ooof. That's gotta be embarrassing. Unless you're Speed Saunders.

"WHERE'S MAH MONEY?!"

YOWTCH.  Well, at least he's comparatively polite about slapping a women in her own home without a search warrant. In the Golden Age, you usually need a search warrant to slap a woman in her own home. But he's Speed Saunders. What is she doing to do: call the police? She must feel absolutely helpless, just like her idol, Supergirl.

Seething, she accompanies him on his tour of her house.

"Naturally, I kept them."

Wait... Miss Rogers is... Mrs. Rogers? Her husband ... left her? Or is she... the Widow Rogers? I don't know. Does Speed? I don't know. Does she?! I DON'T KNOW. The Saudersverse is a unique dimension, composed entirely of απορία. 

Speed, being Speed, doesn't care anyway. The vaguer reality is, the easier it is for him to alter it later, if necessary.  He's all about the blueprints now, because those are like PLANS and he likes those.

Wait, Count Ruskovsky described his home as an apartment he was renting. But now Speed makes it sound like... a residential hotel?  I guess that was a thing in the Golden Age. But if it's a residential hotel, why didn't Speed talk to the hotel manager or owner?  For that matter, why didn't he do that if it was an apartment building? Or did that happen between panels?  I think Speed just found some blueprints and is using them as the basis for retconning reality, like he's the Golden Age Geoff Johns.

So, now I'm utterly confused and need a glass of water. Apparently I'm not the only one.

"AN' MAKE ME A SAMMICH!"

I love the look of disbelief on Ms. Roger's face at Speed's presumption: "OH, can I please POISON that for you while I'm at it?!" Miss Rogers is not a Speed Lover.  

Not like Durand; now that is what love looks like.
Find somebody who looks at you like Durand looks at Speed.

While Rogers is fetching Speed's water (which was a transparent excuse), he pockets one of the blueprints.

You've been there twice already Speed; are you having that much trouble remembering the layout? 

Don't you wonder who Speed is talking to in that panel? I think we are actually witnessing Speed using his reality-manipulation powers, activated by performative utterance. It was just a random blueprint, but once he focuses his Force of Will and emphatically states "THIS THE PLAN FOR DURAND'S NIGHT CLUB!", why, then the plan for Durand's Night Club it becomes, both in the present and retroactively.  

When obviously ticked off Rogers returns with his glass of (hopefully poisoned!) water that was an obvious ploy to get rid of, Speed doesn't even both to maintain the fiction of the ploy.

OH
MY
GOD

Ms Rogers must have superhuman self-control not to have thrown that glass of water in Speed's face. But considering that Speed has literally dodged bullets fired at point-blank range, it probably would have missed his face anyway, or its constituent hydrogen and oxygen molecules would have spontaneously decoupled from shame before the Face of Judgement.

Speed's only got one page left to solve the mystery, so no more lolly-gagging waiting around for glasses of water!  We cut immediately to a new time at a new place as Speed's beginning a new plan with a new person based on new information we have to infer from previous performative utterance.

And if you can't keep up, then maybe you should be reading a VICTORIAN NOVEL, bub.

Hm. Reading between the lines of that panel: Speed has deduced from the blueprint he stole from Ms. Rogers that there's a secret passage at Durand's Night Club, just like at the Home of the--I mean, The Royal Arms.  Which he's now going to use for some reason. And he's dragooned a bluecoat to ... complete a delayed rearguard pincer?

So, then Ms. Rogers shows up and uses the secret passage.

I mean... I guess that's what's happening in this panel. Who can tell? I only know it's Ms. Rogers because she's still wearing her Supergirl Fan Club outfit.

Speed follows.

Thank you, Speed, for taking the time to explain the ONE thing about this story I could have figured out myself.

  

Then SPEED SAUNDERS USES A DOOR.

Better make a note of this historical first in his Wikipedia page.

Good heavens, it's the Spider! Is Ms. Roger's architect husband NOT so dead after all? Is Mr. Roberts the Spider?!  And he has... a secret hideout INSIDE Durand's Night Club, from which he robbed Durand himself, after two months of other thefts?! It's ingenious!

Nope.

None of the above.

Because that would make some sense.

Because the Spider is, in fact...

Whaddya know; the water WAS poisoned.

MS ROBERTA ROGERS HERSELF.

Yes; that's right.

This tall lanky person...

is this person, in disguise.

Oh, but wait.

There's more.

"Why, that's it, Robin! There are two Ds in Durand; DOUBLE-D! It was LITERALLY staring us in the face the whole time!"

Yes, that's right.

This person...

was ALSO this person, in disguise.

Can't you see the resemblance?

OF COURSE YOU CAN'T; YOU'RE NOT SPEED SAUNDERS.

Prepare for: THE SPEEDSPLANATION!

I--I---what?

you were clever

but you forgot your face

and it was familiar to me

i'd seen durand

when i came here last night

and didn't find you

i thought of durand

and knew you for him

i wanted proof

and got those blueprints!

I have read and said those words aloud over and over again.

It's like a poem. A beautiful dada poem. It doesn't make more sense with repetition. In fact, with each repetition, everything else in the world starts to make less sense. It's like... like a black hole of sense. But I just keep repeating it.

Over and over....

Please.

Someone.

Someone please help me.

