Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 34, No. 13 & 14, Winter 1989

“Well, you’ve done it often enough before, haven’t you. Taken a case that’s as good as wrapped up, and worried it, poked at it, sniffed around till you came up with some outrageous, contrary solution. Turned out to be right a fair amount of the time, I admit that. All very clever, of course, credit where credit is due, but I don’t mind telling you it’s made the C.I.D. look like nincompoops.”

Andrew resisted the temptation to point out that certain individuals within the C.I.D. could contrive to look like nincompoops without any help whatever.

Brow furrowed, immensely serious, Moi said, “I mean, criminal investigations, man, that’s our job, isn’t it? So suppose we just take it as given, you and I, that this one is solved, eh? What d’you say? A little esprit de corps. Harmony in the ranks and all that.”

“What of the knife?”

Moi sat back, sighing. “What about the knife?”

“A switchblade. An uncommon weapon here. Illegal.”

Moi held out his hand. “Well, there you are, eh? He brought it with him. Everyone’s got them in the States. Boy Scouts, housewives, babes in the cradle.”

“If he brought it with him, why was it not noticed at customs, and confiscated?”

“What, rolled up in a pair of knickers? How on earth would they spot it?”

“It would have shown on the fluoroscopes.”

Moi smiled his celebrated Lestrade-trouncing smile and held up his long index finger. “Not if he checked his bag. They don’t fluoroscope checked baggage, you see.”

Sherlock Moi, Master of the Obvious.

Andrew said, “There were no baggage claim tickets among his effects.”

“Good Lord, man, he threw them away. Who keeps the bloody things?” Moi shook his head, sighed theatrically, made his face go from exasperated to earnest, and said, “Look. Sergeant Mbutu. Andrew. Let’s be reasonable about it. This was a suicide, plain and simple. Even if it were something else, which I tell you is impossible, we’ve virtually no way of proving it. I know the chief’s got a lot of respect for your opinion. As well he should, of course. And I know he’ll ask you for your feelings. I’d like to close this case out so we can get on with police business.” What was this case, Andrew wondered, if not police business? “Man to man now,” said Moi, “can’t you just let it go?”

Regretfully, Andrew admitted to himself that for perhaps the first time since Andrew had known him, Moi might be right. There was, as he’d said, no way of proving this anything but a suicide.

Andrew nodded. “Very well.”

Moi’s eyebrows arched in surprise. “You mean it?”

Andrew nodded. “So long as no new evidence appears.”

“Oh, it won’t, it won’t. Not a chance of it.” He stood up, smoothed down his pants, and, grinning happily, held out his hand to Andrew. “Good man. Glad we had this little chat. Enjoyed it. If I can ever do you a good turn, you let me know. One hand washes the other, eh? Ha ha.”

“Andrew? Andrew.”

Reluctantly, Andrew opened his eyes. Mary lay beside him, her elbow propped against the bed, her face peering down at his. Mary’s face was an object upon which he had gazed for years with fondness and gratitude, and frequently with amazement at its beauty; but at the moment, given a choice, he would have preferred the interior of his eyelids. “Uh,” he said.

Mary said, “There’s someone at the door.”

“Uh,” he said. He turned to look at the clock on the night-stand. Two o’clock. “Impossible,” he breathed, and closed his eyes.

“Andrew,” she said, and gently shook his shoulder.

This time Andrew heard it: a firm insistent rapping at the front door.

He opened his eyes.

“You see?” said Mary.

“Uh,” he said. With a prolonged, pained expiration, sigh and groan combined, he sat up and swung his legs off the bed. His head flopped forward, threatening to topple off his neck, roll down his chest, go bouncing like a soccer ball across the floor.

Moonlight spilled between the curtains. The night was silent.

The rapping came again. An ominous sound in the stillness. Doors that were knocked upon in the middle of the night seldom opened onto anything pleasant.

“Uh,” he said, and pulled himself to his feet. Fumbling in the wardrobe, he found a freshly starched shirt — even Destiny might balk at Mary’s starch — and fumbled into it. Found a pair of pants and stumbled into those. Then shuffled out the door and across the moonlit sitting room, an obstacle course of dump trucks and racing cars and tiny spiked motorbikes. He stepped on something hard and sharp, and he jumped.

He bent down, picked it up. An item called an action figure, a futuristic soldier of indestructible plastic. Another diabolical invention of the United States.

He reached the door, unlatched it, pulled it open.

On the moonlit landing, Constable Duhanni. Standing at stiff attention, looking himself rather like an overgrown action figure awaiting orders. New, of course: only three weeks in the constabulary.

“Sorry to bother you, sir,” said Constable Duhanni.