[Celebrity Murder Case 02] - The Alfred Hitchcock Murder Case

by George Baxt

  The man with the tic was at the wheel of the hearse. In the back, Alma had been bound and gagged. The windows of the hearse had been blacked out from within. The two men with Alma were smoking and joking, and the man with the tic was confident they had little idea where he was taking the hearse.

  * * *

  Hitchcock’s eyes opened slowly. The pain at the back of his head was excruciating. He was clutching something in his right hand. It felt like a knife hilt. Slowly and with great care, he turned his head to look at his right hand. “Oh, my God,” he whispered. The blade was covered with blood. Hitchcock released the hilt and struggled to his knees. Alma! Where in God’s name was Alma! He got to his feet, and it was then that he saw Angus McKellin’s body. Hitchcock’s body began to tremble. “Alma!” he cried, “Alma!” but there was no response from Alma. He kneeled beside the body and stared at the face. Although the incident with the three assailants had been nightmarish, Hitchcock registered their faces in his memory. The man with the tic under his left eye who had attacked Alma, the other two who were perfectly cast as thugs, but the dead man on the floor was neither of them. Hitchcock went from room to room crying Alma’s name, but she wasn’t there. Then he stared at the knife. My God, he realized, my God! The knife killed the man lying there, that ugly red stain on his back. I was holding the knife when I came to.

  My God! I’ve killed a man!

  The police! I’ll be taken into custody! He was perspiring, and yet his blood had gone cold. Not the police. Not for him, not the police. Alma. He must find Alma. Hitchcock sat on a chair staring at McKellin’s body. He had to think, and think hard. It was uncanny. This was in Regner’s scenario. Hitchcock a murderer, Alma abducted. The son of a bitch! Had he set them up? Had Regner set them up? Hitchcock was angry. That was a good sign. Anger filled him with determination, and in that state, Hitchcock could become a tiger in action. He hurried to the kitchen to retrieve his notes and saw they were gone. “Bastards,” he muttered, “bastards.” But having worked on those notes for so many hours and gone over them repeatedly with Alma, he had committed them to memory. Then Hitchcock dwelt for a moment on Detective Superintendent Jennings. Should he take a chance? Would the man believe his story? He was a policeman. Hitchcock didn’t trust policemen. In the bedroom, Hitchcock found his old plaid jacket and put it on. From the top shelf of the closet he took a dark hat and pulled it over his head. He felt around for the tin box and found it, his and Almas hidden store of cash kept there for emergencies. He emptied the box of its contents, well over a hundred pounds, and knew Alma would forgive him. Alma! He must at least alert the police about Alma.

  John Bellowes, their solicitor. He would call John and tell him what had happened. John would know what to do. Hitchcock went back to the sitting room to the telephone and groaned with dismay. The wire had been cut. The bastards thought of everything; why couldn’t his scriptwriters? He rushed from the flat, down the steps, and hurried across the street to the phone kiosk. Damn, damn, damn! The wires were clipped there, too! Such efficiency had to be admired. In the dense fog, Hitchcock pulled up his jacket collar and went hurrying in search of another kiosk. They couldn’t have vandalized all of them along Cromwell Road.

  John Bellowes was a rare species of solicitor. People liked him. He was sympathetic. He didn’t drone on and on in the lawyerese that most normal people found boring. He was a sensible man married to a sensible woman he’d met while a student at Oxford. Bettina, his wife, had a wealthy father, which again made a great deal of sense. The Bellowes, with their two young sons, ages nine and six, lived quite sensibly in a sensibly detached house in Hampstead.

  This night John and Bettina had planned a quiet evening together. After supper, with the boys sensibly tucked in bed, they planned to play backgammon, after which Bettina would sensibly read a chapter or two of the latest Evelyn Waugh and John would sensibly study his briefs for the next day. Then Alfred Hitchcock phoned and nearly drove John Bellowes out of his senses.

  “What do you mean, you think you’ve killed a man and Alma has been abducted? Hitch, are you drunk?” Bellowes barked into the phone while Bettina stood behind him wringing her hands like a silent screen heroine about to be tied to the rails. She liked the Hitchcocks, although she thought the director was too fat and his wife a bit aloof, but then, they were cinema people and John warned her all cinema people were a little strange, especially directors and their wives.

