Manhunt. Volume 2, Number 10, December, 1954

So it was Harry Cushman after all who was causing whatever the trouble was, I thought.

I asked, “He still here?”

Instead of answering, she led me into the front room. “Would you like a drink before we talk?”

“No, I wouldn’t like a drink before we talk,” I said, exasperated. “Just tell me what’s wrong.”

“I’d rather show you.”

The words raised the hair at the base of my neck. The last time she’d used similar words, she led me to her husband’s iced corpse. Now she took my hand, just as she had that previous time, and led me into the dining room. I followed numbly, almost knowing what to expect.

The light was off in the dining room, but the switch was by the door and Helena flicked it on as we entered. Then she dropped my hand and looked at me expectantly.

The dining room was large and had a fireplace on the outside wall. Against the wall closest to us was a sideboard containing a tray of bottles and glasses and a bowl of ice cubes.

Lying face down in front of the sideboard was Harry Cushman, the entire back of his head a pulpy and bloody mass from some terrific blow. His left hand clutched a glass from which the liquid had spilled, and near his outstretched right hand lay a siphon bottle on its side. Next to him lay a pair of brass fire tongs with blood on them.

The shock was not as great as you might expect, because I had anticipated something on this order from the moment Helena said she would rather “show” me. Glancing about the room, I saw the drapes were drawn so that we were safe from outside observation.

I said coldly, “It looks like you hit him from behind while he was mixing a drink. Right?”

She merely nodded.

“Why?”

“Because I was afraid he might give us away. He was in a panic when I told him Lawrence was dead.”

“Did he threaten to go to the police?”

She shook her head.

“What did he say?”

Helena shrugged slightly. “Nothing, really, except that I hadn’t any right to involve him in murder. It was the way he acted. He shook like a leaf.”

For a long time I looked at her. “Let me get this straight,” I said finally. “He didn’t threaten to expose us. He wasn’t going to the police. But just because he seemed to you like a bad security risk, you murdered him.”

She frowned slightly. “You make it sound worse than it was.”

“Then make it sound better.”

She made an impatient gesture. “What difference does it make now? It’s done. And we have to dispose of the body.”

Again she looked at me expectantly, a curious brightness in her eyes. And suddenly I realized something I had been aware of subconsciously for some time, but hadn’t brought to the front of my mind for examination.

Helena enjoyed watching me solve the problems brought on by murder.

It was a game to her, I knew with abrupt understanding, for the first time really knowing what went on under that expressionless face.

I said, “What do you mean, we have to dispose of the body? I haven’t killed anybody.”

Her lip corners curved upward in a barely discernible smile. “I’m sure you wouldn’t want me caught, Barney. You can only be executed for one murder. So there wouldn’t be any point in not telling the police about Lawrence if I got caught for this one. Including how cleverly you got rid of the body.”

With a feeling of horror I looked off into the future, seeing myself disposing of corpse after corpse as Helena repeatedly indulged her newly discovered thrill.

With only one result. Nobody gets away with murder forever.

I knew what I had to do then.

For a moment I examined her moodily. Then I shrugged. “All right, Helena. We may as well start now. Get some rags.”

Obediently she went into the kitchen, returning in a few moments with several large rags. Taking one from her, I picked up the tongs.

“Lift his head a little,” I said. “So I can spread a rag under it.”

Turning her back to me, she put both hands under the dead man’s shoulders and tugged upward. I swung the brass fire tongs down on top of her head with all my force.

It isn’t much harder to dispose of two bodies than it is to dispose of one. Not with a river as deep as the Mississippi so close by.

No Half Cure by Robert E. Murray

The doctor felt very happy — and the fact that he’d cured Mrs. Clinton didn’t account for all of his happiness...

* * *

For one of the few times since he had become an analyst, Doctor Kleist felt something very close to euphoria. He smiled at the woman across the desk from him, savoring this moment. It was one of the good times. It was times like these that kept a man from going back to the more profitable field of surgery. A complete recovery like this one made a grim profession worth while.

“You’re certain, Doctor?” the woman asked, and there was an almost breathless pleasure in her voice.

Doctor Kleist laughed. “Yes, Mrs. Clinton, I’m quite certain.”

“And there’ll be no — recurrence?”