Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 1, No. 12, December 1956

Still, maybe not. He couldn’t be sure, and this was no time to take chances.

“Well?” the proprietor frowned. “What d’ya say, Mac?”

“I’ll tell you what I’ll do,” Mitch said. “Whatever you’re offered for the cup I’ll give you two hundred dollars more.”

“What the hell does that mean? Suppose I ain’t offered anything?”

“Then,” said Mitch smoothly. “You get two hundred dollars. Fair enough?”

The man frowned uncertainly. He scratched his head, a doubtful look coming into his eyes. “Yeah, I guess so,” he admitted. “Two hundred bucks on top of anything, from zero on up. Yeah, that sounds okay.”

He gave Mitch a look of surly approval. He said he liked a guy that shot square and didn’t rush him, and that he’d hold the cup for twenty-four hours.

Mitch thanked him warmly, shook hands and left.

He didn’t go back to the hotel, naturally. The redhead wouldn’t be there; he had no funds to pay his bill. He entered a pawnshop, emerged minus his topcoat and wristwatch and caught a cab to the airport. A little more than an hour later he got out of another cab on Los Angeles’ Spring Street, and started up the steps to his wife’s apartment.

It was above a store building in a rundown neighborhood. Bette made good dough as a burlesque strip-teaser but she was always a tight gal with a dollar, and marriage to Mitch hadn’t loosened her up any.

There was a double lock on the door. Two locks, instead of the customary one, and both of them were new. He went to work on them, picked them almost as readily as he had picked all the others and went inside.

It was only a few minutes after ten. Bette wouldn’t be home before midnight. Mitch got busy again, searching every nook and cranny of the apartment, searching all the old hiding places and every possible new one. He wound up empty-handed.

There wasn’t a dollar in cash in the joint. There wasn’t a thing that was hockable for more than a few bucks.

Mitch put back everything as he had found it. He left, not at all dejected, already planning his more subtle return. Meanwhile, there was another prospect on his list, a proven sucker who, unfriendly as he might be, was also loaded.

The guy’s name was Duke English. A pretentious thug with a phony way of talking, he ran a night club a few blocks from Bette’s apartment.

Mitch strolled into the place. A muscle-bound bouncer called The Ape escorted him back to Duke’s office. He was very firm about it.

This visit was probably a mistake, Mitch decided. Duke was still as murderously sore at him as he had been a week ago. The Ape knee-booted him into the Duke’s office. English greeted him warmly, and Mitch’s hunch that he had erred became a conviction.

That was the Duke’s way. The sorer he was the more friendly he acted. “Sweetheart!” he said. “Mitch, darling! What a pleasant surprise!”

“Look, Duke,” Mitch stammered. “I’m sorry about that little frammis on the booze, and I’ve come to make it up to you. I’ve got a—”

“A surprise?” Duke clapped his hands. “I’ll bet it’s money, isn’t it? You’ve come to give me some money!”

“No... yes, that’s right,” Mitch said hastily. “You put in eleven or twelve hundred with me, well, two grand at the outside, and—”

“Money!” Duke interrupted him gaily. “Oh, goody! Ape, lover, our friend is being coy. Will you give him a little assistance?”

The Ape frisked Mitch. He did a very thorough job of it. Duke pouted over the result, then leered and fluttered his eyelids modestly. “Will you put your clothes back on, dear? I do blush so easily!”

Mitch re-dressed, keeping a wary eye on him. Despite Duke’s talk, his appearance was anything but feminine. He was small, with the same wiry build and hard, big hands of a jockey. Without his shoulder-holstered gun, Mitch knew he was a match for practically any tough customer who patronized his place. He could joke while kicking a man’s teeth out.

“No money,” he said. “Dear, dear. But you spoke about letting me in on something juicy?”

“That’s right! Duke if you can bank me for a two-grand max, I’ll guarantee—”

“It wouldn’t involve whiskey, would it? I do hope not!”

“On the level, Duke. I swear it!”

“Proceed,” the Duke said. “And would you mind, darling? I’ll decide whether it’s on the level.”

Mitch gave him the story, holding out enough details to prevent Duke’s taking over the deal himself. He finished and Duke frowned thoughtfully, and reached for the telephone.

“Long distance,” he said. “I’d like to speak to San Diego, the residence of—”

“Wait!” Mitch broke in. “Doc will lie to you, Duke. He’ll tell you that—”

“Shaddup!” the Ape said.

Mitch shut up. The Ape had tapped him across the Adam’s apple. Duke spoke to Doc, listened and hung up the receiver. He grinned at Mitch.

“Naughty, naughty! Oh, you naughty boy!”

“Listen!” Mitch begged. “That cup is the McCoy, the real thing! Doc lied to you because—”