The Dancing Doll Murders

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FOUR people stared in frozen fascination at the small dancing figure on the polished table in the century-old home of Esmond Caulder. The thing was a musical doll of German make. It shuffled, pirouetted, arms outstretched stiffly, while a tinkling, monotonous melody came from a music box inside it.

To one in particular of those watching there was something strangely disturbing about the doll. Don Winstead, Caulder’s youngest nephew, saw his own features imprinted on that tiny waxen face. His own blond hair, his own petulant mouth, his own high cheek bones and straight nose. It was his very image – his effigy in brief!

And there was something else! Winstead’s nostrils flared. An emotion close to horror darkened his eyes. For on the manikin’s white shirt front was a lurid stain. A blotchy crimson oval, with hideous spreading tentacles – blood! The macabre effect was completed by a slender dagger no bigger than a broken toothpick that was thrust into the exact center of the spot.

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