Crime at Christmas

Crime at Christmas

A SEASONAL BOX

OF MURDEROUS DELIGHTS

Selected and
introduced by

JACK ADRIAN

Illustrated by

Brian
Denington

Crime at Christmas

Contents

Introduction

1- A Problem in
White by NICHOLAS BLAKE

2 - Detective's Day
Off by JOHN DICKSON CARR

3 - Santa-San Solves
It by JAMES MELVILLE

4 - Herlock Sholmes's Christmas Case
by PETER TODD

II

Ill

5 - The Three
Travellers
by EDWARD D. HOCH

6 - Murder in Store by PETER LOVESEY

7 - Waxworks by ETHEL LINA WHITE

8 - Serenade to a Killer by JOSEPH
COMMINGS

9 - Stuffing by EDGAR WALLACE

10 - No Room at the Inn by BILL
PRONZINI

11 - Sister Bessie by CYRIL HARE

12 - Murder Under the Mistletoe by
MARGERY ALLINGHAM

13 - Christmas Train by WILL SCOTT

14 - A Present For Christmas by
ROBERT ARTHUR

15 - The Santa Claus Club by JULIAN
SYMONS

16 - The Secret in the Pudding Bag by
HERLOCK SHOLMES

17 – The Great Christmas Train
Mystery by ANTHONY BURGESS

18 - The Plot Against Santa Claus by
JAMES POWELL

Afterward – BIGGLES’ APPLE SNOWBALLS

Acknowledgements

Sources

Solution to A PROBLEM IN WHITE

End of Crime at
Christmas

D
ICKENS WAS
to blame, to begin with. There is no doubt whatever
about that. As far as Christmas jollifications go, he has a lot to answer for.

And as the annual flood-tide of festive good cheer threatens once more to
engulf us all (as I write, at the beginning of November—seven whole weeks
before the dreadful day itself), it's hard not to sympathize with the putative
villain of the piece, Ebenezer Scrooge, who, before his unhappy transformation
into putty-hearted old duffer, struck the right note exactly: 'Every idiot who
goes about with "Merry Christmas" on his lips should be boiled with
his own pudding, and buried with a stake of holly through his heart.'

Indeed. And bring back the Poor Laws, bring back the workhouse;
especially, bring back the treadmill, and let anyone who so much as whispers
'Compliments of the Season' be sentenced to thirty days on it, without the
option.

I have a dream of a perfect Christmas, during which barrel-organs, bedecked
with holly and rolled out on Saturday mornings by grinning buffoons with
jingling collectors' tins to catch the shopping precinct crowds, will be
grenaded. Hot-potato men will have their wares mashed, the resulting sludge
stuffed down their trousers; hot-chestnut sellers, especially those dressed in
Dickensian garb, dumped in their own braziers; street-actors impersonating Tiny
Tim their crutches kicked from under them.

Special task-forces brandishing furled umbrellas with needle-sharp points
will be directed to the street-corner pitches of balloon-sellers, there to
wreak noisy havoc. Turkeys stuffed with Chinese firecrackers will be sold at
knock-down prices, thus spelling ruin for the country's poultry farmers as well
as creating mayhem in the kitchen. Carol-singers will be offered LSD-spiked
mulled wine, and just let them try getting through 'God Rest You Merry,
Gentlemen' when the words start soaring up off the page at them. I see
flying-columns of misanthropic midgets dressed as children harassing Santa's
Grottos throughout the land. And as for Santa himself, it's the Lucky Dip
barrel for him. Head-first.

Do I mean any of this?

Of course not.

Not really.

Well, not entirely. There's no getting away from the fact that
Christmas—or at least its extended overture—can at times be an ordeal that
tries the bravest heart, the strongest nerve, the mightiest patience.

Hence
Crime at
Christmas
, a Box of Murderous (and other) Delights to take your mind off the
rigours of the festive season. Here are eighteen short stories and no old
sweats—absolutely no stories which, however excellent, you must have read a
score or more times before. Most have never appeared in book-form and two, by
British crime writer James Melville and American suspense-writer Bill Pronzini,
have been written especially for this anthology.

There are tales of tension, tales of brain-racking ingenuity; grim tales,
comic tales, atmospheric tales, undeniably acidic tales, tales with twists to
their tails. There is a puzzle-story to ponder over, perhaps while cracking
nuts beside the fire. There's even a recipe (and a very good one too; and from
a surprising source). And all illustrated in fine style by Brian Denington.

All that remains for me now is to wish you, the readers, a downright
Dickensian Christmas.

After all, Dickens may be guilty of first-degree assault and battery in
the matter of popularizing roast turkey, plum pudding, holly-wreaths, six-foot
spruces laden with glitter, and boisterous, back-slapping good cheer; but he
had his good points too. Never forget what lay in store for Edwin Drood at the
Festive Season. . .

Back
to Table of Contents