"A Policeman Always Keeps His Eyes Open"

IT'S not that easy to commit . . .

"Crime on Mars."

(a.k.a. "Trouble with Time").

By Arthur C. Clarke (1917-2008; Wikipedia HERE; the ISFDb HERE; and the SFE HERE).

Reprints page as "Crime on Mars" (ISFDb HERE).

Reprints page as "Trouble with Time" (ISFDb HERE).

First appearance: Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, July 1960.

Short short short story (5 pages).

Online at SFFAudio (HERE) and (HERE).

   "No wonder the Goddess is the Solar System's Number One mystery."

HOW do you get away with stealing something when you're 140 million miles from Earth and there's only one way out? A pretty problem for our would-be thief . . .

Principal characters:

~ Detective-Inspector Rawlings, Mr. Maccar, Danny Weaver, and the unnamed narrator.

Typo: "near vaccum".

References (all are from Wikipedia):

- "Phobos" (HERE)

- "Meridian" (HERE); "International Date Line" (HERE)

- "you might as well steal the Mona Lisa" (HERE); "That's happened too" (HERE)

- "Late Canal Period" (HERE)

Sorry. No canals here.

- "a man will die in seconds without protection" (HERE)

- "the Syrtis Major" (HERE)

- "Mars Years" (HERE)

- "the Yard" (HERE).

Resources:

- Here is FictionMags's list of reprints for "Crime on Mars"/"Trouble with Time":

  Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine (Australia) #159, September 1960

  Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine (U.K.) #92, September 1960

  Ellery Queen’s 16th Mystery Annual, 1961

  The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, June 1961

  The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction (U.K.), October 1961

  Tales of Ten Worlds, 1962, as "Trouble with Time"

  Introducing SF: A Science Fiction Anthology, 1964, as "Trouble with Time"

  The Nine Billion Names of God, 1967, as "Trouble with Time"

  Ellery Queen’s Minimysteries, 1969

  Quickie Thrillers, 1975

  The Gourmet Crook Book, 1976

  Masterpieces of Mystery: The Sixties, 1978

  The Evening News Collection (2), 1991, as "Trouble with Time"

  More Than One Universe, 1991, as "Trouble with Time"

  Cyber-Killers, 1997

  Cyber-Killers, 1998

  The Collected Stories, 2001, as "Trouble with Time"

  Fourth Planet from the Sun, 2005.

- One of Arthur C. Clarke's stories was, mirabile dictu, performed on live TV, no less, back in the fifties; see Mystery*File (HERE).

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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"You Can't Prove Anything from a Score Card or the Fingerprints on a Golf Club."

"Tee Shot."

By Tom Robertson (?-?).

First appearance: Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, July 1960.

Short short short story (3 pages).

Online at SFFAudio (HERE).

   "Only now every move he made to finish this game took me that much nearer to disaster."

"GOLF," Winston Churchill once observed, "is a game whose aim is to hit a very small ball into an ever smaller hole, with weapons singularly ill-designed for the purpose." "Weapons," he says. Hmmm . . .

Main characters:

~ Graybow, Harry Jackson, Johnny Taliferro, Lorene, and Abe Joseph.

References (all are from Wikipedia):

- "the long fairway" (HERE)

- "Embezzlement" (HERE).

Resources:

- "Tee Shot" is Tom Robertson's only story on the FictionMags list.

- There's one particular Agatha Christie Hercule Poirot short story that also involves factors which figure into today's tale (WARNING! SPOILERS! The IMDb HERE) and (Archive.org HERE).

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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"Mind You, There Was a Slight Technical Glitch"

"A Matter of Antimatter."

By Ron Friedman (the ISFDb HERE and Webpage HERE).

First appearance: Polar Borealis, July-August 2016.

Short short short story (2 pages).

Online (HERE; go to pages 13-14).

   "That wasn't in the contract I signed."

WHEN you agree to a contract, try as you might, it's virtually impossible to anticipate all of the ramifications. Just ask Jeff . . .

Principal characters:

~ Jeff, Tim, and Commander Peterson.

References (all from Wikipedia):

- "antimatter" (HERE)

- "EVA" (HERE)

- "hologram" (HERE)

- "A.I." (HERE)

- "Houston" (HERE)

- "microgravity" (HERE)

- "Titan" (HERE)

- "multiverse" (HERE).

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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"That Doesn’t Look Much Like Self-defense. It Looks Like Murder."

WHAT HAPPENS when an accomplished musician turns to writing classic detective fiction? You get little gems like . . .

(1) "Death and Aunt Fancy."

