Alfred Hitchcock Presents: 16 Skeletons From My Closet

and let his own eyes slip away and fix themselves deliberately on the door closed upon her bedroom.

'May I go into your bedroom, Miss Shore?' he said.

'No. Certainly not.' She sat very still, watching him until his eyes returned to her, and then her small breasts rose and fell slowly on a drawn breath and a sigh. 'Well,' she said, 'I see you have been as clever as I was afraid you would be, but I'm glad, really, quite glad, because he seems to be getting worse instead of better, and I have been afraid he would die in spite of everything I could do. It was impossible to get a doctor, you see, and so I took out the bullet myself, but he seems to be getting worse, as I said, and I've been wondering what I should do.'

'Did you also return the pistols to the apartment and pick up a razor and toothbrush while you were there?'

'Yes. How very clever you are! Alex and Rufe simply decided between them what they must finally do, the way to settle matters for good and all, and so they walked out there to the golf course together, which was the handiest place where it could be done, and it might have turned out all right for Rufe, although not for Alex, except that he got hit, too, in the shoulder, and that made everything much more difficult. He had to go somewhere, of course, and so he came here, and I helped him. He had the pistols, and I thought the best thing to do was to clean them and oil them and take them back to the apartment, and that's what I did.'

'It was a mistake. Surely you know we can match the bullet in Alexander Gray with one of those pistols.'

'That's true, isn't it? I suppose I didn't think of it at the time because I was upset and not thinking clearly about anything. It's odd, isn't it? I wanted so much to help Rufe, and I tried, but I guess I only did him harm instead.'

'The fools! The crazy fools!' Marcus spoke with low-key intensity, slapping a knee. 'Why the hell couldn't they have drawn high card for you or something?'

'Oh, no!' She stared at him with scorn, as if he had betrayed himself as a sordid sort of fellow with no discernible sense of honor. 'Alex and Rufe would never have treated me so cheaply.'

'Excuse me,' he said bitterly. 'I concede that you've done your best for Rufe, whom you love, but what about dear Alex, whom you loved equally and who is unfortunately dead as a rather irrational consequence?'

'If it had turned out the other way around,' she said, 'I'd have done as much for Alex.'

'I see.' He stood up, his bitterness a taste on his tongue that he wanted to spit out on the floor. 'I'll call an ambulance, and then you and I can go downtown together.'

* * *

He was at his desk, doing nothing, when Fuller came in that afternoon.

'We dug all over that bank,' Fuller said, 'and there's no bullet in it.'

'That's all right,' Marcus said. 'I know where it is. Or, at least, was.'

'The hell you do! Maybe you wouldn't mind telling me.'

'Not at all. It was in the shoulder of a fellow named Rufus Fleming. He and Gray had a duel out there yesterday morning. That's how Gray got killed.'

'A duel!' Fuller's eyes bulged, and he was so certain that Marcus had gone off the deep end that he felt safe in saying so. 'You're always talking about someone being nuts,' he said, 'but in my opinion you're the biggest nut of all.'

Marcus was not offended. He closed his eyes and smiled bleakly.

Well, he thought, it takes one to catch one.

Dear Readers:

By now, I hope, you have read each and every one of the stories in this Dell Book Anthology, and your appetite for crime-mystery-fiction has been whetted to a keen edge as a result. There is always the possibility, of course, that you are one of those who start reading a book from the back instead of from the front. Psychologists have a name for this habit, which I shall not define further, since I have no wish to invade any other field of research. I am kept quite busy laboring in my own vineyard, to mix a metaphor. Others enjoy the fringe benefits of my labors For example, the postal employees of the Riviera Beach, Florida, branch Post Office have noted a heavy increase in their daily burdens since we moved the editorial offices of Alfred Hitchcock's fine publication to an enchanting location, at 2441 Beach Court, Palm Beach Shores, Riviera Beach, Florida, facing the blue Atlantic. If you are interested in learning further particulars about this excellent publication, please write to me at the above address. I look forward to hearing from you, one and all.