"But Your Tongue Slipped"

"If Christmas Comes."

By Steve Fisher (1912-80; Wikipedia HERE; the IMDb HERE; Paperback Warrior HERE; and The Thrilling Detective HERE).

Tony Key No. 4.

First appearance: Detective Fiction Weekly, December 25, 1937.

Reprinted in:

  Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine #14, January 1944 (today's text) and November/December 2024.

  Silver Screams, 1994

  Murder at Eight, 2024.

Short story (13 pages.)

Online at The Luminist Archives (HERE; go to text page 5.)

(Note: Some text clipped but interpretable.)

   "You are sweet on her, aren't you?"

THE GLITZ AND GLAMOR of Yuletide Hollywood suffer a temporary dimming when a walking dead man is found on the floor of a drugstore—done in, appropriately enough, with poison. Since the victim had a movie studio connection, being an assistant film cutter, Tony Key is on the scene. Ostensibly a freelance Hollywood agent, Tony is more than most people suspect, his real job being "to put a heavy foot on the Hollywood crime wave in picture circles." (Why are we not surprised that there is such a thing?) In the end, as Tony already suspects, it's the green-eyed monster that put the victim on the floor of that pharmacy. Even at Christmastime, some things never change . . .

Main characters:

~ William Blake ("stared glassily up and past us at some Christmas tinsel on the ceiling"), Tony Key ("the world's highest paid detective"), Ben Thompson ("I am fine, who is dead?"), Betty Gale ("Merry Christmas to a corpse"), Mickey Ryan ("a bantam-weight guy with gray hair wandering around the store"), Stella Matthews ("It was something in the past that I thought I could bury and forget"), Roger West ("like Clark Gable, was one of the really big stars"), and Wilt Davis ("Yes, I disliked Bill Blake," he said, "that isn't news").

Typo: "lavendar".

Comment: Offhand, we can think of a couple of other authors have also used the epistolary technique to tell crime stories: Dorothy L. Sayers (HERE) and Lawrence G. Blochman (HERE and HERE).

References and resources:

- "even Garbo":

  "Greta Garbo (born Greta Lovisa Gustafsson; 1905–1990) was a Swedish-American actress and a premier star during Hollywood's silent and early golden eras. Regarded as one of the greatest screen actresses of all time, she was known for her melancholic and somber screen persona, her film portrayals of tragic characters, and her subtle and understated performances." (Wikipedia HERE.)

  Apart from Greta, our author namedrops some of the most famous Hollywood celebrities. Many links to Wikipedia:

  Marie Dressler (HERE)

  Jean Harlow (HERE)

  Rudolph Valentino (HERE)

  Lillian (Lilyan) Tashman (HERE)

  Mickey Mouse (HERE), the same rodent who was also a suspect in another murder (HERE).

  Lionel Barrymore (HERE). While he played a well-known French detective (HERE), his brother portrayed a better-known English sleuth (HERE).

  Mae West (HERE)

  Clark Gable (HERE)

  Luise Rainer (HERE).

- "it isn't Hollywood Boulevard then, it is Santa Claus Lane":

  "The Hollywood Christmas Parade (formerly the Hollywood Santa Parade and Santa Claus Lane Parade) is an annual parade held on the Sunday after Thanksgiving in Hollywood, Los Angeles, California. It follows a 3.5-mile (5.6 km) route along Hollywood Boulevard, then back along Sunset Boulevard, featuring various celebrities. Traditionally, Santa Claus appears at the end." (Wikipedia HERE.)

- "Hollywood's most prolific scenario writer":

  "In the silent era, screenwriters were denoted by terms such as photoplaywright, photoplay writer, photoplay dramatist, and screen playwright. Screenwriting historian Steven Maras notes that these early writers were often understood as being the authors of the films as shown, and argues that they could not be precisely equated with present-day screenwriters because they were responsible for a technical product, a brief 'scenario,' 'treatment,' or 'synopsis' that is a written synopsis of what is to be filmed." (Wikipedia HERE.)

- "a little extra kid"; "cowboy extras":

  "A background actor or extra is a performer in a film, television show, stage, musical, opera, or ballet production who appears in a nonspeaking or nonsinging (silent) capacity, usually in the background (for example, in an audience or busy street scene). War films and epic films often employ background actors in large numbers: some films have featured hundreds or even thousands of paid background actors as cast members (hence the term 'cast of thousands'). Likewise, grand opera can involve many background actors appearing in spectacular productions." (Wikipedia HERE.)