By Edmund Crispin (Robert Bruce Montgomery, 1921-78; Wikipedia HERE and the GAD Wiki HERE).

Gervase Fen No. 16.

First appearance: The Evening Standard, February 26, 1953.

Reprinted in Collier's, April 25, 1953 (today's text).

Illustration by Anthony Saris (1924-2011).

Collected in Fen Country, 1979.

Other reprints:

  John Creasey’s Mystery Bedside Book, 1969

  Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine, December 1974

  “We Know You’re Busy Writing . . .”: The Collected Short Stories of Edmund Crispin, 2023.

Short short short story (1 page).

Online at UNZ (HERE).

   "I don't know what she wants, you see. I don't know why she's doing this."

Main characters:

~ George Gotobed, Miss Preedy, Aunt Fancy, and Dawkins (in absentia).

(2) "The Unloaded Gun."

(a.k.a. "Humbleby Agonistes.")

By Edmund Crispin (1921-78).

Gervase Fen No. 4.

First appearance: The Evening Standard, October 16, 1950.

Reprinted in The Saint Detective Magazine, September 1955 (today's text).

Collected in Beware of the Trains, 1953, as "Humbleby Agonistes."

Short short story (7 pages).

Online at Archive.org (HERE).

   "Everything about the affair fits and is quite innocent, excepting just one thing."

Main characters:

~ Detective-Inspector Humbleby, Gervase Fen, Garstin-Walsh, Jourdain, Saul Brebner, and Weems.

References:

- "like pneumoconiosis in coalmining" (Wikipedia HERE).

- "the first war" (Wikipedia HERE).

- "batman" (Wikipedia HERE).

- "there’s no such thing as attempted manslaughter" (Wikipedia HERE).

- "delayed shock, or post-traumatic automatism" (Wikipedia HERE).

- "John Wilkes Booth, who assassinated Lincoln" (Wikipedia HERE).

- "Gross (Wikipedia HERE) and Taylor and Sydney Smith (Wikipedia HERE)."

Resources:

- Wikipedia has an article about Gervase Fen (HERE).

- TV's mildest-mannered detective also encountered a case involving an incriminating bullet hole in the wall (WARNING! SPOILERS! The Columbophile Blog HERE).

- We've visited rather extensively with Edmund Crispin several times: The Moving Toyshop (HERE), Fen Country (HERE), and Beware of the Trains (HERE).

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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"Disaster Was Indiscriminate. And It Had Taken Murder Out of My Hands."

(1) "The Shock."

By C. K. M. Scanlon.

First appearance: Popular Detective, October 1936.

Short short short story (1 page).

Online at The Pulpgen Archive (HERE).

   "Perfect crime? Far from it!"

YOUR mama probably never said there'd be days like this:

  "Without warning the floor beneath me cracked open like a coconut rind. A savage, rending sound, magnified into distance, pressed about my eardrums. The walls cavorted and split, and shattering glass exploded like doom opening for the cohorts of hell. Screams rose up all around me. A weight dropped loose from the suddenly cobwebbed ceiling, and my head took the full impact. I lost consciousness at once...."

Principal characters:

~ Inspector Shelting, Randolph, Tess, the head physician, and the unnamed narrator.

References:

- "Long Beach, California" (Wikipedia HERE).

- "Catalina Island" (Wikipedia HERE).

- "the strength of a Samson among the Philistines" (Wikipedia HERE).

- "March 11th, 1933" (Wikipedia HERE).

(2) "Filed in Person."

By C. K. M. Scanlon.

First appearance: Popular Detective, February 1939.

Short short short story (1 page).

Online at The Pulpgen Archive (HERE).

(Parental note: Mild profanity.)

   "There was the scrape of a match and a soft gasp from the girl. It was now or never."

THE D.A. gets conked, a material witness gets menaced, and a desperado gets buzzed. Case closed . . .

Principal characters:

~ John Barstow, Diana Wayne, and Gunner Overholt.

Resource:

- "C. K. M. Scanlon" didn't just write fiction but was "himself" a fiction. A story with the Scanlon byline could have been by any of the following, as FictionMags informs us:

  Scanlon, C. K. M. (fl. 1930s-1950s); house pseudonym used by Joe Archibald (1898-1986), W. T. Ballard (1903-1980), Robert Sidney Bowen (1900-1977), D. L. Champion (1902-1968), Edward Churchill (1902-1960), Ray Cummings (1887-1957), Tom Curry (1900-1976), Norman A. Daniels (1905-1995), Lester Dent (1904-1959), Laurence Donovan (1885-1948), George Fielding Eliot (1894-1971), Whitney Ellsworth (1908-1980), G. T. Fleming-Roberts (1910-1968), Charles Greenberg (fl. 1920s-1960s), Frank Gruber (1904-1969), Donald Bayne Hobart (1898-1970), Henry Kuttner (1915-1958), Johnston McCulley (1883-1958), George A. McDonald (fl. 1920s-1940s), Sam Merwin, Jr. (1910-1996), Frank Philipp (fl. 1990s), Jean Francis Webb (1910-1991) & Manly Wade Wellman (1903-1986).

