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

He swung out of bed, scanning the greyness that filled the early morning room. Tugging on a pair of jeans, he hurried into the living room.

She wasn’t there either.

He found the note in the kitchen, written in her helter-skelter handwriting and stuck to the front of the refrigerator with a Disneyland magnet.

Wes, it said, I had second thoughts during the night and decided it was selfish and thoughtless of me to drag you along on this wild goat chase. So—

“Wild goose,” he corrected.

So I’m sneaking off to do it alone. No use both of us risking our necks. Wish me luck. Love, Casey. XXX

“You nitwit,” he observed, detaching the note from the door.

The phone rang in his den.

Wes spun, note clutched in his left hand, and ran for it. The phone rested on the taboret between his drawing board and his computer.

He grabbed up the receiver. “You can’t go up there alone,” he said.

“Go where, old buddy?” It was Filchock.

“I thought you were Casey.”

“If I had time, I’d be insulted,” said his writer friend. “But I have another news bulletin for you. Just heard it on the radio.”

“What are you doing up this early?”

“I arise every day at this time to practice my yoga.”

“Yoga?”

“Well, actually I touch my toes a few times while murmuring, ‘Om.’ The point is, there’s been another killing.”

“Who?”

“The TV guru who Casey claims was masterminding this caper.”

“Alan Omony?”

“Him, yeah,” answered Filchock. “His body was discovered up near Mulholland Drive in the wee hours. Dead after having been beaten and tortured.”

“Jesus, Casey’s gone off to—”

“Gave you the slip, did she? What did I predict last night when you phoned to announce your plans to go into the freelance exhumation business? I suggested that your Lizzie Borden surrogate would ditch you in favor of the loot and—”

“She says she decided to go it alone to keep me out of danger.”

“Sure, finding several hundred thousand dollars’ worth of gems would put you in danger of leading the life of a playboy,” said his friend. “Darned thoughtful of her to—”

“If those goons killed Omony, it must mean they’re going to go after the jewels on their own.”

“Yep, sounds like the classic situation of thieves falling out.”

“They’re going to try to find Casey — if they haven’t already.”

“You’d have noticed that.”

“Maybe they got a tip that she was staying here,” said Wes, worried. “Maybe they followed her when she left this morning.”

“Well, get yourself up to where this movie siren is buried and—”

“I don’t know where that grave is, Mike.”

“How were you planning to do your bit of grave robbing if—”

“Casey had a map on a computer disk, and she was going to print out a copy before we...”

“I’m losing you.”

Wes was staring at his computer. He’d just noticed that a disk had been left in the slot. “I’ll call you back in a few minutes,” he promised. “I think can get myself a copy of the map.”

A moment after the rain ceased, Filchock turned off the windshield wipers in his Mercedes. Hunching his shoulders and squinting out into the late afternoon, he said, “We ought to be reaching that side road in another few minutes.”

In the passenger seat Wes again fished out the printout of the map that the late actor had drawn.

“Reisberson Road is what we want,” he said after studying the map once more.

“I know that. You’ve mentioned the name of that turnoff full many a time since you lured me along on this lamebrain journey in the early hours of—”

“Sorry, but it’s just that I’m worried about Casey. If those guys are tailing her and she’s got a lead of a couple of hours on us, then—”

“We’ve been making good time. And it’s unlikely that those thugs are driving a state-of-the-art Mercedes that they can barely afford and that their next of kin nags them about each and every day.”

“All right, I won’t mention the name of the road or Casey for a while,” vowed Wes, gazing out at the highway and the small Northern California town they were driving through. “How’s Angel on Horseback coming along?”

“It’s not.”

“I thought NBC okayed a pilot, feeling television was in need of one more show about a heavenly visitor.”

“Angels per se are fine by NBC, but some of their younger execs decided that no one likes cowboys any more.”

“Sounded like a dandy premise to me. An angel in the guise of a gunslinger, traveling through the Old West and—”

“As I recall, you loathed the idea.”

“You’re right, it sounded sort of trite to me.”

“Well, we’ve come up with a brilliant switch, and all and sundry at the National Broadcasting Company are gaga.”

“Which is?”

“Gabriel’s Gig.”

“We’re talking about the Angel Gabriel?”