The Perry Mason of the Final Frontier

"Jurisdiction."

Kerry Dale No. 2.
By Nat Schachner (1895-1955).
Illustrations by Charles Schneeman (1912-72).
First appearance: Astounding Science Fiction, August 1941.
Novelette (28 pages, 3 illos).
Online at Archive.org (HERE).
(Note: Text is faded.)

     "Kerry Dale, sky-lawyer, proves a crook may be smart at sabotage, murder and assorted crime, but it takes a navigator to steal a sky-mine!"

Even in deep space in the 24th century, the meaning of "jurisdiction" hasn't changed: "The geographic area over which authority extends; legal authority; the authority to hear and 
determine causes of action." So why is the captain of a rickety tramp freighter the only 
one who seems to understand that?

Characters:
~ Simeon Kenton, head of Kenton Space Enterprises, Unlimited:
  "For a solid half-hour he coruscated and sizzled. His language lifted the temperature of the hotel room by ten degrees. His epithets were triumphs of twisted word compoundings."
~ Sally Kenton, his daughter:
  "She loved her irascible father, who was known to all and sundry as Old Fireball because of his habit of exploding on the slightest provocation. They might tilt at each other and parry deft strokes for the sheer intellectual joy of the thing, but underneath her slim, proud beauty there functioned a brain as keen and hard as the one that had propelled old Simeon to the commanding position he had achieved on the spaceways and in the industrial marts of the System."
~ Jericho Foote, President of Mammoth Exploitations:
  "The cane whistled and sang about Foote's ears, slashed his body, cut down his upflung arm, thumped across his back as he turned to flee. Foote screamed for help, yelled for mercy. But still the cane sang and danced."
~ Kerry Dale, owner-captain of the Flash:

  ". . . preferred to be on his own. A lone wolf, pitting his wits and skill against the men of power and money. They had sought to use his wits and skill at law for their own benefit. 

They had thought to suck him dry and then cast him aside. Well, he'd show them."

~ Jem, the Flash's exec:
  "This here salvage business ain't what it's cracked up to be."
~ Sparks:

  "All radio men ran to a pattern. They were slight and wiry and dried-out and birdlike in the brighness of their eyes and the quickness of their movements. This particular Sparks was 

no exception."

~ Captain Ball, of the Flying Meteor:
  "You mean you want to take an assignment of something that is valueless?"
~ Roger Horn, Chief of the Kenton Space Enterprises Legal Department:
  ". . . that dithering ass . . ."

Comment: Considering the fine build-up our author gives to Sally (see above), it's a shame nothing is done with it.
Typo: "Simon Kenton".

Resources:
- According to Wikipedia (HERE), Nathaniel Schachner trained as a lawyer, which would explain the character of Kerry Dale as well as his only SFF novel, Space Lawyer (1953; HERE), a fix-up of two Astounding novelettes, "Old Fireball" (June 1941) and "Jurisdiction" (August 1941), today's story. Because there are quite a few references to the earlier tale (to which we don't have access at the moment), you could get the feeling that you've missed out on something. If Schachner had intentions of continuing the Kerry Dale series, he never followed through with them since he gave up writing SFF full-time in 1941.

- See also the SFE (HERE) and the ISFDb bibliography (HERE).

- In addition, there's a small Nathan Schachner collection at Faded Page (HERE), which includes two of his biographies of early American historical figures.

- Real world science stuff mentioned in our story: Venus (HERE; assumed to be a jungle planet); Vesta (HERE); the asteroid belt (HERE); Jupiter (HERE); Ganymede (HERE); the Trojan asteroids (HERE); and the three-body problem (HERE; it's probably not what you think).
- Previous ONTOS posts about the trials and tribulations of space salvage and asteroid mining are (HERE), (HERE: "The Risk Profession"), and (HERE).

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"Was It Conceivable That Nobody Had Heard the Sound of the Shot?"

"Murder!"
By Arnold Bennett (1867-1931).
First appearance: Cassell’s Magazine, October 1927.

Reprints: Liberty, October 1, 1927; Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine, May 1942; EQMM (Australia), May 1949; and 

The Saint Detective Magazine, August 1956 (as "The 

Secret Murderer").

Collected in The Night Visitor and Other Stories (1931).
Novelette (14 pages as a PDF).
Online at Project Gutenberg Canada (HERE).

     "There is something to be said for murder, though perhaps not much."

