Ahead of him, standing beside the walk, was a girl about his own age in a pink dress. It looked like a party dress, with a blue sash at the waist and a bit of lace at the throat. The girl had golden hair woven into two braids, and she was far and away the prettiest girl he had ever seen. As a matter of fact, he had instantly a notion that he had seen her before, although he couldn’t remember where or when. This could not be true, however, for if he had seen her, pretty as she was, he would not have forgotten.
As he came abreast of her, she smiled and spoke.
“Hello,” she said.
He stopped, watching her, and said hello.
“Do you live in this neighborhood?” she said.
“Down the street a few blocks.”
“I live here. In this house. We just moved here yesterday.”
“That’s nice. I hope you like it.”
“I don’t know anyone yet. I’m a stranger. I may like it when I get to know someone. Would you come and talk with me sometime?”
“Sure. Maybe tomorrow.”
He was painfully conscious of his dusty jeans and bare feet with the plastic bandage, somehow a survivor of the swimming and walking, still stuck on the one big toe. He edged away and began to turn, lifting a hand in a brief, shy gesture of good-bye.
“What’s your name?” she said.
“Dewey. Dewey Martin. What’s yours?”
“My name is Ellen,” she said.
The sound of it was like an echo in the fading afternoon as he hurried on his way, but he did not recognize it as a name that he had known in the future.
IQ - 184
Originally published in Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine, September 1962.
Rena Holly was in the living room with the policeman when Charles Holly went downstairs to join them. Rena was sitting in a high-backed chair of polished walnut upholstered in dark red velvet. She was sitting there quietly, very erect, her knees together and her feet flat upon the floor and her hands folded in her lap. Her face was pale and still, perfectly composed, and she was even now, even in the violation of her grief by police procedure, so incredibly lovely that Charles felt in his heart the familiar sweet anguish that was his normal response to her. Only her eyes moved ever so slightly in his direction when he entered the room.
“Charles,” she said, “this is Lieutenant Casey of the police. He is inquiring about Richard’s death.”
Lieutenant Casey arose from the chair in which he had been sitting opposite Rena. He was a stocky man with broad shoulders and a deep chest and thin gray hair brushed neatly across his skull from a low side part. His face was deeply lined and weathered-looking, as if he spent much time in the wind and sun, and the hand he extended toward Charles had pads of callus on fingers and palm, although its touch was surprisingly gentle. He seemed awkward in his gray suit, which was actually of good cut and quality, and the impression he gave generally was one of regret, almost of apology, that he had been forced by his position to intrude.
“Good afternoon, Lieutenant,” Charles said. “We’ve been expecting you.”
“Sorry,” Casey said. “It’s a routine matter, of course. I regret that I’m compelled to disturb you at this time.”
“Not at all. We must tell you whatever is necessary.”
Charles sat down and placed his hands on his knees in an attitude of attention, while Casey resumed his place in the chair from which he had risen. “Please ask me anything you wish.”
“I think that Lieutenant Casey wishes you to tell him exactly how Richard died,” Rena said.
She spoke softly, with a kind of deficiency of inflection. Charles was aware of the terrible and almost terrifying quality of her composure, and he wondered if Casey was also aware of this. He doubted it. Her horror and grief were not apparent, although the latter could be assumed, and Casey was not familiar, as Charles was, with the wonderful complexity of her character.
“I’d be grateful if you would,” Casey said. “Just as it happened from the beginning, if you don’t mind.”
“Well.” Charles paused, seeming to gather his thoughts, but he knew, in fact, what he was going to say, and his mind was functioning, as it always did, with precision and clarity. “Richard was a guest in this house for the weekend. Perhaps Rena has told you that. In any event, he asked me this morning to take a walk with him. I did not wish to walk with him, and I told him so, but he asked me to humor him as a special favor. I did not really feel that I owed him a favor, special or otherwise, but he was so urgent that I agreed to go.”
“What was the reason for his urgency?”
“The answer to that would involve Rena. I’d rather that she answered, if she wants the question answered at all.”
“Oh?” Casey looked vaguely astonished and somewhat distressed that he had been led so quickly by his own question into an area of intimacy that he would have preferred to avoid. “Mrs. Holly?”
“Certainly, Lieutenant. As Charles has said, we must tell you whatever is necessary.”
Rena’s hands moved, smoothing the skirt over her knees, and then sought and held each other again in her lap. “Richard was in love with me. And I with him. It was not an emotional attachment that either of us particularly wanted in the beginning, but it happened, and there was no help for it. We wanted to marry. I spoke with Charles about it and was, I thought, candid and reasonable. But it was an unfortunate effort on my part, I’m afraid. Charles was very angry. He refused even to discuss the matter. Then, of course, Richard wanted to approach him. I agreed rather reluctantly, and it
