Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 148, Nos. 3 & 4. Whole Nos. 900 & 901, September/October 2016

The Luddite by Marcia Muller

Many historians of the mystery consider Marcia Muller the mother of the hardboiled (fictional) female P.I. and date the form to the publication of her first novel, Edwin of the Iron Shoes, in 1972. She has gone on to write more than forty more novels, many of them starring Sharon McCone, the protagonist of that first book. A multiple winner of both the Shamus and Anthony awards, the author is also an MWA Grand Master.

My name is Ivy Allison, and I’m a Luddite.

A Luddite, and proud of it.

Meaning I don’t deal with all this new-technology crap — like computers, iPhones and smartphones, faxes, answering machines, pagers, even digital clocks. I make an exception for a landline telephone and a TV; I couldn’t do without ordering in pizzas so I can eat while I watch all my favorite shows.

It’s not that I don’t know how to use the junk; when I was employed as an executive assistant at General Motors I had them all at my disposal. But now that I’m retired, no way.

My friends make fun of me. I explain that we present-day Luddites have a noble origin. I looked them up once at the library.

The original Luddites date back to the nineteenth century, when English textile workers, fearing the end of their livelihoods, protested newly introduced labor-saving devices such as stocking frames, spinning frames, and power looms. Legend has it that one Ned Ludd destroyed two stocking frames in 1779, thus becoming an emblem for the movement.

What’s that got to do with today? people ask me.

Plenty, I tell them. For one thing, we’re relying too much on these devices: Kids are playing video games instead of sports or even stickball in the streets; their parents aren’t supervising them because they’re always on the Internet or texting or whatever; even in the schools they’re tethered to those unnatural things. You walk along the street and people are mumbling to themselves. Not so long ago, you’d have thought they were maniacs, but now you just realize they’re talking on their Bluetooths. Adults come into a nice restaurant and don’t even bother to look at the menu; they’ve already accessed it online and decided what to order. And while they’re having their feasts, there’s a constant ringing and beeping. Some are considerate and go outside so they won’t inflict their conversations on the other diners; others voices blare out, telling strangers more than they want to know about the talkers’ future plans, problems at work, and sex lives.

The hell with them all.

The landline is okay, though. It lets me use a couple of those old-fashioned rotary phones, one in the kitchen and one in the bedroom, that work off direct phone-company lines. So I don’t have to worry whenever the electricity goes out. And besides ordering out for pizza and Chinese, I can pick it up, dial, and hear a friendly familiar voice. I love to talk, to talk for hours. I tell my friends what I’ve been doing: a trip to the yarn shop; finding a guy to fix the siding on the back of my house; the tree in my side yard that looks like it might have to come down; the jackrabbit that hides in the weeds out back. All sorts of interesting things.

And then there’s the TV. I’m up on all the new shows and the reruns on the oldies channels too. Funny how the content of the shows hasn’t much changed in the past thirty-five years.

Thirty-five years...

Back then Gene, my husband, and I had just moved here to this nice central-Michigan town. General Motors had a small branch office here, so I could keep working. Land was cheap and we bought a big rural tract and built our house on it. Today I’m still living there; the house is sort of isolated, but that’s how I like it. The neighbors are fine, and I can see them when I want to, on my own terms.

Gene and I had a little girl, Maryanne. A darling. The schools here weren’t so good, and her bus rides were too long, so finally we had to send her away to boarding school. It worked out fine: She got into a good college, met a smart fellow. She and her family are in Indiana now — not far, but I hardly ever see them. Gene died of a heart attack seven years ago. I grieved, sure, but I’ve become accustomed to being alone. I have my activities: gardening, trips to the farmers’ market, a weekly session at the beauty shop. I keep up my appearance; I’ve got standards.

It’s January, and the snowstorms have been pretty heavy this year. Christmas wasn’t much. Maryanne and her family couldn’t make it up here; they offered to send me a round-trip ticket to Indianapolis, but I don’t trust the airlines, so I stayed home. None of my friends and neighbors invited me like they used to. Guess they figured I’d be busy.

Come to think of it, I don’t hear from many of my friends and neighbors at all anymore. Probably they’re glued to their computers. Even my friends who live at a distance didn’t send cards — probably they’re all into those damned e-cards. I call and get their answering machines, but there’s no way I’m going to leave a message on one of those things.

This winter I’ve been studying seed catalogues, planning my spring and summer vegetable gardens. There’re some interesting new varieties available. But when I call to ask questions about them, I always get put on hold, with some horrible music blaring in my ear. The same thing happens when I try to order a few tools that look promising.

It’s sure not like it used to be. Even if I tried to order by mail, the postal service would louse it up. Don’t get me started on the USPS; if there was ever an organization that was messed up, it’s them. Too few clerks, and they’ve put in these machines that are supposed to save you time mailing packages or buying stamps, but there’s always a line of morons in front of them who can’t figure out how they work. Give me a real-live person, even if he or she doesn’t do much better than the automatic vendors.

Lord, there’s so much wrong with this world. I blame it all on that Steve Jobs and his cohorts. They’ve ruined everything for us clear-thinking, intelligent people.

It’s going to be really cold tonight. Another storm, a big one, is due any time. I stepped out on the porch and called the dog. Big female golden Lab named Genie after my late husband. She came right away, that big tail wagging.

