Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine. Vol. 49, No. 1 & 2, January/February 2004

“Secondhand. If you dump your stock at these prices you might as well hold an execution sale. Why don’t you let me keep the shop open instead? I can run it for you along with my own, we can split the profits. And I’ll have an excuse to see you once in awhile. To talk. What do you say?”

“That’s a very generous offer.”

“You bet it is. So?”

“Look, if you want to take over the shop, we can work that out. But you’re wasting your time on me, lady. I’m damaged goods.”

“I know that. And maybe you’re not repairable. With secondhand, every buy is a gamble. But that’s not always a bad thing. Taking a chance is part of the fun. Whenever I walk into a secondhand shop, do you know what I feel?”

“What?”

“Hope,” she said.

The Girl Watcher

by Janice Law

“Mister, excuse me, Mister!”

Mister! Me, Troyman, formerly on a first name basis with a cool twenty million living, breathing listeners. Guys on cells and car phones making drive time with The Troy Donnelly Show, make that caps and emphasis, THE TROY DONNELLY SHOW! What’s this kid — twenty, maybe? Old enough but not enough car time. My fans were turnpike jockeys carrying a big load of carbon monoxide, reliables who got a thrill out of ringing up Troyman and saying Hello, keep giving them hell; no-lifers who wanted to vent, to grouse, to grab a bit of my air time.

“Yeah,” I say. “What’s wrong?” Course, I know. Knowledge has always been my strong suit. Who was on the take, who had an affair or an addiction; who was in, who was out, who had the goods, who had a weakness. I had all the dirt, and what I didn’t have, I knew how to get, because I could shake the Tree of Knowledge.

“You’re bothering the woman,” says the guard. Brown hair, dusty green top and pants over the regulation red swim trunks. He’s got a swimmer’s body, slim but well muscled, compact, not big. A lifesaver, not a bouncer.

“I’m looking for someone,” I say. “Someone important, all right? I’m meeting her on the beach and, sure, I stopped to talk to this young lady. She looks very like—”

“You grabbed her arm,” says the guard. “You kept calling her Shelley. You were insisting she knew you.”

“Mistake,” I say. “To err is human.” Kept me in business — the human penchant for error, for erring, for errant behavior, which in the right hands becomes blame, becomes a living, breathing illustration of the rottenness of things as they are, which is just the simple truth — and a damn profitable line, I can tell you.

“She was frightened,” says the guard. “She complained.” He looks like some bionic youth of the future in those reflecting bronze sunglasses. Probably has a drug problem.

“Look,” I say, “you don’t know who I am. I need to find Shelley...” I start to explain market share and distinctive voices and Shelley Phillips, who screwed my life up good, but he’s not listening.

“You gotta stop bothering the women. You bother anyone again, you’re back inside — and you’re in for the whole afternoon.”

That would be fatal, unthinkable, so I turn on the charm. Take out my wallet, ask him to get Carlos, the beach chair fellow, to take over a lounge for the woman who wasn’t Shelley. I can see that now. She wasn’t Shelley at all. “Something for yourself, too,” I say.

“You want to get me fired?” he asks and turns on his heel.

I put away my wallet. I could have about bought this damn beach before Shelley. I still have a very nice waterfront house. I believe I do. Well, I know I do, because thanks to the Florida homestead law, the Phillipses can’t touch the real estate. Nope. And I was smart enough to keep the Sunshine State property out of Linda’s hands, though she went through my northern holdings like a dose of salts. Sure did.

I go back to my place, the chair and umbrella which I rent every day from Carlos, who saves one for me even when he’s busy. Loyalty, right? I switch on my transistor radio — on the earphone in case it “bothers” someone. Two years ago that woman would have been thrilled to meet the Troyman. Troy! I hear you every afternoon! Driving to Jersey! Or Greenwich or Darien, points north and south. Who said women didn’t like me? Maybe the show was a little rough — maybe. I hit the screaming sisterhood pretty hard; no friend of feminism, me. But charm. Everyone said I was charming off-mike.

A bit of static requiring delicate adjustments... There — drive time with my replacement. Why do I listen? Why, why? It’s like a musician hearing someone else on his Strad. Pain, I can tell you. Flat, flat, he’s very flat. Hits even the hot points without flare, without humor. Just another bloviator. I can’t believe they pay him for this rubbish. Me, I could entertain and influence. Could yet. Could.