Thomas Godfrey (Ed)

by Murder for Christmas

  Edited by Thomas Godfrey

  Illustrated by Gahan Wilson

  Castle books

  This edition published in 2007 by CASTLE BOOKS a division of Book Sales, Inc., 114 Northfield Avenue, Edison, New Jersey 08837

  This edition published by arrangement with and permission of Otto Penzler LLC, 58 Warren Street, New York, New York 10007

  Copyright © 1982 by The Mysterious Press All cartoons copyright © by Gahan Wilson

  Originally published in 1982 by the Mysterious Press.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

  Grateful acknowledgment is made for permission to reprint the following:

  “Back for Christmas” by John Collier. Copyright © by John Collier. Reprinted by permission of A. D. Peters & Co. Ltd.

  “Mr. Big” by Woody Allen. Copyright © by Woody Allen. Reprinted by permission of Random House, Inc.

  “The Adventure of the Christmas Pudding” (The Theft of the Royal Ruby). Copyright © 1960 by Agatha Christie, Ltd., Copyright © 1961 by Christie Copyrights Trust. Reprinted by permission of Dodd, Mead & Company, Inc. from Double Sin and Other Stories by Agatha Christie.

  “Cambric Tea” by Marjorie Bowen. Copyright © by Gabrielle Margaret Vere Campbell Long. Reprinted by permission of Stella Jonckheere.

  “Death on Christmas Eve” by Stanley Ellin. Copyright © 1950 by Stanley Ellin. Reprinted by permission of Curtis Brown Ltd.

  “A Christmas Tragedy” by Baroness Orczy. Copyright © by Emmusra Orczy. Reprinted by permission of A. P. Watt & Son and the Estate of Baroness Orczy.

  “Silent Night” by Baynard Kendrick. Copyright © by Baynard Kendrick. Reprinted by permission of Collier Associates and Mrs. Baynard Kendrick.

  “The Stolen Christmas Box” by Lillian de la Torre. Copyright © 1945, 1973 by Lillian de la Torre. Reprinted by permission of Harold Ober Associates, Inc.

  “Death on the Air” by Ngaio Marsh. Copyright © 1947 by the American Mercury, Inc. Renewed 1975 by Ngaio Marsh. Reprinted by permission of Harold Ober Associates, Inc.

  “Inspector Ghote and the Miracle Baby” by H. R. F. Keating. Copyright © by H. R. F. Keating. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  “Maigret’s Christmas” by Georges Simenon. Translated by Lawrence Blochman, from A Treasury of Great Mysteries, ed. Haycraft and Beecroft, Simon & Schuster 1957. Copyright © 1951 by Georges Simenon and reprinted with his permission and Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich, Inc. acting on behalf of the author.

  “The Adventure of the Dauphin’s Doll” by Ellery Queen. Copyright © by Ellery Queen. Reprinted by permission of the author and the author’s agent, Scott Meredith Literary Agency, Inc., 845 Third Ave., New York, NY 10022.

  “The Necklace of Pearls” from Lord Peter by Dorothy L. Sayers. Copyright © 1933 by Dorothy Leigh Sayers Fleming. Renewed by Lloyd’s Bank Ltd., Executors. Reprinted by permission of Harper & Row Publishers, Inc.

  “Blind Man’s Hood” from The Department of Queer Complaints by Carter Dickson. Copyright © 1940 by William Morrow and Company, Inc. Renewed 1968 by John Dickson Carr. Reprinted by permission of William Morrow and Company.

  “Christmas is for Cops” by Edward D. Hoch. Copyright © by Edward D. Hoch. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  “The Case is Altered” by Margery Alllngham. Copyright © 1949 by Margery Allingham. Reprinted by permission of Paul R. Reynolds, Inc., 12 East 41st Street, New York, NY 10017.

  “Christmas Party” by Rex Stout. From And Four to Go by Rex Stout. Copyright © 1956, 1957 by Rex Stout. Reprinted by permission of Viking Penguin, Inc.

  “The Flying Stars” by G. K. Chesterton. Copyright © 1911 by Dodd, Mead & Company. Copyright renewed 1938 by Frances B. Chesterton. Reprinted by permission of Dodd, Mead & Company, Inc. from The Innocence of Father Brown by G. K. Chesterton.

