Mr. and Mrs. Dove, Katherine Mansfield

by Patti Abbott

#99 PA
This is a beautifully written if slightly enigmatic story of a young couple. Reggie, is going abroad to run a fruit farm in Rhodesia, and trying to get up the nerve to propose. The girl compares their relationship to two doves, where the female takes the lead, seemingly laughing at the male who follows. She says she can never marry him because she finds him humorous, an unattractive trait in a potential husband. . And yet, she can’t let him go either.

The Gun Also Rises by Jeffrey Cohen

by Barb Goffman

From the January/February 2011 issue of Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine

80/366

Freelance reporter Aaron Tucker has two mysteries to solve: Was foul play involved in the death of a local minor-league pitcher? And who planted a water gun on his son at school, earning the boy a two-day suspension?

This story is a finalist for this year’s Derringer Award in the Novelette category.

Death At Stonehenge by Norma Schier

by Arun

Theme: Authors from the pages of AHMM

Source: Alfred Hitchcock’s Tales to Make You Quake And Quiver

Story Number: 92

The name of Norma Schier rang a bell but couldn’t place it till a simple Google search gave me the result – she has authored a series of stories under various fictitious names, the anagram of the name corresponding to one of the great practitioners of the genre and the story itself  being a pastiche of  that author and the detective that he/she created .  All these stories have been collected in the volume The Anagram Detectives. This story written in 1969 is a late entry in the author’s output though it looks like a deviation from the stories featured in the anagram puzzles.

Chief Inspector Harlan Faulkner is called in to investigate the death of Felicity Carmichael, an archaeologist who was assisting the research activity at the Stonehenge site. The body at the Stonehenge site looks as though she was being sacrificed as part of a ritual but the Inspector who is extremely knowledgeable in the matter knows that the scene has been set up by a person of somewhat cracked brain.

Her  husband believes that she was having an affair with her fellow research scientist Donat but Donat claims that it was strictly a professional relationship. Donat has an alibi for the time of the crime – he was with another lady who also happens to be the consulting psychologist for Felicity. The clues are fairly provided for the reader to arrive at the solution before the Inspector lays his trap to nab the murderer – a person whose characteristics have been well anticipated by the Inspector!

Martin For The Defense by Jaime Sandaval

by Arun

Theme: Authors from the pages of AHMM

Source: Alfred Hitchcock’s Tales to Make You Quake And Quiver

Story Number: 91

Jaime Sandaval was a pseudonym used by Dan J. Marlowe for a group of detective short stories that appeared in Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine, Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine and Mike Shayne’s Mystery Magazine. This story is a pure court-room drama in the tradition of a Perry Mason story but without the dramatics of the famous lawyer sleuth.

Martin is a lawyer who won’t take a case without a retainer. Mickey Bananas has an earlier conviction for burglary and this time, the charge is grand larceny for stealing an oil painting from a cathedral supposed to be worth two hundred thousand dollars. Defending Mickey seems to be a pretty hopeless situation as there are six witnesses, all nuns, who saw him steal the painting and he was later caught red-handed with the booty on him. The only alternative left for Martin is to prove that the painting was a forgery which would throw the grand larceny case out of the court. But he is in for a surprise when the prosecution brings in a star witness, a witness who valued the painting before it was donated to the cathedral, a witness who has around 20 years of experience in analyzing Italian oil paintings, a witness who happens to have written the only manuscript on the topic. It is a battle of the legal mind versus the expertise of the art critic and the appraiser – and as in so many court room procedurals, it’s no wonder as to what the outcome would be but it’s still a jolly good ride to see another expert fall prey to the guiles of a defense lawyer!

“the Petting Zoo” by Peter De Niverville

by kattomic

“The Petting Zoo” by Peter De Niverville

04.04.12

Story 94/366

De Niverville is a man of many talents. A writer and reviewer, he has indie-published three cookbooks and started a YouTube channel for his animation. “The Petting Zoo” is his first published short story.The story won’t surprise you—you can see the denouement coming from a mile away—but it’s still creepily effective, especially if you dislike spiders. You can read the story here.

See you tomorrow!