Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 21, No. 115, June 1953

Doublecross by Aljean Meltsir

Aljean Meltsir’s “Doublecross” is one of the thirteen “first stories” which won special awards in EQMM’s Eighth Annual Contest. We shall tell you nothing about the story itself except to warn you that it is deceptively clever and to urge you to read the story clear through to the end — don’t dare stop anywhere in the middle! The author is in her early twenties, a graduate of Stanford University where she majored in journalism and was first in her class of 1500 students. She is Phi Beta Kappa, was managing editor of the campus newspaper, and worked her way through school by what she calls “hashing.” Does that mean serving food? If so, you never saw a prettier waitress in any college in the country! (Miss Aljean Meltsir, conscious of her unusual name, sent us a photograph to prove that the name was not a pseudonymous invention.) And when we tell you that in the time-honored tradition of most great literary figures, Miss Meltsir started writing at the age of six — her first story was “a bloodthirsty epic about a talking dog that was captured by cannibals” — we think you will agree with us that this Stanford alumna should go far in journalism and writing.

Mr. Arthur Colton had come 2000 miles, had crossed the Allegheny, Susquehanna, Illinois, Mississippi, and Missouri Rivers and a great many of their tributaries to repay the loss of an arm. Strictly speaking, an arm ought to be repaid by an arm, but Mr. Colton, calculating six years of interest on the debt, had decided that one life was proper payment.

It was a debt of honor, and he was an honorable man. His sense of honor was the one thing he had retained from an excellent college education. He had always considered himself an honorable man, had always divided his loot equitably among his associates. It was for this reason that the doublecross of Jackrabbit Durward had embittered him.

Reflecting, Mr. Colton lit a cigarette awkwardly with his left hand. Everything that he did with his left hand was awkward. But professionally, Jackrabbit Durward’s bullet had actually been an asset. Leaving second-story work to other men, Mr. Colton had entered the confidence racket, where his horn-rimmed glasses, small, pudgy body, and awkward fumbling had quickly made him a success. People seemed to want to give their money to the ill-fated, balding gentleman with only one arm.

The train pulled into the station, and Arthur Colton looked at his wrist watch. It was almost 6. A little dust — the legacy of a rainless summer — swirled at his feet. He hoped it would be a dark night.

He walked down the town’s main street with the interest of a man who has never before been farther west than Pittsburgh. He smiled at a group of young girls in front of the drug store. He looked inside the bank at the merchants depositing their week’s receipts. He listened to two farmers talking about crops. He was interested in everything. At the thought of Jackrabbit as a farmer, he smiled — a kindly, heartwarming smile. And yet being a farmer had been successful for Jack-rabbit. It had taken Colton six years to trace him.

Arthur Colton was not in the least secretive about being in town. When he had seen everything of interest on the main street, he toured the other streets. It was too early to go about his business, and it was pleasant to wander around. He saw some rather astonishing roses. He had always been a rose-fancier. In fact, in his athletic youth he had refused to rob a certain house when he found a group of extraordinary rose bushes in the garden.

Now he thoroughly enjoyed his browsing. In the last six years he had learned that human beings are only interested in themselves, and he quite seriously thought that he could lead a bear down the main street of the town without attracting any special notice from farmers immersed in politics and from housewives planning dinner in their heads.

Arthur Colton did not expect to be caught. Jackrabbit Durward had taken a new name and a new wife when he had moved west. The new wife had quickly tired of rural delights and had headed farther west with a less wealthy but more generous husband. From prudence, Durward had cut all his old friends, and there was nothing but a set of fingerprints to identify him with the lower circle of a large eastern city. Arthur Colton did not expect the townspeople to think it decent to check on the fingerprints of one of their leading citizens.

But for all his poise, Arthur Colton was a little nervous. He ran his fingers through his thick black hair. He had never killed a man before. He felt the knife pressing into his hard, lean stomach, and the steel chilled him. Then he considered the issue in another way and relaxed. He was only soliciting payment for a long-standing debt.

If was now quite dark, and the roofs of the houses were obscured by the blackness. Still, Arthur waited. It was not yet time. It had been Wednesday, September 11, at 8:52 P.M. when Jackrabbit’s doublecross had reached its deafening climax. It would be Wednesday, September 11, at exactly 8:52 when Colton would exact payment.

Colton looked up. There was no moon and even the stars were covered by clouds. Cautiously he began to walk, bending his tall frame double when someone came into a yard across the road. He must not be noticed, and sweat tickled the back of his head as he crouched. Whoever it was had only stepped out for a breath of air. Colton could not see, but he heard a screen door close, and he straightened up again.

He left the main road then, cutting across fields, circling and recircling, crossing the dry stream-bed of the town’s small creek. He arrived at his destination at 8:40.

