"Pandora's Bounty," by Gilbert M. Stack, in Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine, May/June 2026.
I was surprised that this is only the second time one of Stack's stories made my best-of list. I am very fond of the tales in this series.
He writes western mysteries about an unusual trio of adventurers. Corey "Rock Quarry" Callaghan is a bare-knuckle boxer making a precarious life fighting for money through the small towns of the west. Patrick Sullivan is his trainer. Pandora Parson is a professional gambler, and the brains of the group.
Patrick is especially not the brains. In fact, in any situation he is pretty much guaranteed to make things worse. There was one point in this story when he said something so ill-advised that I startled my wife by gasping out loud.
So, what is the situation the friends find themselves in? A bounty has been put out for Corey because he beat up two miners and stole their gold. Except he didn't do that, of course. Someone is imitating our hero, boxing under his name, and dirtying it in the process.
Pandora, naturally, comes up with an elaborate scheme to draw the impostor to them and then expose him. A clever and satisfactory story.