  “Ring Out, Wild Bells” by D. B. Wyndham Lewis. Copyright © by D. B. Wyndham Lewis. Reprinted by permission of A. D. Peters Ltd.

  LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA

  Murder for Christmas/edited by Thomas Godfrey; illustrated by Gahan Wilson, p. cm

  1. Detective and mystery stories, English. 2. Detective and mystery stories, American. 3. Christmas stories, English. 4. Christmas stories, American. I. Godfrey, Thomas 1945-PR1309. D4M87 1989 823’. 087208—dc20 89-15190

  CIP

  ISBN-13: 978-0-7858-2307-0

  ISBN-10: 0-7858-2307-7

  Printed in the United States of America

  To

  Kathy

  The Best Thing that ever

  Happened to me

  Introduction

  Back for Christmas - John Collier

  Mr. Big - Woody Allen

  The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

  The Adventure of the Christmas Pudding - Agatha Christie

  II

  III

  IV

  V

  Dancing Dan’s Christmas - Damon Runyon

  Cambric Tea - Marjorie Bowen

  Death on Christmas Eve - Stanley Ellin

  A Christmas Tragedy - Baroness Orczy

  II

  III

  IV

  V

  Silent Night - Baynard Kendrick

  The Stolen Christmas Box - Lillian de la Torre

  A Chaparral Christmas Gift - O. Henry

  Death on the Air - Ngaio Marsh

  Inspector Ghote and the Miracle Baby - H. R. F. Keating

  Maigret’s Christmas - Georges Simenon

  To be Taken with a Grain of Salt - Charles Dickens

  The Adventure of The Dauphin’s Doll - Ellery Queen

  Markheim - Robert Louis Stevenson

  The Necklace of Pearls - Dorothy L. Sayers

  Blind Man’s Hood - Carter Dickson

  Christmas is for Cops - Edward D. Hoch

  The Thieves who Couldn’t Help Sneezing - Thomas Hardy

  The Case is Altered - Margery Allingham

  Christmas Party - Rex Stout

  II

  III

  IV

  V

  VI

  VII

  VIII

  IX

  The Flying Stars - G. K. Chesterton

  Mothers Milk - James Mines

  Ring Out, Wild Bells - D. B. Wyndham Lewis

  Introduction

  Come chill the cockles of your heart while such masters of evil as Agatha Christie, Ellery Queen and Robert Louis Stevenson spread the true Spirit of Christmas. Come warm your hands in the blazing Yuletide fire while John Dickson Carr, Dorothy L. Sayers and Thomas Hardy suggest ways to handle that hard-to-shop-for person on your list.

  Actually it was Charles Dickens who first realized the natural attraction of crime for Christmas when he was writing for Household Words and its successor All Year Round in the mid-nineteenth century. A Christmas Carol is his most famous seasonal tale, but there were others with more glorious wrongdoing, such as “To be Taken with a Grain of Salt,” the neglected gem in our volume. He has even provided us with a ghost. Obviously, the popularizer of “Christmas, bah humbug” knew he had latched on to a good thing.

  In some ways, Dickens was the founder of the English Country House School of Crime Writing. Later distinguished graduates included Baroness Emmuska Orczy (a foreign exchange student, ) Marjorie Bowen, Margery Allingham, Ngaio Marsh, Dorothy L. Sayers and Dame Agatha Christie, who graduated Summa cum Laudanum. The school made frequent Christmas assignments, and the ladies mentioned above are all represented by one of their distinguished
efforts.

  Christie, in fact, all but owned this institution at the time of her death. Her expressions of the season took a civilized and genteel form—poisoning, jewel robbery and an occasional well-placed knitting needle.

  On the other side of the Atlantic, the Christmas Crime story took a more rugged form. In a land that offered the delights of the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre, buffalo stampedes and Bonnie and Clyde, writers could hardly be expected to confine themselves to the pleasures of a cup of tea laced with strychnine. Consequently we find O. Henry’s “The Chapparal Christmas Gift” out on the plain, Damon Runyon’s “Dancing Dan’s Christmas” in downtown Manhattan, and Rex Stout’s Nero Wolfe at the most barbaric of American Christmas events, an office “Christmas Party.” A few colonial practitioners did stay close to the English format, as does James Mines’s “Mother’s Milk,” which appears for the first time in this collection.

