Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 134, No. 5. Whole No. 819, November 2009

Начало книги

“For his lasting contribution to our craft,” the Short Mystery Fiction Society recently selected Clark Howard as the first winner of the Edward D. Hoch Memorial Golden Derringer Award for Lifetime Achievement. Clark Howard’s honors in the field of the mystery story are many, but this award, which bears the name of his friend of thirty years, the late Ed Hoch, is (he told us) especially meaningful to him. The award will be presented at the Bouchercon Convention in Indianapolis in October.

Joe Kell was nervous, and he was sweating, sitting in front of the desk of Ben Axton, owner of Axton Hunting Expeditions, the largest big-game hunting firm in the Alaskan Interior.

Axton, a big bull of a man with a silver walrus moustache, got right to business as soon as Kell sat down. Rustling through some papers on his desk, he selected one and perused it. “Kell, I have a report on you here. I see that you’re still registered with the Department of Wildlife as a private game warden.”

Читать дальше →