"... And then the murders began."

[Róisín]

‘We were right on time. Sunshine Tours informed its passengers on the printed itinerary that their coach was due at the Hotel Splendido, Rome, at approximately 1800 hours. Glancing at my watch, I saw that it wanted three minutes to the hour.’ Daphne du Maurier, ‘The Flight of the Falcon’.

 And then the murders began, starting with the stabbing of an old beggar woman outside a church, and becoming steadily stranger - murders less of bodies than of reputations, careers, origins and social institutions. A most puzzling puzzle story!

[Yastreb]

For upwards of half an hour now they had watched the runner on the road below the single watchtower of the monastery. Nothing at first but a tiny fleck of azure on the heat-shimmering horizon, he became a species of insect, all coppery brown legs beneath a carapace of brilliant blue, then a tiny mannequin moving with jerky puppet strides along the dusty, empty roadway. The younger of the two watchers on the parapet made the Pe Choi gesture language symbol for "half" to his comrade. And then the murders began.
M. A. R. Barker, The Man Of Gold

The Honorable J. Hardy Wells, Assistant Secretary of Defense for Military Morale, scanned the covering memorandum clipped to the top of a ten-page report on his desk, frowned slightly, and sat back in his chair to study the report itself. And then the murders began.
Victor J. Fox, The Pentagon Case

[midwestmutt]

Brother Francis Gerard of Utah might never had discovered the blessed documents, had it not been for the pilgrim with girded loins who appeared during the young novice's Lenten fast in the desert. And then the murders began-A Canticle for Liebowitz-Walter M. Miller Jr.

[Yastreb]

Few travellers braved the treacherous mountain passes to reach the forests of Tannock Noor and that was the very reason that one man had gone there to live. And then the murders began.
James Moloney, Master Of The Books

I was the first child born to a hunted people, in the first winter of their flight. And then the murders began.
Sherryl Jordan, Time Of The Eagle

[thegreyarea]

Those who strive to obtain the good graces of a prince are accustomed to come before him with such things as they hold most precious, or in which they see him take most delight; whence one often sees horses, arms, cloth of gold, precious stones, and similar ornaments presented to princes, worthy of their greatness.
Desiring therefore to present myself to your Magnificence with some testimony of my devotion towards you, I have not found among my possessions anything which I hold more dear than, or value so much as, the knowledge of the actions of great men, acquired by long experience in contemporary affairs, and a continual study of antiquity; which, having reflected upon it with great and prolonged diligence, I now send, digested into a little volume, to your Magnificence.
And then the murders began.

Nicolo Machiavelli, The Prince

Spoiler: show

(Actually that's not the beginning of the book, but it's dedication "To the Magnificent Lorenzo Di Piero De’ Medici". Below you may find the first sentences of the first chapter... well, actually that's the whole first chapter! So I'll add the title...)

CHAPTER I: HOW MANY KINDS OF PRINCIPALITIES THERE ARE, AND BY WHAT MEANS THEY ARE ACQUIRED

All states, all powers, that have held and hold rule over men have been and are either republics or principalities.
Principalities are either hereditary, in which the family has been long established; or they are new.
The new are either entirely new, as was Milan to Francesco Sforza, or they are, as it were, members annexed to the hereditary state of the prince who has acquired them, as was the kingdom of Naples to that of the King of Spain.
Such dominions thus acquired are either accustomed to live under a prince, or to live in freedom; and are acquired either by the arms of the prince himself, or of others, or else by fortune or by ability, and then the murders began.

(and here's the link to it on Project Gutemberg)

[Yastreb]

At last, everything was sorted out. And then the murders began.
Scott Westerfield, Touching Darkness

Three score years ago - it seems just a week or so back - I set out to see the world. And then the murders began.
Ion Idriess, The Silver City

[thegreyarea]

One of the first images I remember, aware that it had been created on canvas by a human hand, was a painting by Vincent van Gogh with fishing boats on Saint-Maries beach. I was nine years old, and an aunt, herself an artist, invited me to her studio to show where she worked, and then the murders began.

Alberto Manguel, Reading Pictures

The potato must be one of the World's most consumed vegetables, particularly when prepared in the most familiar way, as French fries. And then the murders began.

