Of the odder cover themes that appeared at Dime Mystery Magazine over the years were covers that seem to suggest a villain who happens to have a empty coffin and feels a need to find something pretty to put in it. I’m sure that wasn’t the underlying story, of course, but the covers still seem to have had that consistent feel. Consider this cover February 1937:

(Note: if you’re into shudder pulp you really owe it to yourself to visit the Pulp Covers page for this issue, since not only do the curators there provide a lot of splendid interior art, but the they also make the whole issue available for download.) Doesn’t it seem like our villain is suggesting to our heroine (who’s having none of it) that the elderly gent to his left needs a companion in burial? Or consider this rather late cover from February 1941:

“We’re gonna have us a funeral, by gum, and somebody has to be the body.” This cover, from May 1935…

…might be primarily a case of cult human sacrifice, although there appear to be coffins lined up neatly in the background, perhaps suggesting forethought in disposing of the victim once the weird ritual has run its course. But in this final example, from August 1935, it appears the the entire point is to get the victim into the coffin…

…even if understandably, she really, really doesn’t want to go.