  “Mother’s Milk” has a contemporary tone to it—a breath of fresh air that puts one in mind of packed shopping centers, post office lines, Santa Claus parades, and the quiet corners where Christmas lists are made and later regretted. Writers such as the late John Collier, in his “Back for Christmas,” and the American master Stanley Ellin, in “Death on Christmas Eve,” give us a sense of the tyranny of Christmas, depicting those familiar moments of silent desperation with a passion that only a great writer can summon.

  For another contemporary view, as well as a swipe at the hard-boiled school of mystery fiction, one need look no further than Woody Allen’s “Mr. Big.” Not the classic Christmas story perhaps. Not even a true Christmas story in the purest sense of the words, but “Mr. Big” does look at some basic modern day religious questions, and does reflect the tradition of giving it to your fellow man at this special time of the year.

  Baynard Kendrick’s “Silent Night” and Edward Hoch’s “Christmas is for Cops” represent the Christmas crime investigation story in two generations. The police procedural, as a distinct form, came into its own in the decade of social awareness that began in the early 1960’s. Hoch’s story reminds us that the police were not always well-liked, but they were a ready mirror for reflecting social phenomena. And they were not immune when the irresistible forces of crime and Christmas came together.

  For those readers demanding escape, John Dickson Carr, in “Blind Man’s Hood,” and Lillian de la Torre, in “The Stolen Christmas Box,” reach all the way back to Restoration and Georgian England, when people really dressed to kill. No duels here, unfortunately. Not even a good beheading, but other delights of the season abound: lying, stealing, cheating, gouging and—even—murder around the wassail bowl.

  “Markheim,” Robert Louis Stevenson’s classic tale of Christmas shopping, is here, as is an uncharacteristically light-hearted account of a juvenile detective by Thomas Hardy, “The Thieves Who Could Not Help Sneezing.” I trust that the discriminating reader will not be put off by this unexpected bit of seasonal ‘myrrth’ from a source who generally seemed to know better.

  A mixture of times is to be found in Ellery Queen’s “The Adventure of the Dauphin’s Doll,” a reminder that Christmas is, after all, for children, even if they are no longer around.

  For more seasonal malfeasance with an international flavor, the celebrated Belgian writer Georges Simenon provides “Maigret’s Christmas,” a stark Gallic offering that contrasts well with the American sweets and English savories found elsewhere in this volume. From Bombay comes an unusual Christmas tale featuring “Inspector Ghote and the Miracle Baby” by the distinguished English author and critic H. R. F. Keating.

  G. K. Chesterton’s Father Brown offers a last hope for the true believers, those select few still unjaded by the seasonal glut of credit card offers, bargain tinsel, and Christmas Muzak. “The Flying Stars” serves notice that crime does not always pay, even at Christmas. And could a traditional Christmas be traditional without the Master? Sherlock Holmes stars in one of his earliest and best cases, “The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle.”

  There you have it, twenty-five classic Christmas misadventures. And as a Boxing Day bonus, D. B. Wyndham Lewis’s Christmas crime story to end all Christmas crime stories, “Ring Out, Wild Bells.”

  Now, settle back. Relax. Forget that peculiar noise in your chimney. Ignore that odd aftertaste in the brandy. Don’t think about that strange red fluid dripping from one of the stockings on the mantlepiece. Disregard that heavy-breathing behind your chair. Read. Enjoy. And God help us every one.

  Thomas Godfrey

  Back for Christmas - John Collier

  Let us begin our Christmas criminologies at the end. The end of Hermione Carpenter, to be exact. Author John Collier was the master of the story of ordinary people suddenly caught up by a bitterly ironic turn of events, all told in a light, casual tone. Not surprisingly, film director Alfred Hitchcock was among Collier’s admirers. He popularized this type of writing in the movies and on television.

  It was the start of “black humor,” a form of expression that was very popular during the days of the Vietnamese War. Collier, along with Stanley Ellin, Roald Dahl and Robert Bloch, formed the Four Horsemen of Contemporary Crime Fiction, a quartet descended from film noir and Cornell Woolrich, that perfected a distinctive style of mystery-suspense writing that still prevails.

