Read Online Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine Presents Fifty Years of Crime and Suspense by Linda Landrigan - Free Book Online Page A

monsters, killing my mother inch by inch. So don’t tell me about drunks. Even if the newspapers hadn’t announced your drunkenness to the world, I’d have spotted you as being a lush.”
    â€œWhy’d you hire me?” he asked.
    â€œThere was a job to be filled, and I thought you could fill it.”
    â€œYou hired me so you could needle me.”
    â€œDon’t be ridiculous,” Atkins said.
    â€œYou made a mistake. You’re needling the wrong person.”
    â€œAm I?” Atkins asked blandly. “Are you one of these tough drunks? Aggressive? My father was a tough drunk in the beginning. He could lick any man in the house. The only thing he couldn’t lick was the bottle. When things began crawling out of the walls, he wasn’t so tough. He was a screaming, crying baby then, running to my mother’s arms. Are you a tough drunk, Nick? Are you?”
    â€œI’m not a drunk!” he said. “I haven’t touched a drop since I got this job. You know that!”
    â€œWhy? Afraid it would hurt your performance?” Atkins laughed harshly. “That never seemed to bother you in the old days.”
    â€œThings are different,” he said. “I want … I want to make a comeback. I … I took this job because … I wanted the feel again, the feel of working. You shouldn’t needle me. You don’t know what you’re doing.”
    â€œMe? Needle you? Now, Nick, Nick, don’t be silly. I gave you the job, didn’t I? Out of all the other applicants, I chose you. So why should I needle you? That’s silly, Nick.”
    â€œI’ve done a good job,” he said, hoping Atkins would say the right thing, the right word, wanting him to say the words that would crush the hatred. “You know I’ve done a good job.”
    â€œHave you?” Atkins asked. “I think you’ve done a lousy job, Nick. As a matter of fact, I think you always did a lousy job. I think you were one of the worst actors who ever crossed a stage.”
    And in that moment, Atkins signed his own death warrant.
    A LL THAT DAY, as he listened to stupid requests and questions, as he sat in his chair and the countless faces pressed toward him, he thought of killing Atkins. He did his job automatically, presenting his smiling face to the public, but his mind was concerned only with the mechanics of killing Atkins.
    It was something like learning a part.
    Over and over again, he rehearsed each step in his mind. The store would close at five tonight. The employees would be anxious to get home to their families. This had been a trying, harrowing few weeks, and tonight it would be over, and the employees would rush into the streets and into the subways and home to waiting loved ones. A desperate wave of rushing self-pity flooded over him. Who are my loved ones? he asked silently. Who is waiting for me tonight?
    Someone was talking to him. He looked down, nodding.
    â€œYes, yes,” he said mechanically. “And what else?”
    The person kept talking. He half listened, nodding all the while, smiling, smiling.
    There had been many loved ones in the good days. Women, more women than he could count. Rich women, and young women, and jaded women, and fresh young girls. Where had he been ten years ago at this time? California? Yes, of course, the picture deal. How strange it had seemed to be in a land of sunshine at that time of the year. And he had blown the picture. He had not wanted to, he had not wanted to at all. But he’d been hopelessly drunk for … how many days? And you can’t shoot a picture when the star doesn’t come to the set.
    The star.
    Randolph Blair.
    Tonight, he would be a star again. Tonight, he would accomplish the murder of Atkins with style and grace. When they closed the doors of the store, when the shoppers left, when the endless questions, the endless requests stopped, he would go to Atkins’s office. He would