Isaac Asimov - Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine, Vol. 73, No. 3. Whole No. 424, March 1979

Pollard was impressed. Perhaps he’d been hasty in his judgment of Knowles. He was showing the kind of sense his job called for.

“In that case, Knowles,” Pollard said, “I’ll be happy to tell you whom to pick up for questioning.”

Knowles was speechless.

“What threw you, and me for a while,” Pollard went on, “was the ‘lands’ part of the message. It was our major stumbling block — but when you interpret it properly it’s also the solution to the problem.

“No possible meaning of the word ‘lands’ seemed to have any application here. When I learned that, I began to wonder if Georg wasn’t trying to tell us something else. ”

“Something else? But—”

“Don’t interrupt! Remember, you reconstructed the message from the typewriter ribbon, imagining where the spaces — which don’t show up on the ribbon — go. When you got to l-a-n-d-s, the five letters you didn’t understand, you assumed they formed one word. But they don’t have to.

“Respace it. L-a-n-d-s. Is there a word in those five letters?”

Knowles mulled it over. “L-a-n... a-n-d... and!”

“A-n-d. And. If we assume that and is part of what Georg was trying to say, what of l and s ?

“L — and — S. L and S. Has this any possible meaning? Review the names of the suspects — Lester Gill has a name beginning with L, and Stanley Fitch has one beginning with S.”

Knowles’s mouth was open. “The doormen? Both of them?”

“Why not? No reason to think that there couldn’t be two cell members where there could be one. And you’ll notice that Georg used their first initials in naming them. Don’t you usually call the doorman of your apartment building by his given name?”

The younger man’s expression had turned to one of satisfaction. “Makes sense,” he murmured. “More than any of the other ideas.” He stood up. “Mr. Pollard, I have to go now — there’s work to be done.” He held out his hand. “Thank you. I’ll be seeing you again soon.”

“I’m quite sure of that, young man,” Pollard said.

This is the 515th “first story” to be published by Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine ... “ As some day it may happen that a victim must be found, I’ve got a little list — I’ve got a little list.” — from Koko’s Song in The Mikado (Gilbert and Sullivan) ...

The author, Gina Haldane, formerly an actress, is now vice president of a video systems company, and “writing is an alternative to the pressures of owning a small business.” She is “interested in all sorts of things, from the conventional (sewing, design) to the more controversial (human liberation). Above all, I am addicted to reading and have inadvertently committed nineteen cereal boxes to memory!”...

1 doz eggs

1 lb butter

(I remember when we were first married how Bob loved my omelets)

1 gal milk

1 lg box Whoopie Wheetsies

(I wish the kids wouldn’t believe all that junk on television. They keep begging me to get them this, get them that)

1 bottle Kalm-Tabs ( for stress)

1 six-pack Macho beer

(which will be gone by the end of Sunday s football game. Bob’ll be dozing in front of the TV, wearing that old undershirt)

1 head lettuce

2 tomatoes

3 lbs hamburger

(I remember when Bob said, “Steak and caviar, baby — marry me and it’ll be steak and caviar all the way!” And now we can barely afford hamburgers)

1 pkg Sweetums disposable diapers

3 jars Bitsie-Bites baby food

(maybe if we hadn’t had three kids in three years, maybe then)

1 box Storm detergent

1 floor mop

(or maybe if Bob had let me keep my job instead of being a broken-down housewife, I could have had a career)

1 Calorie-Counter’s Meals for One

1 doz cans Lo-Lo Kola

(I don’t know why I try to lose weight. I’ll bet she would be eating all the time if her husband was seeing another woman)

1 bunch asparagus

(I bet they think I don’t even know about their affair! Well, if they think I’m going to let them get away with it)

1 box rat poison

(damn them!)

Barbara Williamson’s first story, “The Thing Waiting Outside,” appeared in the December 1977 issue of EQMM. We called it “a story of dark and terrifying implications.” Her second story offers more darkness and terror, but of an entirely different sort. There is the dream that keeps coming back, and the thing in her hand, and the puzzle that must be solved... a subtly written story, with fine imaginative touches...

Three months before Ruth’s twelfth birthday her father married again.

There was a garden wedding and Ruth wore a yellow dress with long full sleeves and carried a bouquet of late roses.

During the ceremony the bride was fidgety and the groom had trouble with the sun in his eyes, but Ruth stood very still and did not take her eyes from the minister’s face.

Later, when her father’s friends told her how pretty she looked — “Just like a Renoir!” one gushy matron proclaimed — Ruth smiled shyly, but said nothing.

No one was surprised. It was well known among her acquaintances that Ruth was a quiet child who enjoyed playing alone and reading her books behind closed doors.

At the reception she ate a small piece of cake and tasted her first champagne. She didn’t like it very much, but was too polite to say so.

Just before her father and his new wife left, they came to her to say goodbye. Her father kissed her and his wife, a plumpish blonde with stiff sculptured hair, gave her a hug.

“Now you’re my little girl too,” she whispered into Ruth’s ear. And you, Ruth thought, are my very own Wicked Stepmother and I shall hate you as long as I live.

Then she put her lips against the perfumed cheek close to her own.

“How sweet!” everyone said.

While her father and his wife were away on their honeymoon, Ruth stayed at the home of a classmate.

Every third day a postcard came for her. Ocean scenes with golden sands and blue water. Once there was a sunset with a lone palm tree black against the vivid sky.

“That’s pretty,” said the classmate, whose name was Patricia. Ruth thought her stupid, but at least she didn’t giggle like some of the other girls.

“Yes,” Ruth said.

The card was signed “Mother and Daddy,” but the fussy, curly handwriting was not her father’s.

When she was alone, Ruth tore each card into bits and flushed them down the drain.

That night she had the dream.

It was not a new dream. From time to time, as long as she could remember, the same house blossomed in her sleep. A silent place of higgledy-piggledy rooms with many doors and windows. There was bright sun outside and the rooms were filled with the airless, heavy heat of summer.

In the dream she was alone, walking from room to room, but always with the feeling that just beyond a certain wall or just beyond the next door was the person she was looking for. She also knew she must move with stealth so as not to be seen or heard.

Her breath came quickly. Not from fear, but from something close to exultation and a sense of purpose.

And always she held something in her hand.