Alfred Hitchcock Presents: 16 Skeletons From My Closet Part 11

"Just open the door and go in ahead of me," he said suddenly, in a quiet voice, "and then there won't be any trouble."

The girl turned and faced him.

"No..." she said, finally.

"Just open the door," George said. "I don't want to hurt you."

"You're looking for ... he's not here," the girl said. "I don't know what you want."

"You know just what I want," George said. "Let's not stand here talking. Come on. Let's go inside."

"You can't -"

George motioned with the gun.

"- they're waiting for you inside. They'll kill you."

George shook his head. "Now I'm tired of wasting time," he said. And he made an angry, jabbing gesture with the gun.

The girl turned without a word, opened the door and stepped inside. At the last second, she tried to close the door in George's face, but he threw himself forward and came through into the apartment.

He closed the door behind him and stood leaning against it for a minute. There was a long hallway in front of him, carpeted in dull red, the walls painted pearl-gray. At the end of the hall was a large room. Doorways opened off the hall to his left.

George took the gun from under his jacket. The girl's eyes widened.

"Don't try making any noise," he said. "Maybe somebody would get here, but they'd be too late as far as you go. And it wouldn't help your Fred, anyhow."

"Fred?" the girl said. "I don't know any Fred. Who're you talking about?"

"Don't kid around with me."

"Really..." the girl said. "Please. Please believe me, I don't know any Fred."

George moved away from the door, keeping himself between it and the girl. He backed the girl down the hallway into the large living room, and sat down on a red-upholstered couch. "Just sit down and listen," he said to her. "Could be we've got a long wait."

"I don't know any Fred," the girl said. "You must have the wrong place. Really ... I - I don't know what you're talking about."

"Sure," George said. "Sure."

"You can go downstairs and ask," the girl said. "They'll tell you I live alone. So whoever you're looking for -"

"Sit down," George said. He pointed with the gun. The girl dropped dazedly into a straight-backed chair. "You live alone," he said. "Sure you do. And Fred takes care of the rent. Now you can't kid me and there isn't any use trying to."

The girl was silent for a long moment. George figured she was trying to decide whether or not to go on with her bluff.

"You can't kill him," she said, gently, softly. "Fred doesn't want to do anybody any harm. All he wants is to be let alone."

"I got a job to do," George said.

"But Fred hasn't done anything. He won't do anything."

"That's a chance we can't take," George said.

He studied the girl, and admired Fred's taste. She was slim and about medium-height, with light-brown hair and a heart-shaped face. And her prettiness and pleasantness were somehow one thing.

Suddenly, George didn't know if he could go through with the job. He was frightened and tried to push away his feelings.

"Please," the girl said. "Please, I'll do anything." She was pleading now.

"That's no good," George said irritably, "and you know it." If he left now, Terry would only send someone else, and maybe find a third gun to send after him. It was crazy to even think about leaving the job undone...

"What are you doing to me?" he said. "Now I want you to just sit right where you are and not say anything. One word out of you and this gun goes off. It's silenced, so I'll still be able to wait here for Fred."

"Please..."

The girl was silent.

They sat without moving. The apartment was soundless; they were enclosed in a great blanket of cotton, George felt, and there was no way out, no way to escape, to go back to a simpler period in his life.

He held the gun in his hand like a weight, and sat still, waiting.

The doorbell rang, and George and the girl walked slowly out of the living room and into the hall. George walked behind her, and now the gun and his hand were in his jacket pocket. "Open it," he told the girl.

The doorbell rang again as she put her hand to the k.n.o.b.

A voice outside said, "Cleaners."

She opened the door.

The boy standing outside had a dress on a hanger, poised on one hand. "Dollar-fifty," he said.

To George the boy looked a little like Fred. He had the same eyes, the same shape of jaw, thin, nervous; but George knew the boy had nothing to do with Fred. George felt the gun in his pocket and tried to move his hand away from it but his hand remained, touching the cold metal.

George thought the boy looked at him strangely, after he was paid and as the door closed.

Some day I might be after him, George thought. And then: Why would I think anything like that? What's wrong with me, anyhow?

"Maybe Fred won't be here today," the girl was saying. "Maybe -"

"If he doesn't show up today," George said, "I'll wait until he does. Just go on and sit down."

The girl sat on the straight-backed chair. George walked around the room nervously, stopped abruptly when the k.n.o.b of the door rattled and they heard a key fitted into the outside lock.

The girl stood up, and George moved quickly to her side. "No sound," he whispered, and put the gun in her back.

Like her body, the girl's silence seemed tensed. The door swung slowly open.

Fred saw them both at once, but he stepped inside and shoved the door shut behind him, He grinned, let his face go slack, stood pressed against the door, without saying anything.

"I've been waiting for you," George said.