- Previous Scanlon stories that caught ONTOS's attention: "Footprints" and "Blood for Breakfast" (both HERE) and "Page the Murderer" (HERE).

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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"Yonder Is the Wolf That Makes This Spoil"

"Wolf in the Fold."
Story by Robert Bloch (1917-94; Wikipedia HERE; the ISFDb HERE; the SFE HERE; and the IMDb HERE).
Adapted by James Blish (1921-75; Wikipedia HERE; the ISFDb HERE; the SFE HERE; and the IMDb HERE).
First appearance: Star Trek 8, 1972.

Reprints page (ISFDb HERE).

Novelette (32 pages).
Online at Archive.org (HERE).

   "The viewer was a riot of changing colors. Figures began to emerge from them. Serpents writhed through pentagons. Naked women, hair streaming behind them, rode astride the shaggy backs of goats. Horned beasts pranced with toads. Rivers boiled, steaming. Above them, embraced bodies drifted down fiery winds. Human shoulders, pinioned under rocks, lifted pleading arms. Then the red glow, shedding its bloody mist over the screen, gave way to the deathly whiteness of a cold, unending snow. Up from the glacial landscape rose a towering three headed shape, its mouths agape with gusts of silent laughter. A cross, upturned, appeared beside it. The shape crawled up it, suspending itself upon it in an unspeakable travesty of the crucifixion. Its vast, leathery wings unfolded . . ."

A therapeutic shore leave turns into a nightmare for Mr. Scott when he becomes the prime suspect in not one, not two, but three murders. And he's as prime as a suspect gets, being found in every case hovering over the victims with the murder weapon in his hand. For Kirk, Spock, and Dr. McCoy it's going to take some real doing to clear their friend . . .

Main characters:
~ Kara, Scott, Kirk, McCoy, Mr. Hengist, Jaris, Sybo, Karen Tracy, Tark, Morla, Spock, 

Boratis—Kesla—Redjac, Tancris, Sulu, the nurse, and the Transporter Chief.

(Our title is from Henry VI, Part 3, Act 5, Scene 4.)

References:
- "Venusberg" (Wikipedia HERE)
- "The few polyesters" (Wikipedia HERE)
- "fleshpots" (Merriam-Webster HERE).

Resource:
- Well over a decade ago we dealt with the TV episode (HERE).

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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"Anyone Knows You Don't Go Buck-Hunting with the Idea of Killing a Man"

MURDER is usually an indoor sport, but today's two tales of misadventure take us into the Great Outdoors . . .

(1) "Blood Money."

By Owen Cameron (1902-60).

First appearance: Collier's, September 6, 1952.

Illustrated by Saul Tepper (1899-1987; Wikipedia HERE).

Short short short story (3 pages).

Online at Archive.org starting (HERE; page 48) and finishing (HERE; pages 50-51).

   "He was about sixty feet off when I reached into the pickup, and got my rifle and shot him. In the head. I didn’t think, just pulled the trigger; and he kind of jerked and laid over the saddle horn and stayed like that a minute and then slid sideways without ever saying a word."

THEY may all be neighbors but that doesn't necessarily make them friends, and one of them is a murderer . . .

Principal characters:

~ Clyde Matson, Ruth Matson, Lloyd Fells, Joe Gruber, Jake Metterman, Hap Powell, Adam Burns, Parker, and Milly Powell.

(2) "The Quick and the Dead."

By Owen Cameron (1902-60).

First appearance: EQMM, May 1945.

Reprints:

  Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine “Overseas Edition for the Armed Forces” #22, May 1945.

  Shocking Tales, 1946.

  Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine (Australia) #27, September 1949.

Short short short story (3 pages).

Online at The Luminist Archives (HERE; go to text pages 96-98).

   "Too slow, I'm always too slow."

THEY say that guns don't kill people; people kill people. Basically it's often just a matter of finding the right occasion . . .

Principal characters:

~ Ed May and Clarence.

Reference:

- "a .300 Savage" (Wikipedia HERE).

Resource:

- FictionMags's thumbnail about Courtney Owen Cameron: "Born in Oregon; settled in California; short story writer and novelist."

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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