GRAHAM GREENE – The Third Man. Viking, US, hardcover, 1950.  Reprinted many times.

   Rollo Martins, a somewhat drunken writer of westerns, has come to Vienna at the request of his old school friend, Harry Lime. Lime has suggested he might write a piece on the postwar international refugee problem and pay his way to the divided city. But when Martins arrives, Lime is dead, having been run over by a car in front of his building, and Martins is barely in time for his funeral. There he meets Colonel Calloway of the British occupational police force; Calloway is interested in Lime, and in Martins’ association with him.

   Although he has little money, Martins manages to stay on in Vienna by cadging funds from a variety of people who seem extraordinarily concerned with his welfare. And soon questions about Harry Lime begin to plague him: Who was his friend, really? A harmless adult version of the boy Martins knew at school — a young rogue who played all the angles? Or a vicious racketeer, the worst Vienna has ever seen? Why did Lime really want Martins to come to Vienna? Was Lime’s death merely an accident. or was it very deliberately staged? And who was the third man at the scene when he died-the third man who disappeared shortly after?

   Martins becomes more and more convinced that Lime’s death was no accident, and he crosses the various zones of the war-tom city searching for the mysterious third man. Set against the backdrop of postwar Vienna, and told alternately from Colonel Calloway’s and Martins’ viewpoints, this is an intriguing and suspenseful novel that contains a number of surprises.

   The Third Man was the basis for a gem of a film of the same title, made in 1949, directed by Carol Reed, and featuring Joseph Cotten, Orson Welles, and Trevor Howard.

   Other equally absorbing thrillers by Greene include Orient Express (1933); This Gun for Hire (1936), made into a tense 1942 film starring Alan Ladd in his first major role; Brighton Rock (1956); The Quiet American (1956); Our Man in Havana (1958), the screen version of which showcases Alec Guinness in one of his best roles; and The Honorary Consul (1973).

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   Reprinted with permission from 1001 Midnights, edited by Bill Pronzini & Marcia Muller and published by The Battered Silicon Dispatch Box, 2007.   Copyright © 1986, 2007 by the Pronzini-Muller Family Trust.

FORTY NAUGHTY GIRLS. RKO Radio Pictures, 1937. James Gleason (Inspector Oscar Piper), Zasu Pitts (Hildegarde Withers), Marjorie Lord, Joan Woodbury, Tom Kennedy. Based on story and/or characters created by Stuart Palmer. Director: Edward Cline.

   Nothing naughty about this movie at all. What this is instead is the last of the Hildegarde Withers movies, as she and Inspector Piper solve the murders committed backstage while a musical is going on. We see a lot of legs but nothing more.

   Zasu Pitts, the last of three actresses to play Miss Withers, cuts down on her usual flutter and settles for mere clumsiness instead, while Gleason acts like he’s auditioning for the Three Stooges, This does mark the first use of the nitrate test in the movies, though.

CORNELL WOOLRICH – Death Is My Dancing Partner. Pyramid G374, paperback original; 1st printing, 1959. Savage Bride / Death is My Dancing Partner / Doom Stone, Centipede Press, hardcover, 2025.

   Bandleader Maxwell Jones helps a dancer from an Oriental temple, then uses her erotic Dance of Death for fame and fortune, with coincidence and promotion adding to the legend as it builds. Her love for him is not returned; he does not even treat her as a person, a fact that does not seem believable, nor is her success in making him jealous.

   After 100 pages, their strange love affair has been established, but by this time, his fear of her dance causes their common fortunes to decline: they are now living in the depths of a poor Panamanian café. The terror and suspense that has been promised thus far are confined to the last chapter only, as the dancer tests the curse of the dance, as they find themselves locked together in their hotel room…

   To me, the story would have been better told as a shorter story, with the lengthy “love affair” eliminated. My rating below is almost only for the ending.

Rating: ***½

BOB McKNIGHT – Secret Sinners. Merit 355, paperback original; 1st printing, June 1960.

   Or, perhaps as an alternate title, The Case of Cocky Robin. No kidding. Attorney Arch Behan is hired by Cocky’s sister, to locate him after he turns up missing. Just as in The Bikini Bombshell (reviewed here), the story takes place in Florida, and involves gun-running to Castro’s rebels.

   And lots of naked, willing women. This is a story for red-blooded males, that is for sure. The swamp girl who wants Arch to help her make a baby is tops. One question: a Miami deputy think Cocky might have been “gator et.” What could he have meant?

PostScript: If you follow the link above to my review of The Bikini Bombshell , be sure to read on to the comments that follow.

AVRAM DAVIDSON – The Island Under the Earth. Ace SF Special; paperback original. 1st printing, 1969. Cover art: Leo Dillon & Diane Dillon.