A mercifully few men insist on being bloody-minded just for bloody-mindedness's sake, to such an extent, sometimes, that only a decimal 38 bullet from a Webley Mark III can offer a cure . . .

Characters:
~ Mr. Gontle:
  "'You see, the point about it is that until the breach is properly closed it cannot be fired. So that it can't blow open and maim or kill the would-be murderer.' Mr. Gontle smiled archly at one of his oldest jokes."
~ Lomax Harder:
  "I came down here specially to talk to you. I should have said all I had to say earlier, only you happened to be going out of the hotel just as I was coming in. You didn't seem to want to talk in the street; but there's some talking has to be done. I've a few things I must tell you."
~ John Franting:
  "He drew the revolver from his overcoat pocket, and held it up to view. 'You see this thing. You saw me buy it. Now you needn't be afraid. I'm not threatening you; and it's no part of 
my game to shoot you. I've nothing to do with your goings-on. What I have to do with is the goings-on of my wife. If she deserts me—for you or for anybody or for nobody—I shall follow her, whether it's to Copenhagen or Bangkok or the North Pole, and I shall kill her—with just this very revolver that you saw me buy. And now you can get out.'"
~ Dr. Austin Bond:
  "The detective-sergeant recoiled at the dazzling name of the great amateur detective, a genius who had solved the famous mysteries of 'The Yellow Hat,' 'The Three Towns,' 'The Three Feathers,' 'The Gold Spoon,' etc., etc., etc., whose devilish perspicacity had again and again made professional detectives both look and feel foolish, and whose notorious friend-ship with the loftiest heads of Scotland Yard compelled all police forces to treat him very politely indeed."
~ The Superintendent:
  ". . . hesitated. Why should the great amateur meddle with what did not concern him? Nobody had asked his help. But the Superintendent thought of the amateur's relations with Scotland Yard, and sent for the charwoman."
~ Emily Franting:
  "'I expect you were right,' she angelically acquiesced."

Comment: As always, plot is paramount in detective fiction, with characterization rightly subordinated to it; nevertheless, in "Murder!" Bennett proves that it's possible to integrate deeper characterization into a mystery short story's plot without completely spoiling the thing.

Resources:
- If you're fortunate enough (we're not) to have the April 1977 issue of The Armchair Detective, you might want to consult N. C. Ravenscroft's article, "Arnold Bennett — As a Writer of Crime Fiction." As of now, we have no idea what Mr. Ravenscroft's assessment was.

- Previous criminously-themed Arnold Bennett stories that we've highlighted are "The Christmas Eve Burglary" (HERE), "The Murder of the Mandarin" (HERE), and "Mr. Pen-
found's Two Burglars" (HERE); we're pretty sure that we're not through with him yet.

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Miscellaneous Monday—Number Twenty-nine

THIS ONE IS very miscellaneous indeed, comprised as it is of dribs and drabs that we've stumbled across in our random walk through the Interblab searching for vintage information about detective and crime fiction. One possible justification for highlighting them is the window into the life and times of our predecessors which such an approach affords, so you could regard it as of historical interest, if nothing else. Interestingly enough, however, we can't help noticing that even after a hundred years some things never change . . .
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"The Pleasures of Mystery."
By Anonymous (?-?).
First appearance: All the Year Round, July 7, 1894.
Article (4 pages).
Online at Hathi Trust (HERE).

In a general article about the quality of mystery in everyday life and art, our critic presents a picture of the detective fiction of the day that is basically a cliched caricature of the genre, the hokey melodrama of the stage rather than the brilliant mentation of a Sherlock Holmes:

