Perky was leading her forward. He cleared his throat “And this is Cletus Higgins, Melly, the artist of whom I’ve spoken.”
Clete and Cousin Melanie exchanged helloes.
“Cousin Melly.” Perky said, “has an artistic interest.”
“How nice,” Clete murmured through cold lips. “How very nice.”
“I act a bit,” she confessed with a smile. “Too often I have to buy a play to find a vehicle, which indicates, I’m afraid, that I’m a very bad actress. But if one has the money, I say, one should make use of it oneself.”
“I’m sure one should,” Clete said coolly.
Clete’s tone brought a briefly worried look from Perky. But Cousin Melanie and Clete were both ignoring him, and Perky drifted with backward glances toward his other guests.
“Tell me about it,” Clete suggested.
Cousin Melanie laughed, joining Clete as he seated himself on a redwood bench beneath a multi-colored umbrella.
“There isn’t much to tell, really,” she said. “In Italy, Spain, France you can always find money-hungry producers. I enjoy acting, even if I am—lousy, as you would say on this side of the Atlantic.”
Clete sat as if hypnotized by the hollow of her throat “You seem to have a rare honesty,” he murmured.
“Why not? If I get a certain satisfaction from my avocation, who gets hurt? No one. On the contrary, each little play in each little theater makes work for a number of people.”
Clete picked up her hands, turning them slowly, looking at them. Then his gaze returned to her neck.
“I’m going to paint you,” he said.
She was poised for a moment, her pulse beating like a bird’s as she tried to study his face, fathom his eyes. Then she relaxed and smiled. “Are you?”
“A portrait” Clete said, “head and shoulders. A real work, nothing like the atrocity Perky has hanging in his living room.”
“And what is your commission for such a work?”
He pushed her hands away almost roughly. “No commission. I thought you would understand.”
She was silent a moment. Then she half lifted her hand. “I’m sorry. I am very sorry. When would you like me to begin sitting?”
“Tomorrow morning at ten o’clock. I live several miles down the beach. Perky will tell you how to get there.”
Clete got up, walked directly to his car, and drove away.
* * * *
The next morning at ten, red-eyed and pale. Clete looked as if he had substituted small, continual nips of Scotch for sleep during the whole of the night. His mass of beard and hair obscured much of the evidence, and his nerveless control did the rest Cousin Melanie blithely entered the cottage without noticing the clues to his mental state. Instead, the unbelievable disarray of the cottage captured her immediate attention.
“You,” she said with a laugh, “have created a room straight from the left bank, here on the sunny shores of Florida.”
Clete reached behind himself, flipping the latch, locking the door. “Sit there, please.”
She gave him the grin of a gamin on a lark, crossed to a straight chair, and sat down. She was silent as Clete walked around her slowly, three times.
“I didn’t believe it at first,” he said. “It simply wasn’t reasonable. All night long I wrestled with the problem of it.”
She began to frown. “What in the world are you talking about?”
“It was as if my artistic senses had gone haywire,” he said. “My genius was playing me false. But no! My perceptions are still true.”
She came out of the chair slowly. “I think we had better postpone this, or cancel the idea entirely. Perhaps we can discuss it sometime when you haven’t been drinking.”
“Who are you?” Clete asked.
“I’ve no earthly idea what you’re talking about. Let me pass, please.”
“Who are you?” Clete shouted.
Real fright flared in her eyes. She ducked around him and made for the door. Clete caught her before she could reach it. He grabbed her arm and spun her about.
She had an unusual resistance to panic. “You’d better think what you’re doing,” she said. “Release me and open the door this instant and I won’t report you. Otherwise, it will go hard for…”
Clete made an animal sound in his throat, suddenly and without warning twisted her arm. She was wheeled into a helpless position, frozen in a hammerlock. With his free hand, Clete scooped the hair from the side of her face.
“Only a tiny, threadlike scar,” he said. “The plastic surgeon didn’t have to do much, did he?”
“You’re mad!” she gasped. “You shall pay for this!”
He jerked her away from the door and shoved her across the room. She half fell on the protesting daybed and remained there, supporting herself with her hands on the edge of the railing.
“I don’t suppose I need to ask you a third time,” he said. He loomed over her, hands on hips. “You were probably an understudy, a double to begin with, searched out with her money, through the talent agencies of Europe. Then later, a bit of plastic surgery and you were her identical twin—except for one thing. So the question now is: What happened to the real Melanie Sutton, the rich old babe with the theater bug? How did you kill her? What did you do with her?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about! Move aside or I’ll start screaming.”
“Go ahead and scream,” he said relentlessly, “and we’ll tell the whole world why. I’ll give you three safe seconds in which to scream.”
He waited. Both remained silent, the woman crouching on the edge of the daybed.
“Where is the real Melanie Sutton?” he insisted. “At the bottom of an Alpine crevasse? Feeding the fish off the south of France?”
She stirred, finally, “How did you know?”
“Your neck. The conniving, money-hungry plastic surgeon could not very well change the length of your neck, so it is far too short”
“My neck…” she
