"There Is Perfection in the Detection of Crime"

"The Perfect Crime."

By Ben Ray Redman (1896-1961; ISFDb HERE; Saturday Review obit at UNZ HERE; Goodreads list HERE).

First appearance: Harper's, August 1928 (online HERE; go to text page 350).

Reprinted in EQMM, July 1951 (today's text).

Other reprints:

 The World’s Best One Hundred Detective Stories, Volume 5 (1929)

 101 Years’ Entertainment (1941)

 Rex Stout Mystery Magazine #4, March 1946

 Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine (Australia) #51, September 1951

 Mystery Digest, September 1958

 Suspense (Australia), February 1959

 Suspense (U.K.), February 1959

 Crimes and Clues (1978)

 The Best American Mystery Stories of the Century (2000)

 Murder Short & Sweet (2008).

Filmed in 1957 as an episode of the Alfred Hitchcock Presents TV series (WARNING! SPOILERS! IMDb HERE).

Short story (14 pages).

Online at The Luminist Archives (HERE; go to text page 93).

(Note: Text magnification might be necessary.)

   "He seemed to have something up his sleeve."

AS WE'VE NOTED before, the perfect crime requires the perfect criminal. The perfect criminal requires perfect knowledge. And, since perfect knowledge lies beyond the reach of us ordinary mortals, there can be no perfect crime or even the conception of one. But that doesn't stop egotistical individuals from trying. Take the killer in a classic movie who justifies himself, at least to his own satisfaction: "I've always wished for more artistic talent. Well, murder can be an art, too. The power to kill can be just as satisfying as the power to create"—which exactly echoes the master detective in our story: "the perfect crime must be a work of art, not of necessity." It's too bad that this detective mistakes a crime of passion for a work of art; if he hadn't, he would have saved himself from having to act out "of necessity," and a life would have been spared . . .

Principal characters:

~ Dr. Harrison Trevor ("The world's greatest detective"), Gregory Hare ("eminent criminal lawyer"), Ernest West (deceased), Alice West ("Oh, yes, his wife, gorgeous woman"), Harrington ("He eliminated West"), and Inspector Furst ("still toyed with the idea that it might not have been murder").

References:

- "in one of Pindar's odes":

  "Pindar was the first Greek poet to reflect on the nature of poetry and on the poet's role. His poetry illustrates the beliefs and values of Archaic Greece at the dawn of the Classical period. Like other poets of the Archaic Age, he has a profound sense of the vicissitudes of life, but he also articulates a passionate faith in what men can achieve by the grace of the gods." (Wikipedia HERE.)

- "sitting in the electric chair":

  "The electric chair is a specialized device used for capital punishment through electrocution. The condemned is strapped to a custom wooden chair and electrocuted via electrodes attached to the head and leg. Alfred P. Southwick, a Buffalo, New York dentist, conceived this execution method in 1881. It was developed over the next decade as a more humane alternative to conventional executions, particularly hanging. First used in 1890, the electric chair became symbolic of this execution method." (Wikipedia HERE.)

- "a heavy touring car":

  "Touring car and tourer are both terms for open cars (i.e. cars without a fixed roof). 'Touring car' is a style of open car built in the United States which seats four or more people. The style was popular from the early 1900s to the 1930s. . . .Touring car was applied in the U.S. to open cars (cars without a fixed roof, for example convertibles) that seat four or more people and have direct entrance to the tonneau (rear passenger area), although it has also been described as seating five or more people. Touring cars may have two or four doors, and the drivetrain layouts of early touring cars was either front- or mid-engined." (Wikipedia HERE.)

- "the public hack":

  "Hack is short for hackney (from the Middle English hakeney), which at one time described a horse of average size, used for regular riding—as distinct from stronger horses used for hauling or in war. . . . Hack as a vehicle for hire was established by the 19th century." (Merriam-Webster.com. HERE.) Also see Wikipedia (HERE).

- "in the Street":

  That would be Wall Street:

  "The Wall Street area is home to the New York Stock Exchange, the world's largest stock exchange by total market capitalization, as well as the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, and commercial banks and insurance companies. Several other stock and commodity exchanges have also been located in Lower Manhattan near Wall Street, including the New York Mercantile Exchange and other commodity futures exchanges, along with the NYSE American. Many brokerage firms owned offices nearby to support the business they did on the exchanges. The economic impacts of Wall Street activities extend worldwide." (Wikipedia HERE.)

- ".25 pearl-handled revolver":

  It could have been an automatic, not a revolver, since people loosely refer to any handgun as a "revolver." However:

  "The cartridge is of semi-rimmed design meaning that the rim protrudes slightly beyond the diameter of the base of the cartridge so the cartridge can headspace on the rim. This semi-rimmed design allows for it to be used in revolvers. Although rare, .25 ACP revolvers were produced in the early twentieth century by Belgian, French, and German gunmakers such as Adolph Frank and Decker." (Wikipedia HERE).

- "played dog-in-the-manger":

  "The story and metaphor of The Dog in the Manger derives from an old Greek fable which has been transmitted in several different versions. Interpreted variously over the centuries, the metaphor is now used to speak of one who spitefully prevents others from having something for which one has no use. Although the story was ascribed to Aesop's Fables in the 15th century, there is no ancient source that does so. Greek origin: The short form of the fable as cited by Laura Gibbs is: 'There was a dog lying in a manger who did not eat the grain, but who nevertheless prevented the horse from being able to eat anything either'." (Wikipedia HERE.)

"The Perfect Crime" - Alfred Hitchcock, James Gregory, and Vincent Price horsing around

The bottom line:

Unless otherwise noted, all bibliographical data are derived from The FictionMags Index created by William G. Contento & edited by Phil Stephensen-Payne.

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