Gene, he didn’t agree with me about this technology stuff. He liked his computer, his cell phone, his electronic games. Agreed with me when I’d say I was a Luddite, and then he’d laugh. But he sure wasn’t laughing when I found him collapsed over his computer keyboard of a heart attack at age sixty. And I sure didn’t laugh when I saw what he’d been looking at.

Porn.

But I don’t want to think about that.

It proved what I’d always suspected: Computers are a tool of the devil.

That’s right: the devil.

And I’m not even religious.

But still...

It wasn’t long after Gene died that I found I couldn’t sleep with the lights out. Inconsistent, some would say. But electricity’s been around a long time. Silicon chips haven’t.

I argued about that with Bruce, Maryanne’s husband, the last time they visited.

“Ben Franklin would’ve approved of computers,” he said. “He discovered electricity, which is what they run on.”

“Ben never envisioned a world like this,” I replied.

“Probably not in his time, but he was a very forward-looking individual.”

“He’d wish he’d never flown that old kite if he could see the way we live today.”

“So you’d rather give up your TV shows and yapping at people on the phone all the time?”

Yapping!

Well, that did it. We argued, and that’s why Maryanne and Bruce don’t feel welcome in my home anymore.

Snow’s really coming down now. Even with the furnace on high I can feel the cold. Genie and I are huddled under an old quilt in the den, watching The Big Prize quiz show. The prize tonight was an iPad with a year’s service contract. I grabbed the remote and tuned in to an old sitcom, but right away a commercial came on. I switched to another channel.

Local news show: “... sex offender who has been stalking our Houghton River Valley for the past four months struck again last night, raping and critically injuring a twenty-seven-year-old woman—”

I changed channels again. These young women today! Probably had been showing herself off in some bar, and the guy had followed her home or wherever. I hold no brief for that type. Or for the ones around my age, fifty-three, who show themselves off. Cougars, I think they call them.

I was getting hungry, thought I’d heat up a cup of soup. It would take awhile, since my old gas stove wasn’t firing so well these days, but what the hell. Time I had. All the time in the world.

Genie started whining to go out again; silly dog always has to pee at the most inconvenient times. I opened the door for her, then went to check on the soup. It was stone cold; the pilot light must’ve gone out. Come to think of it, everything was cold. Was the furnace on the blink?

Oh, hell. I’d been planning to get the filters changed, but hadn’t made the call. Hadn’t wanted to make the call because last year the guy who came out was so unpleasant, tried to tell me I needed a whole new furnace, and I’d screamed at him and made a complaint to his employers. Then I’d decided I needed to contact a different company, but hadn’t gotten around to it.

Cold, way too cold.

I opened the door and called Genie. Damn dog didn’t come. The snow was really coming down now; she’d probably taken shelter with one of the neighbors. I could call around to them...

I went to the kitchen, grabbed the receiver from the rotary phone, and started to dial. No tone. Great. The storm must have done something to the phone lines or the junction box. Either that or AT&T had messed up again.

Maybe Genie’d come to the back door for a change. I called out there. She didn’t respond.

Got to gather quilts and blankets, I thought. Going to be a long, icy night. I went upstairs, pulled both from the linen closet along with my big down pillow and a heavy Hudson Bay blanket. I threw them all on the bed, started to arrange them.

And then all of a sudden the electricity went out.

Oh, damn the power company! Why couldn’t they keep things like that from happening every time there was a big storm?

A good thing the stairs were familiar. The bannister posts too. I groped my way down. There was a flashlight in the pantry, candles too. Matches someplace; I could locate them with the flash. And then read for a while by candlelight, which I’d done before. Spend a cozy night, in any case. The emergency crews would be on the job before morning.

I felt my way to the kitchen, fumbled around till my fingers touched the pantry’s doorknob. Once inside, they easily found the flashlight. Good big one. I pushed the On button.

Nothing.

Batteries. When had I last changed them? Eveready. Didn’t that mean ever ready? I ought to sue the bastards for giving them that name!

Candles. Where were the candles? And the matches? Wait, there were some that I kept in the bedroom nightstand for lighting candles. I made my way back to the stairs, started up.

A noise. At the front door.

Genie? No, she always scratched at the door and barked—

The noise came again. Then I heard the sudden shriek of the wind, felt a cold blast of air.

Someone had come into the house!

I thought I’d locked the front door when I last called Genie, but I must not have. Where was Genie? She was supposed to protect me.

Footsteps in the hall, slow and stealthy. I wanted to scream, but my throat closed up.

The steps kept coming.

I turned and stumbled upstairs into the bedroom and locked the door. If only the old dial-phone line hadn’t gone out I could hide in here and call for help! If only I had one of those cell phones that didn’t need cable lines or electricity—

The footsteps were in the upstairs hallway now. They stopped outside the bedroom door. Oh God, he must’ve heard me come in here.

The knob rattled. Then there were a couple of loud thumps and the lock broke and the door burst open.

Oh no!

A match flared. A big man in a snow-covered coat and cap, somebody I’d never seen before, stepped through the doorway holding the match high. I knew he could see me by the bed.

No!

He kept coming.

Closer.

Closer...