Jewel of The Java Sea

Jewel of The Java Sea by Dan Cushman. Dougherty is a huge man, ex football player from San Francisco, but years in the Java Sea islands has hardened him even more. He is a lover of music, a piano player, a geologist, and seller of weapons, drugs or women. He’s hoping to make a big score and return to his beloved San Francisco. That may just happen when he buys a diamond from a flyer. It appears the diamond may be from a larger batch, worth a lot of money, and if an American killer and the Chinese gang don’t kill him, and the women don’t play him false, he might make that rich deal finally. This is a nice tale, with a number of twists. There are several beautiful native women, but he doesn’t know if he can trust any of them. The author got his start in pulp magazines, writing jungle and South Sea stories for JUNGLE STORIES and ADVENTURE. Although he turned his hand to westerns, it is still these adventure novels that are his best.