Jim stopped the car and looked at her intently. But when he spoke it was with an air of preoccupation. “There’s guilt in your voice,” he said absently. “But we’ll skip it. Do you know, I have a queer sort of impulse. I’d like to—”

“To what?”

“To kiss you,” said Jim unexpectedly, and did so.

THE CASE OF THE CRIMSON KISS

Erle Stanley Gardner

Detective: Perry Mason

IN 1950, George Gallup published the results of a nation-wide survey on mystery fiction, called the “Whodunit Derby,” to determine the country’s favorite mystery writer. The author who came in as the #1 choice was Erle Stanley Gardner (1889-1970), mainly because of his immensely popular lawyer/detective, Perry Mason.

For the record, the other writers who received the most votes, in order, were:

#2 Arthur Conan Doyle

#3 Ellery Queen

#4 Edgar Allan Poe

#5 Agatha Christie

#6 S. S. Van Dine

#7 Mary Roberts Rinehart

#8 Rex Stout

#9 Dashiell Hammett

Much of Gardner’s career is important and inspiring because of the sheer numbers. In the decade before the first novel about Perry Mason, The Case of the Velvet Claws (1933), he averaged approximately 1,200,000 published words a year—the equivalent of one 10,000-word novella every three days, or one full-length novel every two weeks—and he had a day job as a lawyer.

He dictated cases to his secretary and, in 1932, it finally occurred to him that he could dictate fiction, too, which greatly speeded up the writing process, enabling him to produce novels for the first time. Velvet Claws famously took about three-and-a-half days, though Gardner modestly said it was really four days, since he needed a half day to think up the plot.

“The Case of the Crimson Kiss” was originally published in the June 1948 issue of The American Magazine; it was first collected in The Case of the Crimson Kiss: A Perry Mason Novelette and Other Stories (New York, William Morrow, 1970).

The Case of the Crimson Kiss

by Erle Stanley Gardner

PREOCCUPIED WITH PROBLEMS of her own happiness, Fay Allison failed to see the surge of bitter hatred in Anita’s eyes. So Fay, wrapped in the mental warmth of romantic thoughts, went babbling on to her roommate, her tongue loosened by the cocktail which Anita had prepared before their makeshift dinner.

“I’d known I loved him for a long time,” she said, “but honestly, Anita, it never occurred to me that Dane was the marrying kind. He’d had that one unfortunate affair, and he’d always seemed so detached and objective about everything. Of course, underneath all that reserve he’s romantic and tender. . . . Anita, I’m so lucky, I can hardly believe it’s true.”

Anita Bonsal, having pushed her dinner dishes to one side, toyed with the stem of her empty cocktail glass. Her eyes were pinpricks of black hatred which she was afraid to let Fay Allison see. “You’ve fixed a date?” she asked.