Murderer's Chain by Wenzell Brown is a wonderfully devious blend of science fiction, crime, and dark humor. Its narrator has a problem: his wealthy mother-in-law Maudie refuses to finance his latest investment scheme. Since his wife will inherit Maudie's fortune, he begins considering a quicker route to financial independence. Unfortunately, ordinary murder strikes him as messy, vulgar, and far too dangerous.
Then he walks into Melvin Rosy's House of Fantastic Jewelry. Rosy is a Martian, and among his exotic merchandise is an exquisite necklace fashioned from Malutrex, a rare Martian metal with a deadly property when placed against human flesh. The necklace could provide exactly what the narrator needs: a murder weapon that apparently leaves no murder weapon behind. Brown builds the story around a gloriously self-serving narrator who can justify almost anything once enough money is involved. The result feels like a futuristic cousin of the classic perfect-murder tale, with aliens living among humans and interplanetary prejudice woven naturally into everyday life.
Wenzell Brown was an American novelist, educator, and short-story writer whose career extended well beyond science fiction. His books included Hong Kong Aftermath, Dark Drums, Prison Girl, Teen-Age Terror, and the later near-future novel Possess & Conquer. His crime fiction also appeared in publications including The Saint Mystery Magazine, and stories such as Death by Misadventure and Night on the Beach were later included in Alfred Hitchcock anthologies.
Murderer's Chain appeared in the March 1960 issue of Fantastic Universe, placing Brown's crime-story instincts inside a future of Martians, space travel, and interplanetary commerce. That combination makes this story unusual: beneath the science-fiction machinery is the tightly constructed setup of a classic murder tale.
