Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine. Vol. 38, No. 13, Mid-December 1993

“The next step was to talk to Sieurac himself. I decided to pay a visit to his studio, the location of which I learned during a brief stop at Café Dan-court. I had an engagement already scheduled for that afternoon, so the visit did have to be arranged for a later time. I have since then sent him two messages, asking for an appointment, and received no reply. So I plan on making an unannounced visit later today, and if you think it would be more interesting than dusting, you are invited to join me.”

Mrs. Poll did have her sympathy for Sieurac, but the low esteem in which she held his work was shown by the time she took thinking the proposition over, and that she agreed to come only if they also stopped at Cimetière Montmartre to put flowers on the grave of an actor she once knew.

The walk from the omnibus stop on Boulevard de Rochechouart up Rue des Martyrs to Rue Antoinette was something of a trek. And if that was not enough, the concierge at Number 40 pointed them up another four flights of stairs to Sieurac’s attic studio.

They paused at the door to catch their breath. It was made of rough, bare planks and had neither handle nor knob. It could only be padlocked shut from the outside with a hasp, which hung empty.

Aichele rapped on the wood several times. The door moved a few inches, and an ominous stillness seeped out the opening. Aichele instinctively gave the door a crisp push. It swung open with a dry creak.

The scene was one of chaos and clutter, and horror.

“My God,” Mrs. Poll whispered.

The studio was large, probably thirty feet on a side. But the room itself seemed smaller because of its steeply sloped ceiling, which was the building’s roofline as well. It slanted downward from the top of the one full wall to a point only a foot or two above the floor on the opposite wall. Three small windows were cut into it and were the only source of natural light. They leaked when it rained, as shown by the long, moldy streaks on the plaster, running down from their corners.

There were half a dozen pieces of furniture altogether. A black drawing room table, its finish long since scraped and chipped beyond repair, lay on its side under the windows. Another table, made of the same rough planks as the door, had been thrust against the low end of the sloped ceiling with such force that one corner was embedded in the plaster. There was a tattered sofa near the door, and three bentwood chairs, all knocked over, were scattered along the length of the room.

Splatters of paint, with shards of glass embedded in them, were everywhere, along with dirty brushes and palettes and hundreds of rough sketches on scraps of paper of every conceivable size and shape. Two easels stood in front of the high wall. One was empty and one held a finished painting. In front of the painting, hanging by the neck from a black, grimy rope, was the body of Marcel Sieurac.

It seemed like a trick, conjured by some macabre magician. The corpse clearly possessed great weight, yet it dangled in the air, two feet above the floor. The black rope looked more like a thread, making a sharp line up to one of the exposed beams that linked the upper part of the high wall to the sloped ceiling. Thence it descended, at an angle, to the steampipe near the floor.

Mrs. Poll stood without moving, consumed by the sight. It was no less gruesome for Aichele, but his experience as a detective had taught him to regard even the most unnerving sight as a simple collection of pieces, to be taken apart and scrutinized and then, he hoped, to be understood.

He circled the body, tilting his head back to look at it, as one would do upon approaching a very tall person. He followed the course of the rope, up to the beam, and down again. He reached out and plucked the length leading to the steam-pipe, producing a dull thump that startled Mrs. Poll and leaving a smudge on his fingers.

He took hold of Sieurac’s wrists, first one and then the other. He turned the hands outward. They were deeply stained with many years’ accumulation of oils and turpentine; some grime was also smeared across the palms.

When Aichele released the wrists, the body rotated slightly, as if stirred by a faint breeze. It was then that he saw the bloodstain on Sieurac’s shoulder. Its source was a dried trickle emerging from the ragged, graying head of hair.

One of the bentwood chairs was on the floor nearby. Aichele righted it and stood on the seat. Straining on his tiptoes, he could see a short, deep cut in Sieurac’s scalp. Alongside it was a bruised, swollen lump.

He stepped down from the chair, and he and Mrs. Poll both immediately noticed the same thing. Aichele pushed the chair beneath the body. Even though Sieurac’s toes pointed down, they were suspended a good six inches above its seat.

There was a sudden, disgusted cry from behind them. It was the concierge, his eyes wide and riveted on the body.

He came closer, peered into Sieurac’s face, and turned away with a grimace. “Is he dead?”