Alfred Hitchcock - Stories That Scared Even Me

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Alfred Hitchcock (ed.) - Stories That Scared Even Me (Max Reinhardt, 1968: originally Random House, USA, 1967 ) (Ghost edited by Robert Arthur)

Irvin S. Cobb - Fishhead
Basil Copper - Camera Obscura
Miriam Allen de Ford - A Death In The Family
Gerald Kersh - Men Without Bones
Damon Knight - Not With A Bang
John Burke - Party Games
Fritz Leiber - X Marks The Pedwalk
Nugent Barker - Curious Adventure Of Mr. Bond
E. Phillips Oppenheim - Two Spinsters
Robert Arthur - The Knife
Ray Russell - The Cage
Theodore Sturgeon - It
William Sambrot - Tough Town
T. H. White - The Troll
Robert Somerlott - Evening At The Black House
William Wood - One Of The Dead
Algis Budrys - The Master Of The Hounds
Henry Slesar - The Candidate
Jack Finney - The Body Snatchers

The editor gratefully acknowledges the invaluable assistance of Robert Arthur in the preparation of this volume.

I think that may be significant. I've had my suspicions that these books were ghost edited by somebody, and Arthur being represented in all of them suggests that he had a hand in selecting the material. Whoever was responsible, they made a good fist of it.

Includes:

William Sambrot - Tough Town: Ed, a downtrodden travelling salesman, is bitten by a mad dog and pursued by the sheriff and an ever increasing number of townsfolk intent on informing him of his condition. Unfortunately for him, a local girl has been raped and killed and some of the mob get it into their heads that he must be the murderer or else why are so many people after him? And in a tough town they lynch first, ask questions later.

Robert Arthur - The Knife: Herbert Smithers finds the antique knife in a pile of muck along Dorset Street, Whitechapel. When the barmaid of The Three Oaks tries to take it from him to get a better look at the ruby embedded in the hilt he snaps and plants it in her breast. Horrified at what he's done, Smithers runs from the pub leaving behind the murder weapon which Edward Dawes greedily retrieves. He's trying to prize the jewel free when his wife disturbs him and becomes another victim of the demon knife. Both men are apprehended and swear that the blade acted independent of them. Inspector Frayne wonders about a previous owner.

Ray Russell - The Cage: The Countess is about to begin an affair with her husband’s right-hand man, who many suspect is the Devil Incarnate. Worried at her husband’s penchant for torture, she demands her fiendish suitor grants her wish: “Make this beauty never fade. Make it withstand the onslaught of time and violence. Make me - no matter what may befall - live forever.”

When the Count discovers her infidelity, true to form, he locks her in his favourite contraption for the night, just as her treacherous lover is advising the enemy army how best to take the castle …

Nugent Barker - The Curious Adventure Of Mr. Bond: "B-but you're my friend bleated Mr. Bond; and he stared at the shining thread of the axe.
"The Best you ever had, sir, Mr. Bond, sir!" answered Stephen Sasserach; and, stepping back, the landlord of The Traveller's Head cut off the traveller's head.". Three woodland Inns, each belonging to a different Sasserach brother: Stephen has The Traveller's Head, Martin has The Headless Man while Crispin and his "young, small and busy wife" Myrtle have The Rest Of The Traveller. One is noted for his wonderful broths, the other his fine carvings, and the third likes to keep his field of expertise a secret for reasons that soon become obvious. All three favour recycling in a big way.

John Burke - Party Games: Ronnie Jarman's birthday party and his mum Alice is struggling to control twenty over-excited children. The bright, impeccably well mannered eight year old Simon Potter has turned up uninvited and Alice is wondering if she did the right thing by welcoming him in to enjoy the fun. Simon lost his father some years ago and you'd hope the children would be kind instead of continually bullying him. She wishes her husband would hurry home from work. By the end of the story she bitterly wishes he hasn't.

T. H. White - The Troll: Lapland: A man hears noises coming from the adjoining hotel room and, peering through the keyhole, watches horrified as an eight foot tall Smurf devours a woman. After prying into the business of who booked the room, he finds he’s set himself up as the blue ogre’s next meal …

Basil Copper - Camera Obscura: Mr. Sharstead, ruthless loanshark, calls on Mr. Gingold to collect £300. The genial old man flummoxes him with his cordial demeanour and takes him on a guided tour of his home. Sharstead always suspected the place would be a hovel but it's a treasure trove of Objets D'art - it might make better business sense to accept one of these pieces in lieu of the debt. But he's strangely tongue-tied this afternoon and only regains his usual edge when Gingold quizzes him about his brutal eviction of the Thwaite family. Why doesn't he mind his own business! Now Gingold is showing him his pride and joy - a magnificent, customised camera obscura with a difference. It's a window on the town prior to World War II and is populated by the living dead ...

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Interesting little note on John Burke's Party Games


From John: My first contribution to the Pan Book of Horror Stories, ‘Party Games’ (The Sixth Pan Book of Horror Stories) was submitted by invitation from the editor as I was already lucky enough to be a regular on the Pan list in its most formative years. ‘Party Games’ also appeared in the US and UK hardback volume of Alfred Hitchcock’s 'Stories Which Have Scared Even Me', which was taken up for paper-back in this country by Pan – which meant Pan had to pay me twice over!

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Robert Arthur, poor sod. Perhaps the most under-appreciated anthologist of the last fifty years. Three more excellent stories on the spin, the first maybe the stand-out of a superb collection.

Irvin S. Cobb - Fishead: He's called that on account of his looks, his ma reputedly terrified by a huge catfish as she gave birth. Fishhead lives in a cabin along Reelfoot River on the Tennessee-Kentucky border, shunned and feared by blacks and whites alike due to his uncanny rapport with the local marine life. And now the cowardly Baxter brothers, Joel and Jake, are out to kill him. The boys are smarting over the very public beating he dispensed when they falsely accused him of sabotaging their lines ("in the onlookers a sense of the everlasting fitness of things had triumphed over race prejudice and showed them - two freeborn, sovereign whites - to be licked by a nigger"). Fishhead spots Joel's rifle trained on him, knows it's the end, but still has valuable seconds to bellow a last piercing cry to his deadly friends ...

Fritz Leiber - X Marks The Pedwalk: The war between motorists and the pedestrian's of LA's Slum Ring is exasperated when Smythe de Winter and his henchmen mow down an old lady and a girl in a wheelchair, but not before the former pulls an automatic and takes out two of his party. The WFA (White walled Fascists of Suburbia) argue that persons with one foot off the sidewalk are fair game and question a pensioner's right to bear arms. The extremist Committee of Pedestrian Safety (aka 'Robespierre's Rats' to their opponents) stockpile weapons in anticipation of Auto-Armageddon.

Henry Slesar - The Candidate: Mr. Grunzer, high-flying company executive, is suitably flattered to be approached by Tucker, an agent for the strictly hush-hush and very selective Society for United Action, an organisation who believe that "some people just don't deserve to live" and have devised an untraceable means of destroying them. Music to Grunzer's ears as he's long wanted rid of his business adversity, that dinosaur Whitman Hayes. Where do I sign up?

Another from the 'if you didn't see the end coming, you don't read enough of this stuff' brochure, which. of course, is not the same as saying it's in any way a poor story.