I finished Edward D. Hoch's Dr. Sam Hawthorne series when Crippen & Landru published its fifth and final collection of short stories, Challenge the Impossible: The Final Problems of Dr. Sam Hawthorne (2018), which gave closure to one of Hoch's most popular and long-running series – running from 1974 to 2008 in Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine. So haven't visited the good doctor for "another small—ah—libation" since then and other Hoch collections beckon for my attention, but there's a short story I wanted to revisit.
"The Problem of the Pink Post Office," originally published in the June, 1981, issue of EQMM, takes place on October 24, 1929 – a day better known as Black Thursday. While the stock markets began to panic, the small town of Northmont is looking forward that day to the opening own, separate post office away from the general store. The brand new post office, "a pink post office," receives its last lick of fresh paint when the postmistress, Vera Brock, opens its doors for business. Among her first customers is Anson Waters, the town banker, who tells them about the panic down on Wall Street and needs to send his broker "a railroad bearer bond in the amount of ten thousand dollars" ("my broker can cash it at once"). Something everyone in the post office overhears and the registered envelope goes missing without a trace.
Fortunately, Dr. Sam Hawthorne and Sheriff Lens are two of the seven people present at the post office when the envelope disappeared. Dr. Hawthorne states "there are seven of us here, and I can offer seven solutions." The fast moving procession of false-solutions and them getting shot down almost as quickly is one of the highlights of this short story, however, the false-solution serve an even more important purpose than merely entertaining genre savvy detective geeks.
"The Problem of the Pink Post Office" starts out as an Ellery Queen-style "hidden object" puzzle, which is impossible crime adjacent, but Hawthorne knocking down his own false-solutions and eliminating all the suspects turned it into a fully fledged locked room mystery. Next comes the tricky part as the story has to, fittingly enough, deliver an eighth solution to the problem that has to be a little more than good. Hoch more than delivered on not only the story's premise, but on Hawthorne's opening statement that "The Problem of the Pink Post Office" is "unique among all the cases" he helped to solve. A shrewdly clued solution of beautiful simplicity which yet feels satisfying and original, because the trick is tailor-made for this story. A small gem and one of my favorite impossible crime stories from Hoch!