Speed Saunders versus The Spider, Part 2: Mister Roger's Neighborhood

At last report, Speed was pondering the wall-panel that opened to a secret exit in the Home of Count Ruskovsky, the Emerald Collector, by which means The Spider, in all his dashing glory, had escaped (presumably with some emeralds, but that's never actually discussed).

She's his Serge protector.

It appears Speed has met a foe has the same power he does: the ability to travel between panels!

But the Count disavows any previous knowledge of the secret passage.

I guess that settles it, then.

As an Ace Investigator, Speed then removes the wall-panel, explores the passage, follows it through to its exit, finds some clues, and goes to The Library to research them!

Just kidding; he does no such thing. Literally the next panel is Speed walking home (since he abandoned the Speedmobile) and getting shot at along the way.

Yeesh, no wonder he tesseracts everywhere. 
It's not just a time-saver, it's a life-saver.

Speeds recognizes his would-be assassin, The Spider, by his handsome mug and signature double-donut gun.  Unfortunately, the Spidermobile, as you can see, has no license plates to trace it by; the Spider's no dummy, you know.

Probably someone who's seen you drive.

Ticked by the shoddy attempt on his life, Speed goes to kvetch to the unnamed Police Chief, who, because things move really fast in the Saundersverse and he's impressed his superiors by calling in Speed Saunders, has already been appointed Police Commissioner since we last saw him.

Speed demanding leeway to handle things His Way is the funniest thing I've ever seen in a Speed Saunders story

Naturally, Commissioner Cooperation accedes to Speed's "demand" with some confusion, since he's well aware Speed doesn't report to him. Speed Saunders doesn't report to anybody.  Speed is the nail that organizational charts hang off of. Speed is the reason DC editors are afraid to exercise any authority over stories. On the Seventh Day, God asked Speed whether he could take the day off.

"PLEASE DON'T WISH ME INTO THE CORNFIELD, SPEED!"

The next day, Speed goes to the DMV and DESPITE THE SPIDERMOBILE HAVING VISIBLY BEEN MISSING ITS LICENSE PLATES simply makes the Masked Manager give him the name of its owner anyway through force of will.

"The government hasn't named the area yet. We just call it Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood. It's very small.  A model community, really."

Speed tesseracts to Mr. Roger's neighborhood to confront the Spider, thinking that it all seems a bit "to easy". 

But this hit is a miss. Miss Rogers, to be precise.

"Can you identify and apprehend The Spider? That would be great, thanks. My other Female Informant wasn't much help."

WHOA. So, is that a blouse with a boob slit or is Miss D-Cup just bursting at the seams?  Did women actually dress like that in the Golden Age?  Anyway, the expected man with a smoking gun turns out to be a lady with a lit cigarette.  Speed skips over all explanation (at least for us, in the interest of time) and gets to what he's looking for.

That is DEFINITELY a boob slit.

At first I thought Speed was affecting an Irish brogue: "A big black car, it was!"  Then I realized he was  using his Judgement Face to force her to finish his sentence for him, because every second counts: "A big black car. It was--in my name?".  I like to imagine here that Speed is chivalrously offering her his arm and she is studiously ignoring it.  That's not happening, but it is a funny image.

Sometimes, Golden Age composition is consternating. THE CAR is what we need to see in this shot, not Speed's obstructive Physique Magazine posing.

So, to recap: the big black car driven The Spider is register to Mister Rogers, whose address is... the same as this Miss Rogers, who has a small blue car.  Speed is stumped, but not stymied.  He takes a walk by Greasy Poon, the restaurant for zombie cabbies, and formulates a plan of action.

In any normal comic that... thing in the red hat would be significant.
But this is a Speed Saunders comic.

Shadowing! This is one of Speed's special abilities!  It allows him to travel by means of silhouette, like a Golden Age Shadow Thief.  At least, that's what it always looks like.

If he hadn't specifically mentioned shadowing her, I'd picture him simply RUNNING behind her car (unobserved), because he STILL doesn't have the Speedmobile.  I think I'm going to picture it anyway because it's funnier that way.

Presumably, he uses his shadow-traveling to arrive, once again, at Durand's Little Night Club, where he emerges from the shadow of man-sized fern. Rumor has it Geoff Johns may soon retcon this very Man-Sized Fern as the Golden Age Swamp Thing.

"Hullo! We're the Foregrounds, Cyril and Sylvia! Welcome to Durand's! I'd shake your hand but for some reason my right arm is currently Sylvia's instead."

How did Miss Rogers slip in unobserved?  Where can she be?

"Haylow, darlinx.  I am Allupinya Foreground, Countess de Colletage."

Speed spends THREE WHOLE PANELS just milling around the club. Nobody dies. Nobody tries to kill him. Nobody gives him rubies.  It's a total waste of an evening.  But it least it provides enough time for the Speedmobile to finally be repaired and ready for use again.

GOLDEN AGE FEMBOTS

Is that a portrait of Despair on the night club wall? How refreshingly honest. And accurate, since that's what Speed's feeling.  But now he's going to make up for lost time, and in between panels he's already driven to Miss Roger's Neighborhood and is preparing to invade her house by means of silhouette.

Never thought of Speed as a guy who'd name his, let alone name it  "Jimmy"

You only got two more pages, Saunders. Hurry, Speed, hurry!