“Widower.”
“Yes. That was an unfortunate tragedy.”
“She was very careless. And so was your Nancy Adair.”
Nancy Adair! “Good Lord!” exclaimed Hitchcock, “I’ve clean forgotten about her! Have you any idea where she’s disappeared to?”
“I do indeed,” he said with a smile that must have enchanted the ladies before the awful accident to his face. “She was abducted. I saw her being taken somewhat reluctantly into the circus lorry that was trying to run you off the road. “
“Why? Was he trying to catch us, thinking we were responsible for the murder of the man with the tic? Oh, sorry. You don’t know what I’m talking about.”
“Oh, yes, I do. I was at the circus. I saw the murder. The evil little midget is quite a marksman.”
“Then it was Cupid who did it!”
“Unfortunately for Oscar, an unloving cupid.”
“Who’s Oscar?”
“The victim. The man with the tic.”
“Friend of yours?”
“A nodding acquaintance. We’re both in the employ of British Intelligence. That is, I still am. Poor Oscar, he was a magnificent musician but a very chancy operator. That tic was always dangerous, a dead giveaway.” He chuckled. “No pun intended.”
“Then why wasn’t he retired?”
“He was too good in the field. Anyway, sadly enough, this was to be his last assignment. He’d had an offer to join Ray Noble’s Orchestra. Oh, well, another victim of the fickle finger of fate.”
“In this case, the fickle arrow. Where are you taking me?” asked Hitchcock.
“To Harborshire,” announced Herbert.
“You know all about me, I assume. This awful mess I’m in.”
“I’ve been on your tail since Medwin, thanks to Miss Farquhar.”
“You know Miss Farquhar?”
“Oh, God, yes. Bigmouth and I have known each other since the war. I was interned after being captured and that’s where my face was botched up, not that there was much one could do with it after the shell exploded in front of me. Miss Farquhar was my nurse. It was she who recruited me.”
“Imagine,” said Hitchcock with awe, “imagine recruiting such easily recognizable people as a man with a tic and a man with a… a…”
“Shattered face.”
“Please do forgive me.”
“Why? It’s not your face that’s shattered. Why not recruit us? Is it any worse then recruiting a woman like Miss Farquhar who suffers from diarrhea of the mouth? Does May 7, 1915, mean anything to you?”
Hitchcock thought for a moment. “I’m afraid not. Hard for me to think. I’m still recovering from my narrow scrape with death.”
“That is the date of the sinking of the Lusitania.”
“Indeed? So what?”
“Miss Farquhar.”
“Miss Farquhar? You mean she caused…”
“… that ghastly tragedy. Blabbed away over drinks with Sir Rufus Derwent, who promptly sold the information to the Germans, and of course you know now that this was the cause of his downfall.”
“Dear God, if this information were made public today…”
“Nobody would believe it.”
“Marvelous idea for a movie, I’m filing it away for future consideration.”
“You know, Mr. Hitchcock, spying is not the romantic adventure you depict in your films. It’s very tiresome work. Days and weeks can go by when nothing happens. That’s why it requires people of infinite patience. People like our poor lamented Oscar and myself. I’m a very patient man. My poor wife was impatient, so she’s dead and I’m alive. That’s why Rudolf Wagner is dead. He was impatient. When he created his magnificent and so far unbreakable code… La-la-la-la… la-la-la… recognize that?”
Hitchcock groaned. “It’s as implanted in my memory as ‘God Save the King. “
“It’s why Rudolf was murdered. The Germans wanted that code, so did England and the Americans and the Russians.”
“That simple little melody? How did they all know of its existence?”
“By a very complicated process understood only by those of us experienced in espionage. Believe me when I tell you that when a new product comes on the market, word swiftly gets around and countries send their emissaries to do the bidding. At times it gets a little rough. Agents tend to knock each other off in their anxiety to get there, as they say in America, the firstest with the mostest. So you see, there was Rudolf Wagner at the studio tinkling away, giving a sample of his wares to anyone in his vicinity who was in the market to purchase. What wasn’t known, you see, was that I had already won the prize. I was the highest bidder for England. We concluded the deal that day your wife saw me hiding behind the scenery. Unfortunately for you and your wife, Mr. Hitchcock, it was thought in the field that you were spies in on the bidding because Mrs. Hitchcock fell so in love with the melody!”
“Well, I’ll be damned!”
“You almost were.”
“It was also assumed that Anna was in on the deal. Which is why she was murdered. Frankly, if the opposition hadn’t killed her, I would have had to do the job myself.”
Hitchcock said, “The argument in the restaurant.”
“Precisely. Anna was living a dog’s life. Very poor, so often hungry, so often between jobs. When she thought I was dead, she turned to the streets, but she was such an inadequate whore. Or so I was told. Anyway, she was thinking of selling out to the Russians, who in ‘25 were beginning to strengthen their espionage activities now that they had a better cash flow. She suspected Wagner had sold the code to me and tried to prise it out of me. Of course I insisted I didn’t own it yet, but she got hysterical and we argued. Impatience. It can be deadlier than a terminal disease. Anyway, she’s dead, and then Rudolf was murdered for having sold the code to me and not to the fatherland, like a good patriot ought to have.”
“So they thought we were spies! What a typical Hitchcock situation!”
