Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 44, No. 6, June 1999

Heavy, trotting footfalls suddenly sounded out in the corridor. Then Mike Filchock, dripping rain and shaking his furled polka dot umbrella, popped into the office. “Have you seen the paper?” the redhaired screenwriter inquired as he shed a dramatic-looking black trenchcoat. “I rushed right over from my office at the Wheelan Studios when I spotted this.”

“Is it something about Casey?” Wes left the window to approach his friend. “Don’t drip on those storyboards, huh?”

“This transcends storyboards.” From inside his aggressively plaid sportscoat Filchock tugged out a folded newspaper. “Take a look at page three.”

“Paper’s soggy.” Gingerly, Wes managed to get the wet paper unfurled and opened to the page.

The entire lower half was given over to the story and photos. The headline said: RICHARD BARNSON, TOUGH GUY ACTOR OF THE PAST, FOUND DEAD. The subhead explained: FORMER STAR, 83, TORTURED AND KILLED TWO DAYS AGO.

“Casey didn’t do this,” said Wes. “She’s been with me ever since—”

“That’s not my point, dear chum,” Filchock told him. “After that recent dizzy spell, during which you were temporarily insane enough to allow the Bride of Frankenstein to move back in with you, you told me about the latest spin she’d put on reality. Her tall tale, as I recall, was woven around this now defunct actor chap.”

“But this proves she’s been telling me the truth for a change.” Wes shook the limp, wet newspaper.

“What it proves, dimwit, is that once again Casey McLeod is involved in some complex criminal venture,” countered his friend. “This latest incident, by the way, won’t look good in ads wherein she tries to get more work as a ghost autobiographer. ‘Due to the murder of my latest client, I am now able to take on a new assignment from—’ ”

“Wait now,” said Wes. “It says here in the story that Barnson’s body was found by a couple of hikers in a patch of wilderness near Lake Tahoe. That indicates that whoever grabbed the guy took him up there to persuade him to show them where what’s-her-name’s body is buried. All of that confirms Casey’s story to me, Mike.”

“Nope, it only proves that she probably knew they were going to knock off the poor old coot,” said Filchock. “Casey needed a place to lie low and establish an alibi. That was, as so many times in the past, your humble hacienda.” He shrugged. “If you’re lucky, her fellow felons have divided the loot they stole from Barnson and scattered to the four winds. Soon as she gets her share, hopefully shell vanish again.”

Wes shook his head and tapped the soggy news story. “There’s something else that’s bothering me.”

“Were I you, I’d start calculating how many years I was likely to serve in the pokey for being an accessory after the—”

“If they killed Barnson after he told them everything, they probably have found the jewels by now,” Wes said slowly. “But if he died before giving them the secret, they could come after Casey to see what she knows.”

“You’re getting stressed over a fantasy yam that—”

“I’ve got to call her.” Wes hurried to the phone on his taboret, grabbed it up, and punched out his own number.

The phone rang four times, and then he heard his own voice on the answering tape. After the beep he said, “Casey, if you’re there, pick up. It’s me and this is important.” There was no response.

The afternoon rain had grown heavier, and the stretch of Pacific beyond Wes’s cottage was dark and choppy. He left his car in the short, curved driveway, went running across the sparse lawn to his porch.

After unlocking the front door he dived into the shadowy living room. “Casey?”

There didn’t appear to be any unusual disorder.

“Casey?” he repeated loudly.

From the bedroom came a small throat-clearing sound. He ran in there. “Is that you, Wes?” her voice inquired quietly.

“Yeah, why the—”

“Don’t go bellowing like a bulldog, I’m—”

“Bullfrog. What are you doing in the closet?”

The door creaked as she pushed it halfway open and stepped out. She was wearing jeans, a sweatshirt whose faded message advocated fair treatment for dolphins, and no makeup.

“Are you alone?” she inquired as she glanced around. She’d given up her crutches but still had a slight limp.

“What’s wrong?” He skirted the unmade bed, moving up close to the subdued blonde.

She put her hand on his arm. “I haven’t been completely and absolutely truthful with you.”

“Did you have something to do with killing Barnson?”

“Not that untruthful, for Pete’s sake,” she said. “I just meant, Wes, that I know a little more about the location of Neva Maxton’s body than I may’ve let on.”

“But you’ve heard about Barnson’s being dead?” Wes pointed in the general direction of north. “Up near Lake Tahoe.”

She nodded forlornly. “Yes, it was on the news while I was having breakfast,” she answered. “That prompted me, I have to admit, to do something kind of stupid.”

“Stupider than what you’ve already been doing, you mean?”