  Hitchcock shouted into the phone. “I am not drunk, and this is a nightmare. Now listen carefully. Oh, God, how my head aches!” He carefully told him the story of the attack by the thugs, Almas abduction, his awakening with a bloodied knife in his hand, and a fourth man lying dead from a stab wound in his back. “No, I haven’t the vaguest idea who the dead man was. No, I did not look for any identification. My mind was not on identifying him. My only thought was to run and somehow find Alma. I didn’t even stop to wipe my fingerprints from the knife hilt.”

  “Well, that wasn’t very clever,” editorialized John Bellowes.

  “In times of stress, I’m hard put to be clever. Now listen carefully.…” He instructed his solicitor to phone Jennings at Scotland Yard and relay the information to him. “And when you’re finished, put in a good word for me. I have to go now.”

  “Hitch! Hitch!” Bellowes shouted into the phone, “Where are you going?”

  “I’m going to church!”

  “Hitch! Hitch!” Bellowes shouted, then said to his wife, “He’s rung off.”

  “Darling, I’ve never heard you shouting so forcefully before,” said his wife, “Is something wrong? What’s Alfred done?”

  “His worst, my dear, he’s done his worst. And Alma’s gone missing.”

  “What? Alma’s missing? Alma isn’t the type.”

  He ignored her as he phoned Scotland Yard and asked to be put through to Jennings, who listened carefully to Bellowes’ opening line and then asked him to hold on a moment. He shouted for a stenographer into his intercom, and when one came on, told him to get on to an extension phone and take down every word of the conversation. Then he returned to Bellowes, who thoroughly and succinctly relayed the information he’d received from Hitchcock.

  “The murdered man. He didn’t know the identity of the murdered man?” Jennings had paled. It could be Angus McKellin. He looked at his wristwatch. It was not yet eight o’clock, when McKellin’s replacement was due to come on duty.

  “He didn’t.” Then Bellowes added, as the convincer to illustrate Hitchcock’s befuddled state of mind, “He didn’t even wipe his fingerprints from the knife hilt!”

  Jennings glared at the mouthpiece while thinking, thank God for small favors. He asked Bellowes to repeat his name, phone number, and address for the benefit of the stenographer and advised him he’d be in touch with him. “And be sure to let me know if you hear from Hitchcock again!” Jennings rang off and ordered a squad car with three detectives in it to meet him in the driveway in five minutes. Then he got through to Sir Arthur Willing on Willing’s private line, who after he had digested Jennings’ information, said softly, “Tally ho, we’re off to the races.” Then Sir Arthur instructed his secretary to round up Nigel Pack and Basil Cole; there was a long night’s work in store for them.

  Hitchcock took the tube to King’s Cross Station. He decided it was safer and more anonymous than taking a taxi. The train was crowded, and Hitchcock huddled against the door, his hat pulled down in an attempt to shield his face, his hands plunged into his jacket pockets. The turning wheels seemed to be saying “Alma-Alma-Alma-Alma,” and Hitchcock’s mind was a jumble. He could hear Rudolf Wagner’s melody counterpointing the roll call of names racing through his mind: Wagner, Grieban, Rosie, Regner, Hans Meyer, and the man with the disfigured face. Jennings. John Bellowes. Dear, dear, lovable, dull John Bellowes. Hitchcock hoped he’d found Jennings.

  While Hitchcock was undergoing the long tube journey to King’s Cross Station, Jennings, Peter Dowerty, and two other detectives were hurrying u
p the stairs to Hitchcock’s flat. There had been no sign of Angus McKellin on the street, and it was still not yet time for his replacement to appear. Jennings feared the worst, and found it in Hitchcock’s flat.

  “It’s Angus,” said Peter Dowerty, who knelt by the body for a clearer look at the face. “Somebody’ll hang for this.”

  Nine

  Emerging at King’s Cross tube station, Hitchcock quixotically wished he’d retained the murder weapon to cut his way through the pea souper. It had grown thicker and heavier, and he was breathing with an effort. Ahead of him was a newspaper kiosk lit by a kerosene lamp. The owner was a shabby little man missing his upper front teeth and sporting what appeared to be a week’s growth of beard. He hawked his newspapers spiritedly while wishing the fat man now confronting him would decide which paper to buy and go on about his business.

