Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 7, No. 9, September 1962

Gary followed as Marty and I went inside. Langborn had seemingly transported his parlor from a much earlier West Virginia home. The furnishings were heavy and dark, out of keeping with our sunny clime.

“This way,” Gary said in the manner of an impersonal guide.

Langborn had met his end in a room off the parlor. I suppose it was his study. There was a desk, leather couch and chairs, bookcase, a low chest — and a wall safe. I saw the safe before I saw Langborn. The safe had been ripped open.

“He kept three or four thousand in there,” Gary said. “I warned him.”

As I moved deeper in the room, I saw Langborn. The desk had obscured him. An old, dried-up hank of bones in his clothes, he lay as if he had pitched face forward. The side of his cheek touched the carpet. All the gray, brown-blotched skin of his face had collapsed against his skull. A single bullet had entered the back of his head. It remained in his brain.

The room remained very quiet as Rynold and Doc Jenkins came in. The two uniformed officers remained on guard, one at the door of the room, one on the porch.

Rynold marked the position of the cadaver (a very apt word, in its connotations, for this particular corpse) and started taking pictures. Doc chewed on his cigar and went to one knee beside the corpse.

As you know, there are few outward dramatics at such a scene. On the surface, it’s a cut-and-dried job. Details are recorded, in brains and on paper. Each man knows his job and wastes few motions. The inner meaning of the scene depends on a man’s individual reaction to death. There is no better reminder that you are mortal, and there is violence in the world.

“Been dead three, four hours is my preliminary estimate,” Doc said. “No doubt the bullet killed him.”

Marty had searched for the gun. “No murder weapon in here.”

Rynold went over the empty safe for fingerprints. I motioned Gary Scorbin to the parlor. He obeyed quickly enough, but he was able to impart in his action a suggestion of insolence.

“Is everything in there just as you found it?”

“Yeah, I guess it is.”

“You touch anything?”

He shrugged. “The old man. I half turned him, saw he was dead, let him fall back. Started to look in the safe, but didn’t touch it. Thought you’d want to look for fingerprints.”

“Any servants here?”

“Nope, just the old skinflint. Woman comes in three times a week to clean. Today wasn’t one of her days.”

“Better fill me in on your movements today.”

Again he shrugged. I was to learn that he used the gesture habitually. He managed to make it irritating. “I got up. The old man hit the deck couple hours before, about eight. We squabbled, as usual. I told, him to go to hell and went down the beach.”

“Spend the whole day there?”

“The afternoon,” he said.

“See anyone you know?”

That shrug. “Why should I? I didn’t know he was going to get bumped off. I got no alibi, if that’s what you mean. I guess people saw me here and there.”

“I suggest you turn a couple of them up.”

He looked at me levelly. He had heavy brows and thick, dark lashes a woman would have envied. “You want ’em, you turn ’em up. I don’t have to prove anything, now do I?”

I endured the urge to give him the back of my hand across the petulant lips.

“What did you do all afternoon?”

“Drank beer. Watched some guys fish off the causeway. Swam at the public beach. Came home. Found the old twister and hollered for the law.” His tone was flat, telling me I could like it or lump it. In either event I was going to have to swallow it.

“You and Mr. Langborn argue often?”

His shoulders rose and fell. “All the time.”

“What about?”

“Money. Me getting a job.”

“You don’t work?”

“Why should I? He’s got... He had plenty.”

“You know,” I said. “It’s a wonder he didn’t throw you out.”

His laugh revealed complete lack of fear of me and total disregard for my opinion. “When you got right down to it, he was scared. I could see right through him. I was the only one who ever stood up to him. He’d disposed of everybody he’d ever had. I was all he had left.”

Gary stretched and yawned, the back of his hand against his mouth. “You all finished?”

“For now, maybe. You see any strangers around, any suspicious characters?”

“Nope.”

“No one leaving the house as you approached?”

“Nope.”

“Any idea who might have done this?”

“Nope.”

“Who knew about the safe, beside you and Mr. Langborn?”

“How should I know? People up and down the beach, I guess. You know word of a miser gets around.”

“A miser doesn’t usually broadcast the location of his strongbox,” I said.

My meaning was clear, and he got it. “Look, pal, the secret wasn’t so sacred with me.”

In satisfied repose, his face was clean-cut, boyish. Those lashes gave it innocence. I’ll admit I was frightened, in a strange, chilling way. More frightened by this boy than by a professional criminal.

Up and down the beach he’d gone, telling of the safe and its contents, hoping the fact would eventually fall on sufficiently greedy and unprincipled ears...