Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 9, No. 3, March 1964

Looking for George by Anthony Marsh

As Whistler himself has reminded us, “Nature sings her exquisite song to the artist alone.” fudging from our hero’s vivid interpretations, this is indeed a blessing in disguise.

I’ve known George for some time now. I first met him when I was at college. I was doing art; a bit of clay modeling, sculpture, painting, and so forth. It was painting that interested me most, especially oils. You can really give your picture body with oils. Of course, my old man thought I was crazy. According to him, I should have gone to business school or law school, and followed his holy footsteps into the stock exchange. In fact, I once heard him talking to my uncle about me.

“We’ll have to give the boy his head,” he told him. “Wait till he’s worked this nonsense out of his system, then he’ll come to his senses and settle down to do something useful.”

Well I haven’t worked it out of my system so far, and I’m not going to. I’m going to show them yet that I am a painter, if it’s the last thing I do; and it looks as if it might be. In a way, I can’t blame the old man for not appreciating my talent. After all, even my teachers didn’t seem to catch on. I would be sitting there, painting my heart out on that canvas, when old Prof. Whitehouse — well he really wasn’t old at all, he should have known better — would come over and look at it and I could see the sarcasm sort of smeared all over his face.

“That shows quite a lot of promise, Henry,” he’d say, then he’d go on jabbering about form and color balance and draftsmanship and all that kind of rot, just kindergarten stuff. But I wasn’t concerned about old Whitehouse because I knew I was way ahead of him, and I told him so once or twice. He just smiled superciliously, and walked off as if he didn’t care. But I knew he did, because after a while he began to get back at me, though in an underhand kind of way so that nobody would notice it. He was a pretty mean devil, old Whitehouse, but he couldn’t fool me.

I caught on to him before he could get far up the field. You see, when the class first started, the Prof. would go around giving everybody else a bad time, as well as me. Then the others started to kowtow to him and do what he wanted. They didn’t have any guts. They were nothing but a bunch of cheap draftsmen following a lot of stupid rules. But I wouldn’t stand for that sort of stuff, and just went on painting the way I wanted to paint. In fact, the pictures sort of came out by themselves, and some of them were pretty dramatic, I can tell you. After a while, Whitehouse got off the other students’ backs, but he never would let up on me.

In the end, because of the way the Prof. treated me, the other students began to turn against me too. I knew this from the way they started acting when we were up at Billy’s Joint. We used to meet there, every night almost, and sit around drinking beer or coffee or coke, and talking about everything under the sun; art, music, philosophy, and so on. At that time I was all hepped up about those English philosophers Locke, Berkeley and Hume. They called themselves idealists because they said nothing really existed. All the things we see around us, like apples, tables, houses, even other people, are just ideas that exist in our own minds.

I thought they were pretty sharp. L., B. and H., I used to call them. I got the idea from my old man. He used to say M. L. P. and F. when he wanted to talk about that stockbroking crowd. You’d have thought the old boy was talking about a bunch of high priests, he got so solemn when he mentioned their names.

The other students wouldn’t go for L., B. and H. and all the idealist stuff, and I can tell you we got into some real hot arguments about them. Once when I made a pass at one of the girls, she slapped my face and then told me I wasn’t to get upset about it because she only existed in my mind. Well, I started to explain to her how ignorant she was about philosophy. Then the rest of the crowd began to give each other funny looks and they all clammed up. They just sat there like the dummies they were and wouldn’t argue with me any more.

But what really hurt me was when they started getting up and leaving. Then, after a few nights, they wouldn’t sit at the same table with me. It was all Prof. Whitehouse’s fault, but I wasn’t going to kow-tow to him like they had done, and I told them all where they could go. Just to show them how I felt, I used to sit at my own table drinking beer, while they prattled away in their corner like a lot of silly chickens.

I didn’t mind being by myself because it gave me a chance to do some thinking. However, I wasn’t alone for long, because it was soon after this that I began talking to George. He was different from the rest. He wasn’t even a student at that time. He had been, but he was an independent type like me, and he’d told them to go whistle. It hadn’t done him any harm either because he was selling his pictures like crazy. I would have liked to quit like him and do what he was doing, but I don’t dare. That was just what the old man was waiting for. If I quit art school, it would be one, two, three, and into business college, and after that into the dismal old stock exchange.

George looked like an artist too. He sported a wonderful Van Dyke, and though he could afford any clothes he liked, he always dressed in corduroys, and he wore them like a king. I had tried to grow a beard when I first started at art school, but it never looked like anything more than a few patches of tumbleweed sticking out of my jaw. That, combined with the bald area on top of my scalp, made it look as if someone had flattened my head out. My father was bald and so was my uncle. I don’t remember my mother, but I bet she was bald too. Anyway, I had to hack off my beard and shave every day like some cheap stockbroker’s clerk.

