Before I Wake

By Brett Halliday

A teenage girl and her wicked stepmother battle to the death in this pulp fiction classic from the legendary author of the Mike Shayne Mysteries.
 
Ever since her father wrote to say he had married a woman named Florence, April Haddon has nursed a bitter hatred for her stepmother. Now, years later, when they finally meet, she is not disappointed.
 
With her father dead, April is back in Midhampton to claim her inheritance. Only Florence stands in her way. As April’s legal guardian, Florence seems to relish the control she has over her stepdaughter. But April has her own ways of taking control. She’d kill Florence if she thought she could get away with it—she even says so in her diary. And now it seems she’ll get the chance.
 
Over the next eleven days, April and Florence engage in a vicious battle of wills that leads inexorably to tragedy. But is Florence truly an evil stepmother—or is April truly capable of carrying out her darkest fantasies?
 
First published in 1949, Before I Wake was hailed by the Los Angeles Daily News as “an emotional experience” that “hasn’t been matched in years” with “an incredibly terrifying finish that will . . . knock you for a loop.”
 
Praise for Brett Halliday’s Mike Shayne Mysteries
 
“[Mike Shayne is] one of the best of the tough sleuths.” —The New York Times
 
“Unlike anything else in the genre.” —L. J. Washburn, author of For Whom the Funeral Bell Tolls
 
“Raw, ingenious storytelling . . . Pure pleasure.” —Shane Black, creator of Lethal Weapon and writer/director of Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, on Murder Is My Business

• Language: English
• Publisher: MysteriousPress.com Open Road
• Release date: Oct 13, 2015
• ISBN: 9781504019354

Brett Halliday

Brett Halliday (1904–1977) was the primary pseudonym of American author Davis Dresser. Halliday is best known for creating the Mike Shayne Mysteries. The novels, which follow the exploits of fictional PI Mike Shayne, have inspired several feature films, a radio series, and a television series. 

Book preview

Friday, September 3rd.

I hate my stepmother.

That is a lovely, flat, unequivocal statement of fact. I enjoy reading it set down on paper in front of me.

The thing is, I’ve been looking forward to hating her for almost two years. I’ve wanted to hate her all along, but I’ve tried to be fair about it.

You can’t wholly and completely hate a person whom you’ve never met, though. Not until you come face to face with her. Not until you discover for yourself that she is everything odious and despicable that you hoped she would be.

I am pleased, now, to find that Florence is exactly as I have been picturing her in my mind ever since Mother died … ever since Father wrote me that strange letter following her death, from which I was able to read so much between the lines.

It seems odd now, as I recall that letter, that Father should have told so much of the truth about Florence Riddel without even (I am sure) knowing it was the truth. Although I was eighteen at the time, I was a mere child compared to the way I feel now. Yet I remember feeling very sorry for Father. I know he had no idea what I would read between the lines of his letter, or what there was between the lines for me to read. He was such a blundering, straight-forward man. Sweet and good, but fuzzy in his thinking. He had loved Mother dearly … I am certain of that. But I am also sure he never understood her at all. Just as he never understood me at all. I think I gave up hoping he would ever understand me when I was about twelve. Mother and I made our own lives … apart from him … and he didn’t seem to mind at all. I think he realized his own lack, and accepted the only niche he really fitted into.

But I am getting ahead of myself. Or behind myself. Or something. The thing is, I am determined to set all of this down very clearly … just as it happened … just as I see it happen in the days to come.

I am not sure, just yet, why I feel it is so important to put everything down on paper. But I am sure it is important. I don’t want to wait until it’s all over. I want to write out each incident while it is fresh and vivid in my mind. If you wait even a few days, your mind has a way of distorting events and impressions out of all proportion to each other. It’s a trick of the human imagination, of course. You actually think you’re telling the unvarnished truth sometimes when it may be nothing but a tissue of false impressions.

As, for instance, when I recalled a moment ago the effect Father’s letter had on me … the one in which he first mentioned Florence Riddel’s name. In absolute honesty I believe I felt all those things at the time. But that was almost two years ago. I can’t be sure. I don’t know how much my present recollection is colored by what has happened since.

I don’t want this journal to be confused by waiting until it is all ended before I set the facts down. I am not afraid of the truth. My stepmother is the one who should be afraid. God only knows how it will all come out, but I must have this record, and not have to depend on my memory.

So, I’m going to write a little each day … or each time something happens that seems important enough to put down. I am writing this now in my own room with the door locked. I have told Florence that Ellen Chase and I are collaborating on a novel and that I plan to send her chapters of it by mail as I finish them. In that way, she won’t suspect what I’m really doing, and won’t try to prevent me from mailing batches of this record every few days. I shall write Ellen a letter as soon as I finish this first stint, warning her that she will soon begin receiving thick manilla envelopes which she must put away safely, unopened and unread. I won’t have to tell Ellen exactly what I am doing or why I do not wish anyone to read what I send her. Ellen is the one person in this world whom I can trust to do exactly as I wish without asking any questions. The mere fact that I ask it will be enough. We understand each other, and there’s nothing else to be said after you’ve said that.