- "tuned in Bing Crosby":

  Enormously popular, Crosby had a whole series of radio shows. When "If Christmas Comes" was first published, Der Bingle was two years into an 11-year run on the Kraft Music Hall (1935-46):

  "Harry Lillis 'Bing' Crosby, Jr. (1903–77) was an American singer and actor. The first multimedia star, he was one of the most popular and influential musical artists of the 20th century worldwide. Crosby was a leader in record sales, network radio ratings, and motion picture grosses from 1926 to 1977. He was one of the first global cultural icons. Crosby made over 70 feature films and recorded more than 1,600 songs." (Wikipedia HERE.)

- "swell copy for Winchell":

  "Walter Winchell (1897–1972) was a syndicated American newspaper gossip columnist and radio news commentator. Originally a vaudeville performer, Winchell began his newspaper career as a Broadway reporter, critic and columnist for New York tabloids. He rose to national celebrity in the 1930s with Hearst newspaper chain syndication and a popular radio program. He was known for an innovative style of gossipy staccato news briefs, jokes, and Jazz Age slang. Biographer Neal Gabler claimed that his popularity and influence 'turned journalism into a form of entertainment.'

  "He uncovered both hard news and embarrassing stories about famous people by exploiting his exceptionally wide circle of contacts, first in the entertainment world and the Prohibition era underworld, then in law enforcement and politics." (Wikipedia HERE.)

- "another film cutter":

  "The film editor works with raw footage, selecting shots and combining them into sequences which create a finished motion picture. Film editing is described as an art or skill, the only art that is unique to cinema, separating filmmaking from other art forms that preceded it, although there are close parallels to the editing process in other art forms such as poetry and novel writing. Film editing is an extremely important tool when attempting to intrigue a viewer. When done properly, a film's editing can captivate a viewer and fly completely under the radar. Because of this, film editing has been given the name 'the invisible art'." (Wikipedia HERE.)

- "I Get That Old Feeling"; "The Lady Is a Tramp":

  "'That Old Feeling' is a popular song about nostalgia written by Sammy Fain, with lyrics by Lew Brown. It was published in 1937." (Wikipedia HERE.)

  "'The Lady Is a Tramp' is a show tune from the 1937 Rodgers and Hart musical Babes in Arms, in which it was introduced by former child star Mitzi Green. This song is a spoof of New York high society and its strict etiquette (the first line of the verse is 'I get too hungry for dinner at eight...') and phony social pretensions. It has become a popular music standard." (Wikipedia HERE.)

- "a Bromo":

  "Bromo-Seltzer is mentioned in several films and TV shows, including The Crooked Circle (1932), Bed of Roses (1933), Topper (1937), Wonder Man (1945), Somewhere in the Night (1946), The Postman Always Rings Twice (1981), The Hudsucker Proxy (1994), the 1998 The Simpsons episode 'Bart Carny,' and in Golden Girls (Season 4, Episode 1).

  "It is mentioned in John Steinbeck's 1939 novel The Grapes of Wrath.

  "Drugstore Bromo-Seltzer dispensers are mentioned in Georges Simenon's 1949 detective novel Maigret chez le coroner that takes place in Arizona.

  "It is mentioned in several songs, including 'Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered' by Rodgers and Hart, 'Adelaide's Lament' in the musical Guys and Dolls, and 'Pachuco Cadaver' by Captain Beefheart and his Magic Band. In Spike Jones' version of Laura, the chorus chants 'Bromo-Seltzer, Bromo-Seltzer...' to evoke the sound of a chugging train." (Wikipedia HERE.)

- Steve Fisher's Tony Key stories (FictionMags data; ss = short story, nv = novelette):

  "Murder Game—With Mirrors," (ss) Detective Fiction Weekly, May 15, 1937

  "Batten Down That Killer," (nv) Detective Fiction Weekly, June 19, 1937 (online HERE)

  "Mystery at Malibu," (ss) Detective Fiction Weekly, November 20, 1937

  "If Christmas Comes," (ss) Detective Fiction Weekly, December 25, 1937 (above)

  "Me and Mickey Mouse," (nv) Detective Fiction Weekly, January 22, 1938

  "Hollywood Party," (ss) Black Mask, June 1938

  "The Glamour and the Glory," (ss) Detective Fiction Weekly, September 3, 1938

  "Pennies on Your Eyes," (ss) Detective Fiction Weekly, October 22, 1938

  "Goodbye to Hollywood," (nv) Detective Fiction Weekly, December 10, 1938

  "Cinderella Wore Black," (ss) Detective Fiction Weekly, April 19, 1941

  "Rain in Hollywood," (nv) Detective Fiction Weekly, July 26, 1941

  Murder at Eight, 2024 (collection).

- Our only previous encounter with Steve Fisher seems to have been the short-short-short tale, "Listen to Reason" (HERE).

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

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~