A collection of ingenious detective stories written by the early American mystery writers features the sleuthing talents of Professor Augustus S. F. X. Van Dusen, the "Thinking Machine," an eccentric scientist who uses his superior intellect and unique insights to solve impossible crimes. Edited and with an Introduction by Harlan Ellison 
 
Introduction 
 
Harlan Ellison 
 
And now that you’ve made his acquaintance—and trust me on 
this, after the celebrated “Problem of Cell 1 3” you will number this contact among 
the most unforgettable in your life—we’ll return to the bewildering challenges 
to the ratiocinative intellect of The Thinking Machine in just a moment. But 
first, these words from our sponsors: 
 
Friends, do you long for a respite from the anomie of modern 
detective fiction? Do you voicelessly cry out for deliverance from tea-cozy melodramas 
in which varicose-veined elderly matrons unravel nefarious plots among the 
forsythia? Do you weep, in the gentle, lonely, small hours for a world in which 
private eyes do not get sapped across the noggin by footpads and yeggs with 
lisle stockings stuffed with small change? Is your reading fare fairly 
fruitless? Do you feel hemmed in by homicides and henna-haired ’hoors who use 
the effword to the ultimate degree of shocklessness? If you tremble at my words, 
take heart: we offer you Escape! The sweet opportunity to fiy thee hence, to go 
back to Edwardian times in genteel Boston, to an era of ominous gaslight and 
the clatter of Hansom cabs, to the recent invention of the ’phone and the 
introduction of the auto cab. &nbsp;

Jacques Futrelle's "The Thinking Machine": The Enigmatic Problems of Prof. Augustus S. F. X. Van Dusen, Ph. D., LL. D., F. R. S., M. D., M. D. S. PDF

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