  “Is there a church nearby?” asked Hitchcock, hardly a picture of piety.

  “Which denomination, guv?” The little man’s head was cocked to one side; he resembled a scruffy starling.

  “I believe the vicar serves tea and bread to the homeless/’

  “You don’t look particularly hungry, guv.”

  “As a matter of fact,” said Hitchcock, on the verge of bristling with indignation, “it’s long past my dinner and my lunch was nothing remarkable.”

  “You sound like a toff down on his luck, guv.”

  “My luck of late hasn’t been terribly remarkable either.” He wondered if Bellowes had reached Jennings and the wheels had been set in motion to rescue Alma.

  “Well, now,” said the man, scratching his beard, “you mean Mr. Peach, Mr. Lemuel Peach. If you turn the corner there past the pub, across the street is Mr. Peach’s church. He’s usually in the basement.”

  “Thank you. You’re most kind.” While getting his directions, Hitchcock had managed to scan several newspaper headlines. There was nothing about him and the murder at the cottage. He was beginning to feel unnecessary. At the corner outside the pub, he was accosted by a prostitute with Joan Crawford shoulders, broad and padded. A cigarette hung precariously from her lips, and her string purse dangled from a wrist, “ello, dearie,” she said, and Hitchcock imagined he could do a two-step across her breath, “love for sale.”

  “Loathe that song,” snapped Hitchcock and continued on his way to the church. What the prostitute shouted after him to do was a physical impossibility. The church was located in a cul-de-sac, and as Hitchcock approached it, he could see it was in a sorry state of disrepair, perhaps a metaphor for his own life at the moment. There was a tiny blue light over the basement door, and with great care, Hitchcock made his way down the stone steps, eroded by centuries of footsteps. At the heavy wooden door, he thought he could hear some shuffling about from within. He tried the knob, but the door was locked. He found a bellpull and tugged it. After a few moments, a little wooden door in the larger door opened and Hitchcock saw a pair of steely blue eyes staring out at him. A stentorian voice inquired:

  “Are you a good Christian ?”

  Hitchcock swallowed and responded gravely, “One of the best.”

  “I don’t know you, you haven’t been here before, have you?” There was a hint of an accent—not North Country, not Welsh, either.

  “You come highly recommended. I’ve been told you serve bread and tea. “

  “You don’t look hungry.”

  “Looks can be deceiving.” He almost added, And so can vicars—that is, if it was the vicar guarding his gates like Cerberus in the Underworld.

  “There’s no bed for you tonight. I’m all full up.”

  “I don’t need a bed. I… I’m used to sleeping rough.”

  “I should well imagine that, with all that flesh on you. Come in.” The door was unbolted and opened, and Hitchcock entered the basement. There was nobody there except the man he assumed to be Lemuel Peach. There was a long wooden table on which rested loaves of bread and urns that Hitchcock imagined contained the tea, but no downtrodden other than himself. There were a number of cots in evidence against two walls, but none of them was occupied. A most peculiar charitable hostel, Hitchcock decided. When the door shut behind him with what sounded like an ominous clang, Hitchcock examined his host as he shot the bolt back into place. He was wearing a business suit, a polka-dot bow tie, and, for reasons known only to the man himself, a green eyeshade, the kind usually sported by croupiers in third-rate gambling casinos in Hollywood Westerns. “This way,” said the man as he led Hitchcock to the table, sliced some bread, drew a mug of black tea, and served the mean repast to his guest, who was lacing and unlacing his chubby fingers nervously. “Why are you uncomfortable?”

  “Are you the vicar? Are you Mr. Peach?”

  “I am Lemuel Peach.”

  “You don’t look like a vicar.”

  “Most nights I dress in mufti. One gets so bored with clerical drag.” His face hardened. “What do you want? You’re not really hungry. If you were, you’d be wolfing the tea. Were you expecting drippings with the bread? I don’t serve drippings here. This isn’t your mum’s kitchen, you know, this is a house of God, and my God is a bit skint.”

