Black Mask (Vol. 33, No. 3 — September 1949)

“So you been to the movies! Was it formal?”

Her eyes were narrow and her lips had that scornful twist. “So I wasn’t at the movies.”

“Where were you then?”

“Out.” Her voice was flat, final.

“Now listen to me, Reba—”

“You listen to me! A gentleman invites me out. I go out. I have a nice time. Then I have to come back to this. What do you expect me to do — just sit around and bite my nails, waiting for Wednesday and Saturday nights? You don’t have any ball and chain on me.”

“Maybe not, baby, but I’ve got plenty on you without that.”

“Like what?”

“Like pushing an old man downstairs!”

She stared. “You don’t think you could get away with it, do you?”

“I might, if I gave the cops the full story.”

“And what would that make you?”

Now it was my turn to stare.

“An accessory, Joe! An accessory on a murder charge!” She cocked that eyebrow and her lips twitched. “I might even be able to convince a jury that you handled the whole job!”

And she might! If a face and figure would sway a jury, Reba could do it.

“You’d better go back to your room, Joe, and think it over.”

That’s the way everything was at 5 o’clock Tuesday afternoon. It was then that I was tipped-off that all the truck drivers were going on strike at noon the next day.

I tried to get George Preston at home, but he didn’t answer. I was downstate, but I made it back to town in three hours. I drove right out to George’s place. With one foot on the sidewalk, I paused. Reba’s car was in the driveway!

I dressed carefully the next morning and ate a leisurely breakfast. On my way to see Reba, I made a quick stop at my own room. A few minutes later I was tapping on her door.

“Oh, Joe. Come in.”

She was seated in front of the mirror, brushing that long honey-colored hair. I looked at her, and I didn’t feel a thing. I was all dead inside — just as dead as she was going to be.

“You didn’t call me last night.”

“You weren’t in, anyway, were you?”

“No.”

“Movies again?”

“Look, Joe, our arrangement doesn’t seem to be working out.”

“Have you worked out a better one?”

She kept on brushing.

“With Preston?”

“So now you know?”

“Yeah, now I know.”

“And what are you going to do about it?”

Maybe I wouldn’t actually have done anything. Maybe I would have lost my nerve. But she had to keep talking!

“I told you once before I didn’t have time for small potatoes. I’m leaving you again, Joe, and this time it’s for good. Of course, if I ever need another sucker—” And she laughed!

I moved forward one step, snaking the .32 out of my coat pocket. I placed the barrel against the back of her head and closed my eyes. Then I pulled the trigger.

Let Me Kill You, Sweetheart by Frederick C. Davis

Could Timothy Regg’s blonde wife resist the temptation to touch his forbidden black book?

Chapter One Die Tonight

At just 5:30 on the afternoon of September 10th the door of Timothy Regg’s liquor shop at 413 Beetle Street swung open with a sharp, shrill clatter of its bell. Sitting behind the counter with his thin shoulders hunched over his “little black book,” as he called it, Timothy Regg said pleasantly, without looking up “Hello, Blossom, dear.”

To another man the bell might have seemed a nerve-jarring jangle, but to Timothy Regg it was a welcome and dulcet sound because it signalled the return of his beloved wife. Blossom.

This afternoon, however, the bell’s clang was louder and sharper than usual. Timothy Regg lifted his gaze from his little black book to find that his wife had halted just inside the door and was staring at the front page of the newspaper she had brought in.

“Why. Blossom, sweet,” Regg asked, disturbed by the shocked expression on her plump face, “is anything the matter, dear?”

Ignoring his solicitous question, Blossom continued to pore over a front page news item. She might be described in a stock phrase as a “big blonde” but this would not give Blossom due credit. Although large-framed and plump, she was also superbly proportioned.

She was always snugly girdled, her nylons were always sleekly smooth, she invariably had her mouth on straight and her mascara never actually dripped. She was largely a self-made woman and could be proud of the job she had done on herself.

Certainly she need never worry about holding her husband’s affections. He adored the very ground her spike-heeled, size nine sandals trod on — prized her so highly, in fact, that his friends simply wagged their heads.

Alarmed for her now, Timothy Regg hurried around the end of the counter to her side. Blossom’s round face was blanched with anxiety and she had begun gnawing the rouge off her lips. Craning to see the paper, her husband found a headline howling blackly across the whole front page:

LENNOX CORNERED BUT FIGHTS

WAY OUT, KILLING TWO COPS—

MAY BE HIDING INSIDE CITY

“Lennox?” Timothy Regg asked mildly. “Who’s he, sweetie?”