   Although published as an ACE SF Special, this is pure fantasy, living legend stuff, with centaurs, gnomes, harpies, and humans, all inhabiting some kind of counter-Earth, which may somehow justify the SF part of the label.

   I didn’t finish the book, I have to confess, quitting after page 120, at which point new characters were being introduced and with no detectable story having occurred so far. It’s a book I found to be very difficult for quick reading, at least for me. The style is quite strange but it’s also one that’s very much suitable. The world it takes place is one I don’t know and difficult to recognize, in spite of its familiarity.

Rating: *½

EARL W. EMERSON – Nervous Laughter. PI Thomas Black #3. Avon, paperback original; 1st printing, January 1986.

   PI Thomas Black is in danger of falling in love with his client in this case, a woman whose husband is accused of killing a young girl he was sleeping with, then shooting himself. The nervous laughter in the title is hers (see page 86).

   Emerson has s smooth, readable writing style that starts the book off well, but the story is all on the surface. Black takes a lot of physical abuse in this book, but as a substitute for twists and turns of the plot, it’s not really very satisfying.

The Thomas Black series —

1. The Rainy City (1985)
2. Poverty Bay (1985)
3. Nervous Laughter (1985)
4. Fat Tuesday (1987)
5. Deviant Behavior (1988)
6. Yellow Dog Party (1991)
7. The Portland Laugher (1994)
8. The Vanishing Smile (1995)
9. The Million-Dollar Tattoo (1996)
10. Deception Pass (1997)
11. Catfish Cafe (1998)
12. Cape Disappointment (2009)
13. Monica’s Sister (2013)
14. Two Miles of Darkness (2015)
15. Jackson Street (2018)

ARTHUR C. CLARKE “Out of the Sun.” First published in If, February 1958. Collected in The Other Side of the Sky (Harcourt, Brace & Co., hardcover, 1958). Reprinted in The Mammoth Book of Mindblowing SF, edited by Mike Ashley (among several other anthologies).

   This is the lead story in the latter book, and it’s a good one (both the story and the anthology). It’s told by a research scientist studying the sun from the ideal vantage point of the planet Mercury. Although he is not the only person on the station where he is working, none of the others make a physical appearance. He tells his own story, and in fact, I do not believe there is a word of dialogue to be found within it.

   The story begins in earnest when he spots a black spot moving across the surface of the sun before it is ejected off into space, aimed straight at the station where he is standing. I say “black spot” figuratively, as it (perhaps formed solely of invisible gas) cannot be seen by the naked eye – only by the instruments he is using. As he watches, he begins to wonder: could the object actually be alive? And if so, can it possibly survive, now well outside its home environment?

   The story is short, and I’ve already described the essence of the plot itself, except for the last few sentences — which are well worth waiting for. The author, Artur C. Clarke, was an excellent writer who was also a man with a mind based on scientific reasoning. In a few words he could produce a million mind-boggling ideas. Although perhaps not the best of his tales, and it may be just a minor one, but it’s also a story you may find yourself thinking about for a quite a while after you read it.

   I enjoyed this one.

VICTOR HEADLEY – Yardie. The X Press, UK, hardcover, 1992. Pan Books, UK. paperback, 1993, 2018. Atlantic Monthly Press, US, hardcover, 1992.

   D. is a mid-level coke dealer in Kingston, Jamaica. His outfit sends him to London with a British passport and a couple bags of coke. He’s met by the London contacts at the airport and they head for a house to complete the deal.

   D.’s job is to hand over the coke, get the money, hang out for a bit, and fly home with the dough.

   But D.’s got bigger plans.

   At the London dealer’s home, D. asks to use the toilet, and escapes out the bathroom window (protected by a silver spoon), with half the goods in tow.

   D.’s got some buddies in the London slums (which are high living compared to the Kingston ghettos), including Donna, a woman he’d come to know biblically in his youth.

   D. is smart with his stake, and leverages it to become a kingpin in the London crack trade.

   The Jamaican drug lords have much less ruth than their non-Jamaican competitors, having been de-moralized by rabid conditions back home. They are quick to kill, and quick to a drug hued hegemony, to greater and greater wealth and power.

   And then an international syndicate moves in….

           ——

   It’s a good mob book, a 90’s Jamaican Little Caesar set in London with pitch perfect dialect, Caribbean vibes, and parties with a dub soundtrack. My only real complaint is an unfinished ending, feeling like the writer wanted to make sure he didn’t do anything too drastic, lest spoiling options on a sequel.

   Originally published in The Mystery Lover’s Newsletter, 1969. Vol II No. 6, pp. 10/11:
   

   Like so many other things, Mr. Edgar Allan Poe started it all, though this time the illustrious forerunner was not the much-cited “The Murders in the Rue Morgue”, but instead that equally fine quintessence of its form, “The Gold-Bug.” Published in 1843 and yet, today, still as readable as ever, it is the first detective story where the major detection was not that of a crime or of a criminal, but of a vital message contained in a cipher.