  Hitchcock leaned across the table, his attitude ‘Let the devil take the hindmost.’ “Mr. Peach, I have come for information.”

  “What information I can impart you can find in the Bible.”

  “Where’s Fredrick Regner?”

  Too quickly, the man said, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  Hitchcock was getting impatient and angry. “Mr. Peach, in the past twenty-four hours, there have been two murders and a kidnapping, events that give every dangerous sign of reaching epidemic proportions, thanks to a scenario conceived by Fredrick Regner.” He recited for the vicar the contents of Regner’s manuscript.

  When Hitchcock was finished, Peach asked, “But how does it end?”

  “That’s what I’m trying to find out.”

  Very softly, Mr. Peach said, “You are a very foolish man. You are treading where angels fear.”

  “I’m very determined, and I’m very angry. My wife has been stolen, and I find corpses cluttering up my landscape most dismaying and most depressing. You and this church are in the scenario, which means you’re part of this tapestry of espionage!”

  “Tapestry of espionage? How fruity. You must have been bitten by the Baroness Orczy. Your language belongs to The Scarlet Pimpernel.”

  “You yourself come from Germany, don’t you?” It was a stab in the dark, but Hitchcock was rewarded when Mr. Peach’s eyes narrowed threateningly.

  “If you have come here to make trouble for me, there are those who can make trouble for you.”

  “You’re hardly offering me pious words of comfort. How unlike a vicar you speak. If you’re really a man of the cloth, you’re cut from a very peculiar bolt.” And then it exploded in Hitchcock’s brain. “My God! I’ll bet you’re not Lemuel Peach at all.” He moved backward as the man’s hand slowly reached for the bread knife. “You don’t frighten me, whoever you are. You’re not Peach, are you?”

  “I said I am Lemuel Peach.”

  “That’s what you say, but I suspect you aren’t. I don’t care for any more bread, thank you. You can put the knife down.”

  “I think perhaps you should stay the night after all. It would be unchristian to deny you a bed on a night like this. You haven’t told me your name.”

  “My name is Nemesis,” said Hitchcock archly.

  “I don’t much care for Greeks,” said the possible vicar, “and I don’t much care for threats.”

  “You work for the Germans/’

  “I work for God.”

  “You are part of a network that stretches from here to a village on the Channel coast.”

  “Your scenario is poppycock.”

  “My instincts aren’t. Why threaten me with the knife?”

  “Because you’re talking like a madman. I get a lot of loonies here, but they’re rarely given to violence.”

/>   Hitchcock had backed away to the door. With one hand, he was fumbling behind his back to open the bolt. “I think I understand why you’re in Regner’s scenario.”

  “Did it mention me by name?” shouted the vicar, if he was the vicar.

  “No, not by name. It just said ‘the vicar.’ I’ll bet there have been a lot of vicars here named Lemuel Peach. A real vicar doesn’t sport frivolous bow ties. Real vicars are dedicated men.”

  “I, too, am a dedicated man!” stormed the improbable vicar as he sent the knife expertly flying at Hitchcock. Hitchcock yelled and stepped nimbly aside. The knife imbedded itself in the wooden door just a few inches from Hitchcock’s head. Hitchcock was now positive this man was not a vicar as he went rushing out the door, eager to be swallowed up by the fog. He ran up the stone stairs and across the street without thinking of the possible danger of moving vehicles. When he reached the pub, he stopped to catch his breath.

  “Changed your mind, dearie?” asked the prostitute, who had crept up behind him on little tart’s feet.

  Hitchcock continued his flight, and as he ran, he was suddenly reminded of the recurring nightmares he had suffered in Munich eleven years ago, and wondered if those pursuers were once again hot on his heels. He saw a fish-and-chips shop and went in. Later, holding a newspaper cone filled with fish and chips, a hot mug of tea and milk at his elbow, he tried to make sense of his encounter with the obviously ersatz Lemuel Peach. That’s what Regner had insinuated in his manuscript. Peach’s church had been taken over by spies. He had to be right, or why would the bogus vicar hurl a knife at him? It couldn’t have been his comment about frivolous bow ties. He filed a mental note to get this information to Jennings through John Bellowes as soon as he’d finished his supper. He couldn’t remember fish and chips ever having tasted this good before.