   "The pleasures of life are all built on the element of mystery. Literature in its most enjoyable form, fiction, would not attract if on the first page of each novel the reader could ascertain in a moment what fate befell the hero of the book. That agreeable mystery must not be solved until the end of the third volume, or thereabouts. Who would read detective stories if there was no doubt about the criminal from the opening chapter? No; the innocent and virtuous hero must be charged with the crime, must be embroiled in perplexities and woes as biting as Ulysses's own, must seem doomed inevitably to the hangman, and only be rescued when the rope is, so to speak, round his neck, and all the world has ceased to believe in him, save the fond girl who loves him and is prepared to adore him as a martyr after death."
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"Start from the Conclusion":
   "The detective story has its separate art. It must practically be invented backwards. That is to say, the author must start from the conclusion and work out his clues, his false scents, and his wild-goose chases till he gets to the beginning. Then he is in a position to open his first chapter and have a fair run till he reaches earth." — Mr. Marriott Watson in the Daily Mail. Quoted in The Book Monthly (1903/4; HERE).
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"The Detective Story":
   "Is there a product of romance so essentially a creature of the imagination as the detective of popular fiction? It is not that his exploits are more remarkable than the Real Thing, but his personality soars so much higher." — The Sunday Sun, London. Quoted in The Book Monthly (1904/5; HERE).
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"Twenty-five Years Hence":
   "There are some kinds of fiction which have a greater chance of surviving than others, and the detective story is one of them. Take, in proof of this, Miss Anna Katharine Green's story, The Leavenworth Case. It was published a full quarter of a century ago, but it still sells merrily. Twenty-five years hence 'Sherlock Holmes' will be exciting a new generation of readers."
— Anonymous, "Personal and Particular," The Book Monthly (1904/5; HERE).

ONLY twenty-five years?

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"The Detective Tale":
   "It is almost impossible for any detective story, be it ever so powerful, 
to be regarded as a serious addition to literature, for the very elements 
that are essential to its composition — mysterious crime, rival clues, 
startling coincidences, and breathless adventures — have little in com-
mon with the qualities that make up a literary masterpiece."
— The Tribune. Quoted in The Book Monthly (1905/6; HERE).
. . . to which we add: Provide objective definitions of "literature" and "literary masterpiece."
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"A Mere Plot":
   "A third work of fiction is from the pen of Mr. Robert Machray, and is called The Private Detective. As the title suggests, it is a highly sensational tale, but the delineation of character has not been sacrificed to a mere plot, however 'thrilling.'" — "New Books Nearly Ready," The Book Monthly (1905/6; HERE).
- ONTOS posts about Machray are (HERE) and (HERE).
   The old argument about character vs. plot is obviously a lot older than we thought.
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"Shrieks and Throbs: Some Glimpses Into the Shaping 
of a 'Shocker.'"
By C. E. Lawrence (1870-1940; HERE).
First appearance: The Book Monthly, March 1912.
Book reviews (5 pages).
Online at Hathi Trust (HERE).

   The books mentioned in the review:
   ~ The Mystery of the Ravenspurs (1911) by Fred M. White (1859-1935).
     Online at Roy Glashan's Library (HERE; HTML) and (HERE; EPUB)
     Fred White bio-bibliography is at Roy Glashan's Library (HERE).
  ~ The Secret Tontine (1912) by R. Murray Gilchrist (1868-1917).
     Gilchrist Wikipedia article is (HERE).
  ~ The Triangle (1912) by Marie Connor Leighton (1865-1941).
     Bear Alley's article about Leighton is (HERE).
  ~ The Mystery of Nine (1912) by William Le Queux (1864-1927).
     Le Queux Wikipedia article is (HERE); the GAD Wiki entry is (HERE).
  ~ The Ruby Heart of Kishgar (1912) by Arthur W. Marchmont (1852-1923).
     Edwardian Review's short article about Marchmont is (HERE).
OUR CRITIC isn't condemning detective fiction here, just BAD ("second rate") detective fiction. This one should be of interest to anyone who cares about the genre.
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"As Defaulters and Detectives":
   "Every now and then we hear of people being in trouble for petty thefts in shops, and that seems to suggest a new kind of detective story. It would be a detective story in which women played the chief part, alike as defaulters and detectives. This brings us to the other suggestion that such a detective story could best be written by a woman novelist. Who is going to try this new departure in fiction, because it would be that. It would be curious to see whether women, who do not like detective stories as a rule, would read one on those lines." — The Book Monthly (1913; HERE)

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"According to Fiction the Criminal Is the Best-intentioned of All of Us":

"Villains! O Where and O Why Have They Gone?"
By C. E. Lawrence (1870-1940; HERE).
First appearance: The Book Monthly, September 1913.
Article (4 pages).

Online at Hathi Trust (HERE).

AS FAR as really bad guys are concerned, our critic thinks the advent of Sherlock Holmes "hastened the deterioration" of true villainy—or does he have his tongue-in-cheek?

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"Cry Out Against the Age":

"Old Friends and New."
By Margaret Sherwood (1864-1955).
First appearance: The Atlantic Monthly, 1911.
Book reviews article (1 page highlighted).
Online at Hathi Trust (HERE; SPOILERS) and 

(BELOW; no spoilers).