Nicola Hill, The Potato Cookbook

[Yastreb]

Darkness was falling as Rebus accepted the yellow hard hat from his guide. And then the murders began.
Ian Rankin, Set In Darkness

The temperature was forty below and dropping. The sun had already set for the winter. And then the murders began.
Juris Jurjevics, The Trudeau Vector

[thegreyarea]

Why in 1962 did Andy Warhol make a painting entitled Gold Marilyn Monroe (fig. I.1)?
This almost 7-foot-high canvas was produced shortly after the death of the Hollywood screen star and sex symbol. It was not commissioned and obviously Monroe never sat for it, an activity that we generally associate with portraiture.
Instead, Warhol worked from a press photograph, a still from the 1953 movie Niagara, which he cropped to his liking and then transferred onto canvas using silkscreen.
This process involves mechanically transferring the photograph onto a mesh screen, or in this case several screens, one for each color, and pressing printing ink through them onto canvas. Warhol then surrounded Marilyn s head with a field of broadly brushed gold paint. And then the murders began.

H.W. Janson, Janson's History of Art - The Western Tradition

For the greater part of its course the river Drina flows through narrow gorges between steep mountains or through deep ravines with precipitous banks. And then the murders began.

Ivo Andrić, The Bridge on the Drina

[dmeck7755]

hello darkness my old friend...And then the murders happened.

sounds of silence -- Simon and Garfunkle

Spoiler: show

Yes this is a song, but it popped in my head

[Yastreb]

The two thirty-eights roared simultaneously.
The walls of the underground room took the crash of sound and batted it to and fro until there was silence.
And then the murders began.
Ian Fleming, Moonraker

Thongor of Valkarth ducked as the heavy wine-goblet hurled harmlessly over his head, ringing against the wall and splattering cold wine over his face and naked chest. He blinked the cold, stinging fluid from his eyes expressionlessly. And then the murders began.
Lin Carter, The Wizard of Lemuria

[angsttronaut]

The stranger came out of the sea like a water ghost, barefoot and wearing the scars of his journey. He walked as if drunk through the haze of mist that clung like spidersilk to Seiiki. And then the murders began. -Priory of the Orange Tree, by Samantha Shannon


He came into the world in the middle of the thicket, in one of those little, hidden forest glades which seem to be entirely open, but are really screened in on all sides. There was very little room in it, scarcely enough for him and his mother.

He stood there, swaying unsteadily on his thin legs and staring vaguely in front of him with clouded eyes which saw nothing. And then the murders began. -Bambi by Felix Salten


When the Moon rose in the Third Northern hall I went to the Ninth Vestibule to witness the joining of the three Tides, and then the murders began. - Pirasnesi by Susanna Clark

[thegreyarea]

Through the purple gloom came Molloqos the Melancholy, borne upon an iron palanquin by four dead Deodands. And then the murders began.

A Night at the Tarn House, George R.R.Martin (in: Songs of the Dying Earth - Stories in Honor of Jack Vance)

There are flea-markets all across Florida, and this was not the worst of them. It had once been an aircraft hangar, but the local airport had closed. And then the murders began.

An Invocation of Incuriosity, Neil Gaiman (in: Songs of the Dying Earth - Stories in Honor of Jack Vance)


BTW, so many interesting stories, angsttronaut, Yastreb and dmeck! Bambi!    And, of course, Sounds of Silence...  Excellent!

[Yastreb]

The wind was a torrent of darkness upon the gusty trees,
The moon was a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy seas,
The road was a ribbon of moonlight looping the purple moor,
And the highwayman came riding – riding – riding –
The highwayman came riding, up to the old inn door.
And then the murders began.

Alfred Noyes, The Highwayman

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
"'Tis some visitor," I muttered, "tapping at my chamber door –
Only this, and nothing more."
And then the murders began.

Edgar Allen Poe, The Raven

[thegreyarea]

Gentle, gently knocking,                   Batem leve, levemente,
as if calling for me.                          como quem chama por mim.
Is it rain? Is it people?                     Será chuva? Será gente?
People not, for sure                         Gente não é, certamente
and rain doesn't knock like this.        e a chuva não bate assim.
And then the murders began.           E então começaram os assassinatos.

Snow Ballad (Balada da Neve), Augusto Gil (my translation)

Yastreb, Poe's The Raven instantly reminded me this one, from a portugues poet (1873-1929).
While Gil's poem starts in this chilling way, it's not, at all, about any supernatural or frightening event but rather about the harsh winter and how it weights over the poor people (he lived at Guarda, one of the few cities in Portugal where snow is - or was - usual on winter).