In this way, too, I will be completely safe. There will never be more than a few typewritten sheets around the house at any one time. I can put down on paper every mood and every emotion while it is still vivid in my mind. I can say, for instance, that Florence is definitely a bitch. She is common and cheap and nasty-minded. I can calmly and fearlessly write that I wish she were dead, and that nothing would please me more than to kill her if I can work out a plan for doing it without being suspected.

So, that’s the sort of journal this is going to be. I shall conceal nothing. I will have no shame. I shall not be afraid of the truth.

But I must start at the beginning, yesterday afternoon, the first time I saw Florence. I had flown east from California after receiving her telegram, and it was in the middle of the afternoon and I was hot and tired and aching in every muscle after an interminable and jolting trip out from the city on the Long Island railroad. It wasn’t a week-end, so there wasn’t any holiday animation about the passengers. Potato farmers and fishermen with their dowdy wives and dirty children: big-handed, red-faced men, shouting greetings to each other along the length of the cars; women in homemade dresses carrying bulky parcels and bulging shopping bags, and whining children underfoot. It isn’t, goodness knows, that I feel superior to them just because my economic position is better. I hope I’m as democratic as anyone, but …

I did get a taxi at the depot. That was one fortunate result of the type of passenger who got off the train. There were two taxis waiting, and I guess I was the only one who could afford to use one, for both drivers converged on me and tried to take my bags. I selected the younger and more virile of the two and let him put my bags in the back and told him to drive me to the Haddon cottage on the Bayfront. He nodded without asking any of the impertinent questions one usually hears from the native drivers in towns like Midhampton, and drove past the school into the congested business district.

The place looked just the same as it had two years ago. The same ugly little stores and overalled natives, summer dwellers in gay print dresses or slacks. It gave me a feeling of unreality to look out the window of the moving taxi and see that nothing had changed. It was as though I had not been away at all.

It was a short drive, and I took the fifty-cent fare and a quarter tip from my purse as he drew up in front of the old shingled house where I was born.

It looked just the same, too. The lawn was freshly mowed, but the hedge needed trimming. The front porch and window casings had a fresh coat of white paint, I noted, as I waited for the driver to open the car door.

I put the silver in his hand as the front door of the house opened. I knew she was my stepmother when I saw her black-clad figure in the doorway.

She was in mourning. Of all the ridiculous things! It wasn’t only ridiculous and outmoded, but sacrilegious. An insult to my father. Who was she to be making such an ostentatious display of grief? Of course, he had married her after Mother died, but I could never bring myself to think of her as his wife. I had a feeling she had planned this just for the effect she hoped it would have on me … as though she had hung a signboard on herself for all the world to see, proclaiming, I, at least, cared enough for John Haddon to mourn his passing.

I can’t think of the right words to explain what a shock it was; what an affront to see her standing there in the doorway dressed all in black.

The driver distracted my thoughts by asking about my bags. I said, Just set them inside the gate. The servants will bring them in, and started up the walk toward my stepmother.

Florence is the sort of woman who would look dowdy in an exclusive Balençiaga creation. Her hands are like a man’s, broad, with square-tipped fingers. Her feet are large and her ankles muscular. She has no waistline at all. There’s a solid heaviness about her that reminds you of a workhorse.

Her face is heavy, too, smooth and unlined. Not fat, but solidly fleshed. She wears her blonde hair in two braids wound around her head in a style which someone has probably told her is queenly. Her eyebrows are light and unplucked. She has a wide pale mouth and she keeps the corners lifted in a faint smile that doesn’t go at all with the rest of her face.

I don’t remember consciously noticing all these things about Florence, but they came out when I began writing about her. It shows what the subconscious mind is capable of. All I was actually aware of at the time was a distinct feeling of aversion. I recall thinking: She’s just exactly what I expected. Every bit as horrible.

It was partly her very solidity as she stood there, holding the screen door open with her left hand and watching me come up the walk. I could almost feel a shiver running down my spine. Some sort of inner strength emanated from her. The large feet in the low-heeled black shoes were set well apart, supporting the thick legs and heavy body.

It was a warning to me, somehow. An ominous indication that she was not the sort of person easily got rid of. Her posture suggested that it was she who belonged in my father’s house, and that I was the interloper. There was something implacable about her stance and about the placid way she waited for me to come nearer. Her smooth brow was unpuckered, and her pale blue eyes utterly incurious at seeing me for the first time.

I stopped at the foot of the steps when her voice first reached me. It was a deep, bland voice that grated on my nerves more than it would had it been rasping and harsh.

She said, I suppose you’re April.

With my foot on the first step, I just looked up at her. I thought of several obvious retorts I might make to her inane remark. But I gave her what I hoped was a withering stare and said nothing.

She said, I had supposed you were slow in coming because you were shopping for suitable clothes. She didn’t raise her voice or give the words any particular intonation. She just stood there looking me over.