IT'S CLEAR that our critic doesn't appreciate the mystery story in general and A. E. W. Mason's At the Villa Rose in particular, viewing the genre and its practitioners as inferior. Unless you've already read Mason's book, it's probably not a good idea to read the original review with its SPOILERS intact:

   "In placing the poorer work of some of our contemporary authors side by side with the better, one is sometimes inclined to cry out against the age for the way in which it drags down talent. Why does the author of Peccavi turn to writing clever but mischievous tales of burglar life? Why does the man who could create The Four Feathers begin to write mere detective stories? That earlier book was a genuine contribution to art, an unusual interpretation of human character, worked out through a plot which kept alive the finer sort of suspense that comes from wondering which way the human will will turn. Countless people are writing detective stories; many can write them worse, and some can write them better than Mr. Mason does. To readers of this species of fiction, who enjoy the clever processes of reasoning by which, in logical succession, the many wrongfully suspected people are eliminated, and attention is fixed on the guilty one, it will prove a disappointment in this story to find that [SPOILER IN TEXT DELETED]. There proves to be [SPOILER IN TEXT DELETED], but the artistic as well as the ethical balance is better when [SPOILER IN TEXT DELETED]. Interesting as the book is in many ways in its foreign setting, one cannot help wishing that Mr. Mason would leave to lesser people the mystery and murder stories, and express in his earlier manner his rather remarkable insight into character and his subtle moral sense."

Resources:
- Wikisource tells us about Margaret Pollock Sherwood: "American author, feminist and Professor of English at Wellesley College, 1889-1931. Pen names: Margaret Sherwood, Elizabeth Hastings."
- See the ONTOS article (HERE) and follow the links therefrom; other Mason works are highlighted (HERE) and (HERE).

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"The Coup Had Been Cleverly Engineered, and Was Bound to Succeed"

"A Grand Coup: The Bank Manager's Adventure."
By Huan Mee (Charles H. Mansfield, 1864-1930, and W. E. Mans-field, 1870-1916).
Illustrations by Max Cowper.
First appearance: The Harmsworth Magazine, September 1900.
Reprinted in Home Cheer: A Family Journal, May 1901.
Short short story (8 pages, 5 illos).
Online at Hathi Trust (HERE).
(Note: Some text is faded.)

    "There was another factor yet to be dealt with, unlooked for, unexpected, and therefore uncalculated . . ."

Knocking over the Great Central Bank of Lombard Street should be a relatively easy affair, and it would be except for, believe it or not, the hue of a flower . . .

Characters:

~ Harry and Richard:
  ". . . two well-dressed men were waiting apart from the other people on the platform—silk-hatted, frock-coated, prosperous-looking individuals, with, to a keen observer, just a tinge of nervous excitement in their faces."
~ Mr. Gerald Whitney-Brough:
  "Don't let me be branded a thief, as I shall be."
~ Miss Gladys Hunt:
  "Stop him! That man has my purse."

Resources:

- We've featured stories by "Huan Mee" several times already; see the page (HERE) for those.

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"With More Than a Hundred Witnesses, His Alibi Could Not Be Broken"

WE'VE posted about a Ray Cummings story of the perfect crime variety in which time played a crucial role in the plot. Now we have a perfect crime tale in which time travel will shape the storyline. Curiously enough, it shares the same title with Cummings's story.

   "When you play with the fourth dimension there is always more than one—"

"Time for Murder."
By Sydney J. Bounds (1920-2006).
First appearance: Authentic Science Fiction, October 1955.
Reprints page (HERE).

Collected in Time for Murder: Macabre Crime Stories (2012; ISFDb HERE).

Short short story (9 pages).
Online at Archive.org (HERE) and The Luminist Archives (HERE; go to text page 81).

     "I have committed the perfect crime. Naturally I want you to know—now that you can’t do a damn thing about it!"

Alibi-breaking is stock-in-trade for the average police detective, but a major brain-bender of a problem awaits Inspector Burton of the C.I.D. in re the case of Gerald Laver, deceased . . .