The farm was quiet. Colton slid into the barn and prodded the cows into uneasiness. Restlessly they lowed. Colton waited for Jackrabbit to come into the barn to find out what was the matter.

The kitchen door opened and for one moment the back steps of the farmhouse were framed in light. Jack-rabbit stood there, confident, ugly, annoyed at having to investigate what was troubling the stupid cows. Annoyed only. Not frightened. Not alarmed. That was consistent with Colton’s theory of human nature. Six years was too long for any man to remain frightened.

Jackrabbit had entered the barn now, but Colton did not use his knife. It lacked a few minutes of the proper time, and besides, a man was entitled to know who was exacting payment.

“You shouldn’t have dropped all your old friends when you became wealthy,” Colton said. “It shows lack of breeding.”

There was no answer except the restless murmurs of the cows.

“Have you spent it all? How, I wonder? Making monthly business trips to the big cities and then coming back to be a model farmer?”

“I didn’t...” The voice tried huskily to say something and then stopped.

Arthur Colton smiled warmly. “I’m not asking for the money back. That’s included in the debt.”

“What debt?” The voice sounded less hoarse, as though the paralysis of shock were wearing off.

“I have it all figured out here somewhere.” Arthur Colton pushed up his coat sleeve. His arm was bare from his elbow to the tasteful signet ring on his little finger. “Here is my tally,” he said and drew his knife.

“I don’t...”

“Please let me finish,” Arthur Colton said in the prim fashion of a schoolteacher. “You owe me $7,298 plus 4 per cent interest on that for six years, roughly $1,750; doctor and hospital expenses amounting to about $1,000, one arm, on which the interest is not easily calculable, and endless mental anguish.” His voice changed. “Your life will adequately cancel out the debt, I think.”

Jackrabbit Durward suddenly realized what the prim voice was saying. He began to run, but it was too late.

Arthur Colton walked the 50 feet that separated him from the body and looked down. He thought for a moment of looking for Jackrabbit’s wallet, quite probably a well-filled wallet. He eliminated the thought instantly. The debt had already been paid, and Arthur Colton was an honorable man.

Before entering the railroad station Arthur Colton stopped to straighten his tie and scrape the mud off his shoes. Then he boarded the 10:15 train. He joined a group of businessmen who were in the club car and complimented them on their county. They bought him a drink and asked him his business.

“I came to collect a bad debt. It’s awful how dishonest some people are.” He smiled at his companions. “Man bought some mining stock from me and refused to pay my commission when the mine struck a rich vein.”

He showed the stock certificates casually to his companions. They were very interested. They bought him another drink.

Mr. Arthur Colton had a very profitable journey home.

Author’s Note: I do not hope to have deceived the creators of Ellery Queen (editors’ note: We hasten to confess that we were completely fooled!). So I will assume that you have already discovered that Doublecross is a doublecross only on the reader.

I am afraid that the average detective-story reader is getting to be a lazy chap, who prepares for his murders with a good dinner and a comfortable couch. He is good-naturedly inclined to believe anything an author tells him, and the authors have lately been taking advantage of this good-nature by inventing monstrous coincidences and solutions which introduce five new characters on the next-to-last page.

Doublecross is an experiment to see how far an author can go. As a story, it is contradictory, improbable, and, in some places, impossible.

Arthur Colton is described as tall and short, pudgy and lean. He is balding and yet he has thick black hair. He looks at the merchants of the town banking their week’s receipts on a Wednesday in a bank that is curiously open at 6 o’clock in the evening. Dust from a dry summer swirls at his feet and he crosses the dry bed of a creek, yet he must scrape mud from his shoes when he returns to the railroad station.

He has never been in this town before, but he can leave the main road and accurately cut across fields, make tortuous circles, traverse creeks — all in total darkness! — and still arrive at his destination at the right time. He looks at his wrist watch when he enters town and his knowledge of the time is important afterwards, but at a crucial point his arm — his only arm — is bare from elbow to fingers! It would also be extremely improbable, to say the least, for the same date to fall on the same day six years later.

He cannot easily light a cigarette with his left hand, but he can throw a knife well enough to hit a man 50 feet away in total darkness! There is no moon, the stars are clouded over, and the fact that it is completely dark is mentioned in five different ways. I do not believe that anyone could throw a knife well enough to kill a man instantly while he is running away at full speed and in complete darkness. I do not think anyone in his right mind would even attempt it.

To tally my own experiment and see if the story was cunningly enough contrived, I have tried it on several inveterate readers of Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. The average result was ¾ of one error caught per reader. For example, one caught no mistakes at all; another realized that the man was both tall and short; another realized that he was balding and had thick hair. No one realized that the story as a whole could not have taken place anywhere on this planet!