  “Back for Christmas” is a masterpiece of contradictions, a literary web that is both light and lethal, immoral and just, logical and absurd. It is as contemporary as the last election, yet more durable than any political career. Hitchcock adapted it for his television series, one of the few shows he directed himself. Ironically, Hitchcock’s name came to overshadow Collier’s, as it did all of the writers he worked with. Yet, even if one forgets the name John Collier, it is unlikely that he will ever forget “Back for Christmas.”

  “Doctor,” said Major Sinclair, “we certainly must have you with us for Christmas.” It was afternoon and the Carpenters’ living room was filled with friends who had come to say last-minute farewells to the Doctor and his wife.

  “He shall be back,” said Mrs. Carpenter. “I promise you.”

  “It’s hardly certain,” said Dr. Carpenter. “I’d like nothing better, of course.”

  “After all,” said Mr. Hewitt, “you’ve contracted to lecture only for three months.”

  “Anything may happen,” said Dr. Carpenter.

  “Whatever happens,” said Mrs. Carpenter, beaming at them, “he shall be back in England for Christmas. You may all believe me.”

  They all believed her. The Doctor himself almost believed her. For ten years she had been promising him for dinner parties, garden parties, committees, heaven knows what, and the promises had always been kept.

  The farewells began. There was a fluting of compliments on dear Hermione’s marvellous arrangements. She and her husband would drive to Southampton that evening. They would embark the following day. No trains, no bustle, no last-minute worries. Certainly the Doctor was marvellously looked after. He would be a great success in America. Especially with Hermione to see to everything. She would have a wonderful time, too. She would see the skyscrapers. Nothing like that in Little Godwearing. But she must be very sure to bring him back. “Yes, I will bring him back. You may rely upon it.” He mustn’t be persuaded. No extensions. No wonderful post at some super-American hospital. Our infirmary needs him. And he must be back by Christmas. “Yes,” Mrs. Carpenter called to the last departing guest, “I shall see to it. He shall be back by Christmas.”

  The final arrangements for closing the house were very well managed. The maids soon had the tea things washed up; they came in, said goodbye, and were in time to catch the afternoon bus to Devizes.

  Nothing remained but odds and ends, locking doors, seeing that everything was tidy. “Go upstairs,” said Hermione, “and change into your brown tweeds. Empty the pockets of that suit before you put it in your bag. I’ll see to everything else. All you have to do is not to get in the way.”

  The Doctor went upst
airs and took off the suit he was wearing, but instead of the brown tweeds, he put on an old, dirty bath gown, which he took from the back of his wardrobe. Then, after making one or two little arrangements, he leaned over the head of the stairs and called to his wife, “Hermione! Have you a moment to spare?”

  “Of course, dear. I’m just finished.”

  “Just come up here for a moment. There’s something rather extraordinary up here.”

  Hermione immediately came up. “Good heavens, my dear man!” she said when she saw her husband. “What are you lounging about in that filthy old thing for? I told you to have it burned long ago.”

  “Who in the world,” said the Doctor, “has dropped a gold chain down the bathtub drain?”

  “Nobody has, of course,” said Hermione. “Nobody wears such a thing.”

  “Then what is it doing there?” said the Doctor. “Take this flashlight. If you lean right over, you can see it shining, deep down.”

  “Some Woolworth’s bangle off one of the maids,” said Hermione. “It can be nothing else.” However, she took the flashlight and leaned over, squinting into the drain. The Doctor, raising a short length of lead pipe, struck two or three times with great force and precision, and tilting the body by the knees, tumbled it into the tub.

  He then slipped off the bathrobe and, standing completely naked, unwrapped a towel full of implements and put them into the washbasin. He spread several sheets of newspaper on the floor and turned once more to his victim.

  She was dead, of course—horribly doubled up, like a somersaulter, at one end of the tub. He stood looking at her for a very long time, thinking of absolutely nothing at all. Then he saw how much blood there was and his mind began to move again.

  First he pushed and pulled until she lay straight in the bath, then he removed her clothing. In a narrow bathtub this was an extremely clumsy business, but he managed it at last and then turned on the taps. The water rushed into the tub, then dwindled, then died away, and the last of it gurgled down the drain.

  “Good God!” he said. “She turned it off at the main.”