Principal characters:
~ The vic:
  "Gerald Laver, age sixty-three, financier, bachelor, lived alone except for one servant. Shot through the heart from a distance of three yards by a .45 automatic—that's the gun on the table—died instantly. Time of death established by medical evidence, nine to nine thirty p.m. Wrist watch smashed and stopped at nine twenty-one p.m."
~ Clifford Webb:
  ". . . when the question of timing was brought out, caused a sensation by proving conclusively that he was nowhere near Laver’s house at nine twenty-one on the night 
of the murder."
~ Inspector Burton:
  ". . . stared glumly at his desk and wondered how the gun that had killed Laver could clearly show Webb’s finger-prints, and no others, if Webb had not been the last man to handle it. He already had a headache from thinking about that."
~ The Inspector's sergeant:
  "After you’d left Laver’s house, I was alone with the corpse, waiting for the mortuary van to come. It was quiet in that room. Just me and the deceased—then, all at once, there was this rabbit."

Comment: If the killer hadn't had the urge to brag, thus saving the Inspector from having to figure it all out by himself (highly unlikely), this story could easily have been ten or twenty times longer.

Resources:
- An Englishman, Sydney James Bounds was prolific, using many pseudonyms over the course of a sixty-years-plus writing career; see Wikipedia (HERE), Bear Alley (HERE), the SFE (HERE), and the ISFDb's bibliography (HERE).
- It's remarkable how many authors have mashed crime and Professor Webb's technology together; the latest such story that we've featured on ONTOS is Milton Lesser's "Stop, You're Killing Me!" (HERE); two other similarly themed stories are highlighted (HERE) and (HERE).

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"He Didn't Bother to Look Too Carefully When He Didn't See It"

HERE WE HAVE two stories by the same author about how smug killers who think they've committed the perfect crime haven't . . .

(1) "Alibi in Red."

By David X. Manners (1912-2007).
First appearance: Ten Detective Aces, January 1943.
Short short short story (4 pages).
Online at Comic Book Plus (HERE; select page 98 from the dropdown menu).

  "Fingerprints don't lie—but sometimes they bear testimony that is subject to change without notice."

A robbed safe, a dead cop, and being caught red-handed at the crime scene—such is the frame unsuspecting Ralph Childs finds himself in; the only thing that will cancel his date 
with the electric chair is manifested in red, red as in red-handed . . .

~ ~ ~

(2) "Dig It Deep."

By David X. Manners (1912-2007).
First appearance: Popular Detective, May 1948.
Short short short story (4 pages).
Online at Archive.org (HERE).

     "Detective Carter lets a hunch lead him to a killer!"

This policeman is sure he's got the killer; the killer is sure he's thought of everything. We leave it to you to predict just who's right . . .

Erratum: On a subsequent re-reading of "Dig It Deep" we've come to realize that the author did indeed include that crucial element which does play fair with the reader; we therefore 
beg everyone's forgiveness for overlooking it and unjustly libeling the writer.

Resource:
- Says FictionMags about our author: "According to his son Tim he wasn’t actually 'David X. Manners' but was 'David X Manners' as the 'X' was his whole name and not an initial."
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Two Bank Jobs and a Wedding

   "His enemy was escaping—and he had a missile in his hand."

(1) "The Attempt on St. Mary's Branch."
By Harold Steevens (?-?).
Illustrations by Cyrus Cuneo, R.I.
First appearance: The Strand, December 1912.
Reprinted in the January 1913 issue.
Short short story (7 pages, 3 illos).
Online at Hathi Trust (HERE).
(Note: Some text is faded.)

     "Unsupported by any visible agency, it appeared to be behaving in flagrant defiance of the law of gravitation."

In contrast to Americans, the English seem to prefer their bank robberies done differently
—you could say, with a certain flair; take that floating bag of gold sovereigns, for instance . . .

~ ~ ~

  "It was a fine shot and a lucky one . . ."

(2) "The Service Revolver."
By Harold Steevens (?-?).
Illustrations by Norah Schlegel.
First appearance: The Strand Magazine, July 1919.
Short story (10 pages, with 6 illos).
Online at Hathi Trust (HERE).
(Note: Some text is faded.)

     ". . . he was fresh from a sphere where the ethics of killing did not concern him."

Cool customers, these bank robbers, but they never reckoned on the power of love . . .

Resources:
- FictionMags's story listing indicates that over the course of sixteen years Harold Steevens published infrequently, starting with "The Attempt on St. Mary's Branch" and ending (as 
far as can be determined) in 1928.

- It might be instructive to compare the tone of Steevens's first story about a bank job from pre-War 1912 with the second one from post-War 1919.

- In "The Service Revolver," mention is made of "the forged Bradbury"; see the Royal Bank of Scotland's article (HERE) for full details.

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