   And then in the highest tradition of the detective story, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle followed on from Poe, and produced his Sherlock Holmes masterpiece, “The Adventure of the Dancing Men”. This time the cipher concealed (amongst other things) a sinister warning to a victim rather than the clue to a lost treasure.

   However, both stories contain the same basic element, a secret message put before the reader in its clandestine form and then later, carefully, clearly and minutely translated into plain words by the ingenious inventor.

   And after Sir Arthur? Well, certainly not the deluge. Since those matchstick men danced their way off the last page of their story, few indeed have been the short story writers who have ventured cautiously into the demanding world of the code and the cipher. The rigorous and exacting nature of the work, however, has had its compensations (for the reader, at any rate), inasmuch as only the most painstaking and articulate of authors have managed to sell a convincing product on this market.

   If you happen across a good example of this kind of short story, then you can lay odds that it will be exclusively good and fashioned by a master-craftsman.

   The reason for this, on reflection, is self-evident. To succeed the story must contain the original cipher or coded message – it cannot be so simple that it is effortlessly construed by the reader and yet must not be so complicated that it defies any sort of comprehensible and communicable translation.

   The author must, therefore, not only be able to conceive a formula of secret writing, but must also be able to translate it for his reader in a clear and intelligible way. No great wonder, then, at the smallness of that illustrious band who have succeeded in doing all of these things within the confines of a short story.

   In fact, just who are the members of this select company? Poe and Sir Arthur we have already mentioned, but what of those who followed on? Careful examination of my library and an intensive brain-wracking session eventually brought forth — somewhat reluctantly — more names. The ingenious Melville Davisson Post, R. Austin Freeman (inevitably), that brilliant writer Dorothy L. Sayers, O. Henry and F.A.M. Webster. A list was drawn up and appears as follows:

      Author       Story       Book

(l) Edgar Allan Poe. The Gold-Bug, from Tales
(2) Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, The Adventure of the Dancing Men, from The Return of Sherlock Holmes
(3) R. Austin Freeman, The Moabite Cipher. from John Thorndyke’s Cases
(4) Melville Davisson Post, The Cuneiform Inscription, from The Bradmoor Murder
(5) Melville Davisson Post, The Great Cipher, from Monsieur Jonquelle
(6) O. Henry. Calloway’s Code, from Whirligigs
(7) F.A.M. Webster. The Secret of the Singular Cipher, from Old Ebbie Returns
(8) Dorothy L. Sayers, The Fascinating Problem of Uncle Meleager’s Will, from Lord Peter Views the Body
(9) Dorothy L. Sayers, An extract, from Unnatural Death

   (This last item, in fact, was not written as a short story; but part of chapters 26 and 29, in combination with the whole of chapter 28, form a separate story and probably the cleverest example of all.)

   Thus far I had a total of only nine short stories when every fibre in my orderly being was crying out for a nice symmetrical list of ten. I began to pound mercilessly through my list of likely authors again. Ellery Queen? Surely the master of· the cryptic clue would qualify for a place? But no, the nearest I could find were a couple of ineligible dying-message short stories, plus a number of novels (including “Face to Face,” “The Scarlet Letter” and “The Finishing Stroke”) which could in no way be distilled to the size of a short story. (Who would, want to distill Ellery Queen anyway?)

   Agatha Christie? Despite such promising titles as “N or M?” and “The A.B.C. Murders,” I could find no short story of hers to fit the bill. Then for a brief illusory moment, I thought I had it and dug out from an old Ellery Queen magazine “The Message on the Lawn” by T.S. Stribling. The title sounded just right, but on re-reading the story I found that it didn’t quite suit the occasion, Poggioli or no Poggioli.

   I had reached a point of desperation and was manfully steeling myself to the arduous task of battling my way through all my old favorites, Allen, Anderson, Bailey, Bennett, Bentley, Berkeley, etc., — right through to Zangwell, when suddenly a bombshell of an idea exploded in my vortex of a mind.

   Why should I do all the work, I asked myself, when there are dozens of readers out there, idling away their time, who could do it for me? Dozens of readers who, in combination, would have a much wider knowledge than I could possibly have and would be able, without difficulty, to supply that elusive tenth title (and perhaps disagree with the other nine)’ At one fell swoop I would be introducing a competitive element, gain an introduction to lots of interesting stories and, last but certainly not least, save myself a great deal of time and trouble. A positive masterstroke!

   And so, without apologies, this is what I am doing, leaving it to you, the perceptive and omnivorous reader. There are no prizes, other than perhaps the egotistical satisfaction of seeing your name in print. The editor, in being able to decide whether or not a suggestion shall be printed, is, ipso facto, the final arbiter. For my part I shall sit back in my easiest easy chair and await your comments with an appropriate air of self-satisfied detachment— and a good detective story.