I realized then that she had honestly thought I was rushing around Hollywood buying a mourning outfit before I started east. I wanted to laugh in her face. I glanced down at my dress. It was pussywillow-gray with a narrow belt of wine-red crocodile to match my high-heeled, open-toed sandals.

I went on up the steps and said quietly, I had more important things to do before I could get away.

She didn’t move an inch so that I could go inside. She just stood there looking at me with her pale, cold eyes, and said, I think I would have known you anywhere. You have your father’s mouth and chin.

I said, Do I? How did he ever manage without them? I began casually pulling off my gray suede gloves and I fancied that the aloofness of my response struck home to her, though she gave no sign. I’d like to go in, if you don’t mind, I continued. Really, the trip has been quite fatiguing.

You do look warm, she said placidly. She still didn’t move, but glanced past me at my bags piled on the sidewalk. Why don’t we bring your bags in at once? Then you can get into something more comfortable.

She started forward and the screen door closed. I stepped aside, saying icily, Don’t you think the servants can manage the luggage quite nicely?

She paused on the edge of the porch. I have only one maid now, and I think she has enough to keep her busy without asking her to do a porter’s work.

But you expect me to do a porter’s work? I was so amazed by her tone that the words just tumbled out.

She looked at me with that faintly condescending corners-of-the-mouth smile which makes me writhe as I recall it. Would you like your bags inside? Or would you prefer to leave them on the sidewalk?

I shall be very pleased to have them inside if you wish to bring them in, I said, and walked past her.

The hall was different. I saw at once that everything had been done over. The beautiful grained oak of the door was hidden beneath a heavy coat of ivory paint and the wallpaper was a light tan flecked with gold. Glancing through the double glass doors on the left, I saw that the living room had received the same treatment. The exquisite linenfold panelling which my mother had cherished destroyed by that woman’s common taste! I was boiling inside.

Florence came in noiselessly as I stood there. You’ll have the east room, she told me. I think it’s ready if you wish to go up now. Both her hands were empty. She hadn’t, after all, brought in a single bag.

I heard someone coming down the stairway and looked up to see a pleasant-faced mulatto girl in a neat cotton dress. When she came down to us, Florence said, This is Elsie. Miss Haddon, Elsie, who has come to stay with us for a time.

The maid nodded to me and mumbled something and started into the living room. I said, Please bring my bags in, Elsie. I think I’ll go up to my room now.

Elsie is late getting dinner started, Florence said gravely. You may go to the kitchen, Elsie.

The girl flashed me a curious glance and bobbed her head and disappeared. I stalked past Florence and went slowly up the stairs. All the way to the top I was conscious of Florence standing there watching me, silent and sure of herself, with that faint smile at the corners of her mouth. Treating me exactly as though I were a child in a tantrum. Positive, I am sure, that she had succeeded in doing what she would call getting off on the right foot.

Rage shook me, but I knew I had to get a firm grip on myself. I had to keep a level head to handle the situation properly. The quick tears in my eyes dried and left them burning with angry determination.

The door of the east room stood open. It had been my room as far back as I could remember. Mother and Father had always occupied the big southwest bedroom, and the smaller room on the southeast was kept as a guest chamber. Then there were the two smaller bedrooms with their own private bath in the back for the servants.

I presumed Florence had taken over the southwest room after she moved in with Father, and was now keeping it for her own.

I didn’t mind. I’ve always loved the smaller, more intimate and cheerful east room. The ceiling is low above the windows, and slopes up steeply to the inner wall above the head of the bed, giving it a sort of studioish look. It had always been kept just for me when I was away at school or visiting, and I’d thought of it as a homey refuge that I could come back to whenever I wished.

That, too, was all changed now. I trembled with a sense of deep outrage as I closed the door and looked around to see what Florence had done even in this one room which she might have left as it was.

By comparison with what I have called her common taste in redecorating the hall and living room, I can only say that this room was an atrocity. My framed prints were still on the walls, the Breughel and the others, so carefully collected and hung with such dignity, but now they screamed torturously at loops of pink rosebuds which formed a border all about the walls that had become grass-green. There were ruffled white organdie curtains at the windows with green shades and a cheap woolly white rug on the floor beside what was once my handsome walnut fourposter bed. But not any more. Its treasured finish was bedaubed with a violent orchid paint that made my stomach turn over. Two priceless antique chairs were painted to match the bed and the dressing table was swathed in bright-flowered chintz skirts, hiding its delicately carved legs.

It

Reviews for Before I Wake

[datrappert · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This is a well-done paranoid tale for most of the book, as a young girl has dire suspicions about her new stepmother after she returns to her father's home after his death. A provision in her father's will means that she has to live with the stepmother until she turns 21 if she is to inherit half of his fortune. She begins to believe that the stepmother murdered her father--and is now out to murder her. This is a great setup, but as the book meanders along, the author doesn't quite manage to pull it off with the panache it deserves.