DON DAVIS

Don Davis is an agent with Military Intelligence.

Usually when someone is so identified, that person works for one of the branches of service, be it Army or Navy. In the case of Don Davis, he does not seem to care exactly which one he works for as sometimes he reports to Army Intelligence and other times it is Naval Intelligence that calls him in. He is so versatile, in fact, that at the beginning of his recorded adventures, he resigns his post with the U.S. government and heads to Europe to help in their war efforts (that did not last long, though, as he is soon requested back home). From then on he seems to float between bureaus with him reporting to the Navy for one mission and then the Army for another, then on to just the War Department and finally for a while he gets his orders from the F.B.I. He even gets called in by the Secret Service for a mission and towards the end of his recorded missions, the State Department makes use of his talents. His last mission has him reporting the his boss at 'Espionage Service Headquarters'. Who exactly he works for is never specified.

Davis is shown to be a very fit man in his late 20s or early 30s. He has wavy brown hair and a strong chin. He is fond of smoking a pipe and many a briefing is displayed with him puffing away.

In at least one adventure he is described by would-be kidnappers as being "strong as a bull" which might be true because it took three bad guys to subdue him. He is quick to action and prone to pounding people on the jaw to get their attention. He is also very susceptible to being hit on the back of the head as it happens an impressive number of times.

We get no insight in all the many stories there are about him into his history or his personal life. At the beginning, he is referenced as being a lieutenant (almost certainly Army) but that title is not used again after he returns from England. Since he is never shown in uniform unless he is undercover, it is likely he is a civil servant for most of his missions. As to his activities outside of work, we learn nothing whatsoever. We know he is always immaculately dressed in suit and tie (but then so are the bad guys usually) and we know that he can catch the eye of the occasional woman but he seems much to busy to be interested (except for that young lady in Warsaw!).

One mildly interesting quirk of Davis is his introducing himself as "Davis of the Intelligence" - the use of the definite article "the" seems oddly out of place but the rest of his manner of speech, taciturn though it is, is normal.

Many writers develop a pattern to storytelling; in romance novels it is often boy-meets-girl, boy-get-girl, boy-loses-girl, boy-gets-girl-back, the-end. In spy thrillers there are several different repeat sequences like op-tracks-villain, op-loses-villain, op-track-villain, op-captures-villain. Another one that habitually annoys me is op-tracks-villain, op-gets-captured, op-gets-away, op-gets-recaptured, op-gets-away, op-captures-villain.

For the Don Davis stories, regardless of for whom he is working that particular mission, it is Davis-gets-to-scene, Davis-slugs-someone, Davis-gets-knocked-out, Davis-gets-up, Davis-shoots-villain, Davis-wins. Just about every one of the 30+ adventures goes like that. Locales vary as do who is being sought but ol' Don is gonna slug somebody and somebody else is gonna bean him with a chair, sure as little green apples. Back then they never talked about concussions and the relatively new buzz term I hear watching football, chronic traumatic encephalopathy. If they had mentioned it, Davis would have been the poster child.