Fred's face was thin; he was going bald. George also noticed that Fred was wearing a brown, plain suit, like one he had hanging in the closet at home. He thought of putting a bullet through the suit and felt strange, a blend of fright and distaste.

Fred said, "No..."

George stepped away from the girl, holding the gun in front of him and moving to a position from which he could watch both of them. Fred made a half-turn toward the door, and George pointed the gun directly at him.

"You wouldn't make it," he said. "Before you were half out the door you'd have had it."

Fred moved back into the room very slowly. "You wouldn't kill me," he said carefully. "Not you, George. You couldn't do it."

"I came here to do it," George said.

"I'm Fred," Fred said.

George coughed, cleared his throat. He asked himself: Why don't I shoot? Why don't I finish the job and get out...

The silence was long.

"Listen," Fred said. "What I want to say ... she's all right. You can leave her alone."

"All right," George said.

"Listen, I wouldn't do anything either, George. I wouldn't go to the police. What do you think I am? You know me."

"Yeah," George said. "Yeah. You ran out."

The girl said, "Oh, G.o.d, please ... listen, he's right. He wouldn't do anything. You can leave us alone..."

George stood silent, waiting, and he didn't know for what.

"A man has a chance to go straight, George," Fred said.

George nodded.

"I just felt I didn't have to stay with the organization ... forever," Fred said.

"You don't have to do anything," George said, agreeing too readily. "That's right."

"Look, George, why're you acting like this? We were friends, we were better than friends..."

George stood holding the gun. "I can't listen to you," he said. "I can't do it." He heard the voice of his wife, Fred's voice, the girl's voice, his own voice, all moving and speaking, in his mind, stirring there in noisy fragments.

"You've got to listen to me," Fred said. "You've got to, George."

The girl, standing near him, suddenly moved and George turned, but not soon enough. The girl was upon him, trying to swing him around, but George swung with his free hand effortlessly, hitting the girl and knocking her away.

Fred rushed forward, but stopped abruptly. George had backed away, the gun was up again and leveled.

"It's no good," George said.

Fred said, "G.o.d..." and George felt his fingers tighten on the trigger. There was the noise of the gun, and, with surprise, George saw Fred fall, in a world of silence, a pantomimed world of horror and conscience, the strange feeling he knew, now, and recognized, and would never be without.

The girl was kneeling at Fred's side. George watched the girl who was like a figure made of stone, like an idol towering over sacrifice.

"Why did you have to...?" the girl said, staring down at Fred, her eyes br.i.m.m.i.n.g over with tears and pain.

George looked at the gun in his hand. There was nothing to do now, no decision to make. You had to live with the world the way it was, he thought; you had to be dependable, and take care of your responsibilities. You had a job to do and you had to do it, whether you liked it or not, whether you thought about it or not, no matter how you felt...

The girl was no danger, he knew.

The apartment, the apartment house was silent.

George told himself he had to leave quickly. He had a long drive back; the police would arrive soon; Terry would want to know what had happened. He stood in the room, holding the gun in his hand, and then he turned and walked to the door, very slowly in the silence, very carefully.

He felt as if he would never reach the door, or the empty, free corridor beyond it.

In days gone by, a man could make a public speech without really risking life or limb. The audience, as a matter of fact, usually stood to suffer more than did the orator. Now that we live in an age in which everything has been improved upon, a no-good ruler, making a no-good speech had better have a very good bodyguard.

a.s.sa.s.sINATION.

BY DION HENDERSON.

Inside the auditorium, the premier was making the final speech of his goodwill visit. Outside in the restricted area behind the stage door were the police - the city police and the county police and the state police and the auditorium police and two of the premier's own security police standing by the luggage. All of them swung ominously, like the turret piece of a complicated weapon, when the taxi screeched perilously to a halt at the barricade that guarded the parade limousines.

A tall gray haired man wearing a double breasted blue serge suit and carrying a black dispatch bag climbed hastily out of the cab. A perspiring uniformed police sergeant blocked his path.

"Sorry," he said. "Only cleared personnel here."

"Are you in charge?" the gray haired man asked.

"I'm in charge," the sergeant said unhappily. "I am because of a Secret Service guy who isn't here right now."

"I know," the gray haired man said apologetically. "Awfully sorry I'm late. Ran off the road on the way and b.u.mped my driver a bit. I had to get a cab."

He took a worn leather folder from an inside coat pocket.

"Mr. Smith," the sergeant said thankfully, catching the name off the State Department identification card. "Boy, am I glad to see you."

The relief was visible. It communicated to the rest of the policemen. There was an audible sigh as they relaxed, all but the two security police from the premier's own country. They never relaxed. They had turned with the others when Smith arrived but they had remained tense, alert.

Smith and the sergeant walked past them, to the stage door. Inside, you could hear the premier's big voice speaking, then the comparative silence while the interpreter translated, and occasionally a polite spatter of applause.