Alfred Hitchcock’s A Hangman’s Dozen
- Автор: Артур Роберт, Брэдбери Рэй Дуглас
- Год: 1962
- Язык: английский
- Год: Dell Publishing
- Жанр: Другие детективы
Электронная книга - «Alfred Hitchcock’s A Hangman’s Dozen». Краткое содержание книги:
Doris recrossed her legs — carelessly, the way she always did it. “That’ll be fine,” she said.
“Darn right,” Lambert said. “I don’t hold with that old theory that a man has to call another man ‘mister’ and say ‘sir’ to him and all that, just because the other man happens to be his boss. Isn’t that the way you look at it — Doris?”
“Yes,” Doris said. She glanced up at her husband. “You’ll never get those drinks made standing there like that.”
Harvey turned, pushed open the kitchen door and let it swing shut behind him. He heard the muted creak of a spring in the sofa, and a repressed giggle from Doris, and then nothing at all. He moved to the drainboard, where the whiskey and mixer were laid out.
The clock above the sink said twenty minutes past nine. Harvey was due on his job at midnight, and from then until his mid-morning lunch hour at four, he would have nothing to do but take an occasional look at the dials and gauges on the control panel in the sub-basement of Cal Lambert’s sheet-plastics factory just this side of town. He didn’t like the job, but it gave him time to study, and the pay was as good as a man with his lack of training could make anywhere else. Tonight, he looked forward to the cozy warmth of his personal cubbyhole and his stack of technical magazines.
And after all, tonight might be the night it happened.
He took his time making the drinks, humming softly to himself as he worked. When he finished with them, he took one in each hand and walked to the window that looked across the dark lot separating his house from Cal Lambert’s. Lambert, a bachelor, had moved in only three weeks ago; before that the big house had stood vacant for almost half a year. These were the only two homes in the area, because most people preferred to live either in Lairdsville, where the Lambert factory was, or out in the country proper. Harvey studied the dark outline of Lambert’s house for a long moment; then he walked back to the swinging door, pushed it open with his shoulder, and stepped into the living room.
Doris was sitting very close to Lambert now and the hem of her skirt was up above her knees. She brushed the skirt down casually and held out her hand for her drink.
“Harvey,” she said, “I thought you’d decided to distill the stuff yourself.” There was a deep flush in her cheeks and her full lips had the pouty, slightly swollen look they’d had when she and Harvey were first married and made love so violently.
Harvey handed her one of the glasses and gave the other to Lambert. “I might have to distill some, at that,” he said. “We’re running pretty low.”
“I thought I told you to bring a couple of bottles home with you this morning,” Doris said.
“You did,” Harvey said. “I forgot. Just didn’t think about it.”
“Naturally,” Doris said.
“I didn’t know we were going to have company,” Harvey said, smiling apologetically at Lambert. “I’ll take a quick run into town and pick some up.”
Lambert’s face was almost expressionless. “I’d go over to my place for some,” he said. “But I’m fresh out. A bottle or so of beer, maybe, and that’s all.”
“It’ll only take a few minutes,” Doris said. “Harvey doesn’t mind at all.”
Lambert made a move to rise, with obviously no intention of completing it. “I’ll go with you, Harve,” he said.
“Stay where you are, Mr. Lambert,” Harvey said. “I—”
“Cal,” Lambert said. “Call me Cal, doggonit, Harve.”
“Sure, Cal. Now you stay put. It doesn’t take two full-grown men to carry a couple of little bottles.”
“Well,” Doris said, “I hope you two boys can come to some kind of an agreement. We’re going to be ready for another one pretty soon.”
Harvey laughed. “You folks listen to some records or something. I’ll be right back.” He walked to the hat tree beside the front door and took down his overcoat. There was a mirror behind the hat tree, and as Harvey buttoned up his coat he could see Cal Lambert turn to smile broadly at Doris and then look away again, lips pursed, as if he were about to whistle.
The drive to Lairdsville took less than ten minutes. Harvey parked in front of Teddy’s Taproom and went inside. There were only two men at the bar, Bill Wirt and Gus Bialis, and both of them insulted Harvey loudly and affectionately as he approached them. They were both lifelong friends of his, and, before his marriage to Doris four years ago, his constant drinking companions. At a table near the front end of the bar sat George Helm, another of Harvey’s friends, but one who didn’t drink at all.
“I’ll need a couple fifths of the usual, Ted,” Harvey said to the bartender. “And you’d better give me a couple bottles of soda to help out with the weight.”
“Check,” the bartender said, moving toward the shelves where he kept his package goods. “If you want to spoil good liquor with soda, Harvey, it’s no skin off mine.”
“Well, what do you know,” Bill Wirt said. “You and the missus must be figuring on throwing a real one, Harvey. Something special happen?”
“No,” Harvey said. “Cal Lambert dropped over. Just a neighborly visit, I guess you’d say.”
Bill looked knowingly at Gus Bialis and then back at Harvey. “You mean to say, Harvey, you left your wife there with Lambert while you traipsed off down here for liquor? Is that what you done?” He shook his head wonderingly. “Man, you sure got a world of trust in human nature. Don’t it worry you — them two being out there all alone like that?”
Harvey smiled. “Not so you could notice it, Bill.”
“Well, like I said, you sure got a lot of trust in human nature.”
“Yes,” Gus Bialis said. “He sure’n hell has, hasn’t he? Of course, that little lady of his is straighter’n a string, and we all know it — but what’s the use of tempting fate, I always say.”
“Right, Gus!” Bill said. “You said it right, by God!”
Harvey grinned, paid for his whiskey and mixer, and went back outside. George Helm was waiting for him just outside the doorway.
“I didn’t see you step out,” Harvey said. “How’ve you been, George?”
“All right,” George shrugged, not meeting Harvey’s eyes. He was somewhere in his early fifties, a short, heavy-set, balding man who made a living buying and selling second-hand farm equipment. “I kind of wanted to talk to you private, Harvey,” he said.
Harvey shifted the bottles to his other arm and nodded. “What is it, George?”
George slapped his mittened hands together and hunched his shoulders against the bitter slice of the wind. “Cold, ain’t it?”
“Sure is,” Harvey said. “What was it you wanted, George?”
“Well,” George said hesitantly, “I guess it really ain’t none of my business, when you get right down to it...” He paused. “I guess you know I get around these parts a good bit, Harvey. My type business keeps a man on the move all the time. He has to talk with a lot of people, and sometimes he hears a thing or two. You know how it is. Like maybe he hears that some man’s wife is sort of playing around with somebody else. You know what I mean, Harvey?”
“Sure, George,” Harvey said a little impatiently. “But—”
“Now listen a minute. This here’s a kind of ticklish thing I want to say, Harvey. But supposing you was to find out something like I just said? Would you tell the woman’s husband what she was up to? I mean, don’t you think a man in that position should know what’s going on?”
Harvey frowned. “Well... Well, hell, George, it’s hard to say.”