   (Mr. Adey, 27, works as a civil servant in the Department of Health and Social Security, Birmingham, England. He reports that he likes his detective fiction literate and has a preference for the “set piece” mysteries of Queen, Millar, Carr, Christie, Brand, Berkeley, etc. His chief grouse is “with the so-called literary critics who dismiss a book simply because it is a detective story.”)

         ****************************************

   Some replies to the plea for readers’ help were printed in the next Vol. III, No. 1, October 1969, pp. 15/16, with the magazine now renamed as The Mystery Reader’s Newsletter.

      From Amnon Kabatchnik, Binghampton, N.Y.

   In order to help Adey relax into his easy chair let me add the following Code and Cipher stories to his list: THE PUZZLE LOCK by R. Austin Freeman from “The Puzzle Lock and Other Stories”; THE STOLEN CHRISTMAS BOX by Lillian de la Torre from “Dr. Sam Johnson, Detector”; THE WHITE ELEPHANT by Margery Allingharn from “Mr. Campion, Criminologist”; THE FOUR SUSPECTS by Agatha Christie from “The Tuesday Club Murders”. There must be more.

      From Joe Christopher, Stephenville, Texas

   In re: Adey’s “Codes and Ciphers”. Anthony Boucher has a very brief but tricky cipher in “The Numbers Man” (EQMM, June 1953). Another Boucher cipher (which I haven’t read) is “QL 696.C9” (EQMM, May 1943). An example of a cipher from John Dickson Carr is “The Adventure of the Wax Gamblers” in Carr and Adrian Conan Doyle’s THE EXPLOITS OF SHERLOCK HOLMES.

      From Michael Wahl, Los Angeles, Calif.

   For Robert C.S. Adey, I recommend the following stories:

Elsa Barker, The Key in Michael, from The C.I.D. of Dexter Drake (EQMM, May 1942)
R. Austin Freeman. The Puzzle Lock, from The Puzzle Lock
E.C. Bentley, The Ministering Angel, from an early EQMM [September 1943]
M.R. James. The Treasure of Abbot Thomas, from Ghost Stories of an Antiquary
Anthony Boucher, QL 696 .C9, from EQMM, May 1943
Agatha Christie. The Four Suspects, from The Tuesday Club Murders
Edgar Wallace, Code No. 2, from EQMM, Spring 1942
Harvey O’Higgins, The Blackmailers, from Detective Barney
Margery Allingham, The White Elephant. from Mr.·Campion, Criminologist
Alfred Noyes, Uncle Hyacinth, from Walking Shadows
Lillian de la Torre, The Stolen Christmas Box, from Dr. Sam Johnson, Detector

   The above stories are all available in Famous Stories of Code and Cipher, edited by Raymond T. Bond, published originally by Rinehart and now in print as a Collier paperback.

EDITH PIÑERO GREEN – Rotten Apples. Dearborn V. Pinch #1. E. P. Dutton, hardcover, 1977.  Berkley, paperback, 1982.

   Dearborn V. Pinch is described by one of Ms. Green’s publishers as “the world’s oldest and cleverest detective.” At well over seventy, the former at least may be true.

   Pinch, a charming and enterprising old gentleman who still has a sharp eye for the ladies, receives a visit from old flame Antoinette Ormach, who reveals her long-standing membership in the Rotten Apple Corps. This group of eleven, founded in the Thirties, had one characteristic in common: All had committed some sort of minor crime — from poisoning a rival’s dog on the eve of a dog show to plagiarizing a poem that later won a national award. Now the remaining members of the group have begun to die in suspicious circumstances, and Antoinette is afraid she may be next.

   Dearborn has been known lo help out friends with delicate problems they do not wish to take to the police, and Antoinette asks him to look into the matter. Dearborn declines, but when Antoinette is murdered, he undertakes an investigation out of a sense of obligation. As Dearborn probes into the lives of the Rotten Apples, he becomes convinced that one of the group wishes to see the others dead — a true rotten apple; and as he crisscrosses New York City in search of that person, he encounters more peril than any septuagenarian is entitled to.

   Dearborn is an endearing character and, with the exception of L.A. Morse’s “Old Dick,” the horniest old man in mystery fiction. This entertaining elderly sleuth (who combines the best of the little-old-lady detectives with quirks of his own) reappears in Sneaks (1979) and Perfect Fools (1982).

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   Reprinted with permission from 1001 Midnights, edited by Bill Pronzini & Marcia Muller and published by The Battered Silicon Dispatch Box, 2007.   Copyright © 1986, 2007 by the Pronzini-Muller Family Trust.