“A Good Knight’s Work” (Unknown Worlds, October 1941)

Bloch, Robert. “A Good Knight’s Work.” Unknown Worlds, October 1941, pp. 66-75.
archive.org/details/unknown-worlds-v-05-n-03-1941-10/page/66/mode/2up

Butch is a down-on-his luck former criminal is driving to deliver protection money to a small-time thug when he is stopped on the country road by a man in armor riding a horse. The knight charges thinking that the car is a dragon. The car wins the joust, and the knight pledges his loyalty to Butch. The visit Thin Tommy and a scuffle ensues. Butch and Sir Pallagyn beat Thin Tommy and his two waiters and exit the bar. They return to Butch’s house where Sir Pallagyn explains that he has been sent forward in time by Merlin to retrieve the table on which the Holy Grail sat. They determine that it is at the local museum and hatch a plan to steal it. On the way to the museum, they crash into the car of a museum trustee, who is incensed when he suspects that they are planning to do something nefarious at the museum. Butch and Pallagyn intend to bring Pallagyn’ s “empty” suit of armor into the museum and the, after closing time, he will steal the table. The guard suspects something is up and the aggrieved museum trustee arrives with the police. Suddenly, the display of medieval armor comes alive. 

The knights of the Round Table have been sent by Merlin as reinforcements to retrieve the table. They beat the police and, as Butch is fleeing the museum, he sees a flash of light. Suddenly all of the suits of armor are empty again and Pallagyn has disappeared. Butch hurries home thinking the entire day has been a drunken illusion. In his garage, he finds Pallagyn’s horse!

This is such a fun story! It is Bloch first foray into the Damon-Runyon-esque voice that would characterize the stories of Lefty Feep, the first of which will arrive with “Time Wounds All Heels” in 1942. Here is the world of Feep and this story in a single paragraph: “They come running out of the back, and I see they have experience in such matters before, because Bertram is carrying a blackjack and Roscoe has a little knife in his hand. This knife worries me most, because I am practically certain that Roscoe is never a boy scout” (70). Contemporary popular culture references abound, including Pallagyn’s long look at a photo of Ann Sothern in a movie magazine:

“Why, it is but a wooden tray of rough boards, with four: short legs set at the corners. Brown is its hue, and it spans scarce four hands in height. Plain it is, without decoration or adornment, for it was but crudely fashioned by the good Cappadocian Fathers.”
“So,” I say. “I think maybe I have a notion. Wait here,” I tell him, “and improve your education.”

And I hand him a copy of a movie magazine. I go down to the cellar, and when I come up after a while, Sir Pallagyn comes clanking up to me, all excited.
“Pray, and who is this fair damsel?” he asks, pointing out a shot of Ann Sothern in a bathing suit. “She has verily the appearance of the Lady of the Lake,” he remarks. “Albeit with more... more—”
​
“You said it, Pal,” I agree. “Much more, in spades. But here—does this look like the table you’re after?” (72)
Sothern’s career was exploding at this point. She starred as Maisie Ravier, a Brooklyn showgirl with more than a few rough edges, in several films, including Congo Maisie (1940) and Gold Rush Maisie (also 1940) which feature Sothern romping all over the world solving problems and beating the odds. She was just getting started. Her TV career would be long and successful. Indeed, she was one of the biggest stars in the early days of that medium.