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:
“Yes, but put yourself in his place. If you was him, wouldn’t you want to know?”
Harvey took a tentative step toward his automobile, then paused. “I guess so, George,” he said. “But no two men feel the same way. Some of them would be better off if they never found out.”
“Yes,” George persisted, “but don’t you think a man like me, when he knows something’s going on, has a duty?”
Harvey sighed and took another step towards his automobile. “That’s something you’ll have to decide for yourself, George. With things like that, nobody else can make up your mind for you.”
George had moved along with him, and now he studied Harvey’s face carefully. “Supposing you put yourself in this man’s position for a minute, Harvey,” he said. “Just say you was him. If you found out your wife had been fooling around, what would you do?”
Harvey opened the car door slowly, put the bottles on the back seat, and got behind the wheel. He started to close the door, but George caught it and held it open.
“Well?” George said. “You ain’t answered my question, Harvey. If you was this husband, and knew your wife was fooling around, what would you do?”
Harvey took a deep breath. “I’d try to find out what was to blame, George,” he said. “That’s the first thing I’d do. Chances are, it’d turn out to be me.”
George’s mouth sagged open. “You?”
“That’s right,” Harvey said. “It’s always easy to blame the woman in a case like that, George. Me, I’d ask myself what I might have done to make her do what she did. I’d figure there must be something wrong with me — some lack, maybe, or something I was doing wrong that I didn’t know about.” He turned on the motor and sat listening to it, his eyes thoughtful. “And then I guess I’d sit down with her and have a long talk, George. I’d try to find out how I was failing her, and then I’d do my damnedest to make it up to her.”
George swallowed twice and shook his head incredulously. “You... you wouldn’t do anything to her? You wouldn’t take a whip to her or anything like that? You wouldn’t even do anything to the man?”
“No, George,” Harvey said quietly. “I’d know it was my fault to begin with. Why should I try to punish someone else for something I’d caused myself?”
“Lord,” George whispered. “I can’t hardly believe what I hear. I’ll just be goddamned.”
Harvey smiled. “Got to be getting home, George,” he said and shut the door.
Doris and Cal Lambert were dancing to the record player when Harvey came in with the whiskey and mixer. Both of them had obviously been at the last of the liquor Harvey had left in the kitchen, and they were dancing close together in a way that required them to move their feet scarcely at all.
Doris stopped dancing, took the bottles from Harvey’s arms, and lurched into the kitchen without a word. Her black hair was a little disheveled, Harvey noticed, and there were a number of long, horizontal wrinkles in her skirt. Cal Lambert had a self-satisfied look on his face, and the collar of his white shirt was wilted, as if he had been sweating profusely.
“Harve!” he said. “We thought you’d forgotten your way back home, boy!”
“I got tied up for a few minutes,” Harvey said, smiling.
Lambert grinned, glanced warily toward the kitchen door, and winked knowingly. “You didn’t just happen to run into something distracting, did you, Harve? Something about five-two and oh boy, maybe?”
Lambert was very drunk, Harvey saw; the heavy, rapid drinking had finally caught up with him. He wasn’t quite so drunk as Doris, of course, but it wouldn’t be long.
“I thought maybe you came across a little fluffy something on a bar stool. You know, Harve?”
Harvey laughed. “Nothing like that, Mr. Lambert.”
“Cal.”
“Yes, Cal. No, it wasn’t anything like that.”
Lambert shook his head sadly. “Too bad, Harve, old man. Maybe better luck next time.”
Doris returned with drinks for herself and Lambert and a glass of ginger ale for Harvey. “You have to be at work soon, Harvey,” she said thickly. “I didn’t think you’d want anything more to drink.”
“No,” Harvey said. “I don’t think I’d better.”
“Drink all you want,” Lambert said. “Hell, I’m the boss of that place. If you want to drink, Harve, by God, you drink!”
Harvey smiled. “The ginger ale’ll be fine, Cal. Just fine.”
Doris raised her glass and, watching Harvey unblinkingly over the rim, drank steadily until the glass was empty. “There,” she said. “I guess you saw that, didn’t you, Harvey? That’s the way it’s supposed to be done.” She turned to smile at Lambert. “Show him, Cal.”
Lambert hesitated for a moment, then shrugged and emptied his glass. There were tears in his eyes when he finished, and he laughed as he wiped them away with the back of his hand. “Boy,” he said. “I haven’t done anything like that since I was in high school.”
“I could never do it, even then,” Harvey said.
“Oh, be quiet, Harvey,” Doris said. “You’d better think about getting to work.”
Harvey glanced at his wrist watch. It was much later than he’d thought, almost a quarter past eleven. “I guess you’re right,” he said.
Doris smiled at Lambert and took the empty glasses back into the kitchen.
“A shame you have to leave, Harve,” Lambert said.
Harvey smiled and shrugged.
Lambert went on about what a shame it was until Doris came back with fresh drinks. She staggered over to the sofa, sat down heavily, and crossed her legs — apparently oblivious of the skirt that settled a good four inches above the taut round garters that encircled her white thighs.
“Come sit over here, Cal,” she said.
Lambert stared at her for a moment, then moistened his lips and looked along his eyes at Harvey. “I think I’d better be going, Harve,” he said.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Harvey said. “No use breaking up the party just because I have to go to work.”
Lambert smiled uncertainly, trying hard to keep his gaze away from Doris. “Well... if you’re sure, Harve. I mean, I wouldn’t want to—”
Harvey laughed. “Don’t give it another thought, Cal. I know my wife — and I know you. Why it’d be one hell of a world if a man couldn’t even trust his own wife and his own boss together.”
Grinning, Lambert slapped Harvey on the shoulder. “By gosh, that’s right, Harve. It’d sure be some world, wouldn’t it?”
“Yes,” Harvey said, smiling. “It sure would.” He looked at his watch again. “Damn, it’s almost eleven-thirty. I’d better be getting along.” He moved toward the front door. Doris glanced up at him sullenly, then shrugged one shoulder and took a long pull at her drink.
Harvey opened the door and stood for a moment with his hand on the knob. “Well, good night,” he said. “Sorry I can’t stay and—”
“For God’s sake,” Doris said. “Either come in or out. This place is cold enough without your letting all that air in here.”
Harvey went out, quickly, not saying a word.
At exactly four a.m., Harvey made a last-minute check of the control panel in the sub-basement of Cal Lambert’s factory, took his coat from the hook near the door, and walked rapidly along the dimly lighted passageway that led to the parking area at the rear of the building.
This looked like the night, he reflected. If he could have that short stretch of road between the factory and his house all to himself, just this once, it would be the night. This was his fourth try; he had a feeling it would be the last.
Harvey had not parked his car in the parking area, but at the end of the long drive at the rear of it. He knew the drive had sufficient incline to permit him to start his car by coasting it — which meant that the elderly nightwatchman in the upper part of the factory would not be able to hear the motor start. And there was no chance of his seeing Harvey drive off, either, for the rear wall of the factory had no windows at all.