But the one place I really had to hand it to George was the way he dealt with women. The stories he told! It seems he only had to raise an eyebrow, and they came tumbling in his direction like apples down a chute. Of course I’d had a few little adventures of my own, but I had to work hard for them, whereas he seemed to have the girls lined up four deep outside his door. Mind you, George was a gentleman and never mentioned names, but I could guess who some of his conquests were. There were quite a few gorgeous dolls around who usually didn’t have even a good night for me, let alone a good morning.

You might think from what I’ve said that George and I were close. Well, we were most of the time, but we had our quarrels. He’d boast about the prices he’d be getting for his paintings, or his successes with his girl friends, and then he’d ride me a bit. Sometimes I couldn’t take it, particularly if the other students or Prof. Whitehouse had been giving me a bad time. Then I’d get mad and we’d begin to yell at each other, and people in the Joint would stare at our table and start grumbling.

One night we had a real set-to. I hadn’t been feeling well. I hadn’t slept for nights, and had been dozing all day. Quite frankly, I was glad when the other students gave me the cold shoulder, because I couldn’t stand the sight of them any more. I wasn’t too glad to see George either. He tore into me right away, first about some miniature he’d sold for fifty bucks, and then about some visiting film star who just wouldn’t give him any peace. I told him what he could do with his miniature, and the film star. He just laughed and called me a beardless youth. That did it. I started yelling at him like a madman, and tried to punch him on the nose.

The glasses went flying and the table tipped over. A couple of waiters came up and grabbed me by the arms.

“Don’t grab me,” I yelled. “Throw him out. He’s the one that started it.”

“Who?” said one of the waiters.

“Him, George Poldroon. That fellow over there.”

“Over where?” asked the waiter.

I looked round, and, would you believe it, the dirty skunk had sneaked out. That was when old Whitehouse came up. He’d been having a gay time at the corner table with some of the girls. He nodded to the waiters with his face all screwed up, then I heard him tell them to hold me while he called the police. I tried to get at him, but they hung on to me like a couple of octopuses. By the time tire police came, I didn’t know what I was doing, and those boys didn’t give me a chance to find out. I’ve just got a vague recollection of being booked, thrown into the tank, and beating on the bars for hours, shouting bloody murder.

When I came to, I was in a hospital; at least that’s what I found out later. It was just a small room with soft walls, and I was lying on a mattress on the floor. There wasn’t much light in the room, and at first I thought they had put George in there with me. But it turned out to be a hospital orderly. I got to be quite friendly with him later, but at that particular moment I hated him.

“How are you feeling, fellah?” he asked, when he saw me moving.

“What’s that to you?” I grouched back at him.

“Maybe I can help you,” he said, and he had a soft, pleasant sort of voice.

“Well, I’ve got the biggest headache you ever heard of.” I answered.

“Just a moment, I’ll get you something.” He got up, unlocked the door, and backed out. I must have dozed off while he was gone, because the next thing I knew, he was shaking me by the shoulder, and offering me some pills, and some juice out of a cardboard cup. I found out later that I was what they call under sedation at the time. It felt more like a hangover to me because, not only was my head throbbing like a pile driver, but my tongue felt like desert sand, and I had the foulest taste in my mouth.

I don’t know how long I stayed in the little room; it must have been several days. When they reckoned I was fit to be let out, they put me in a big ward with the other patients. I tell you, you’ve never seen such a bunch of nuts. One fellow used to sing to himself all day, off key, and another one just walked up and down the whole time just like a caged lion, not saying a word to anyone. Some of the others had their own brand of screwy habits, but a lot of them seemed like quite ordinary people. Of course, that was how I saw them at the time, but I bet a lot of them had come in like me.

George never showed up the whole time I was in there. My old man and my uncle took it in turns to come down to visit me every week, and when they thought I was ready for it, they started giving me the palsy-walsy stuff and all the man-to-man talk about what I was going to do when they let me out — discharged was the word they used when they wanted to make me feel good. The old man didn’t want me to go back to the art school, and quite frankly I wasn’t too keen myself on getting mixed up again with old Whitehouse and his team of daubers. On the other hand, I was determined not to give up my art and get sidetracked into that dingy stockbrokers’ office.

I think one of the doctors must have settled the argument for us because one day the old man came in a bit pale around the gills. The psychiatrist had been talking to him about mental illness being a family affair, and suggested that the old boy ought to be analyzed too. That was when he compromised and bought that estate for me near Bluestone Park. I was to go down there to convalesce, and, of course, I took my painting stuff along with me.

Land was pretty cheap in that part of the country, and the old man was able to pick up nearly twenty acres for next to nothing. He thought it would be a good investment as a sideline. It was mainly forest land, fir, pine and a lot of brush. Some of the trees had already been cut down by the previous owner, and were still lying around, but there were a lot left, so many that you could almost get lost in the place. In fact, I really did get lost once or twice, and I never actually explored the whole estate.

There was an old cottage down near the road that had been modernized a bit, and that’s where I lived. Nellie used to come up from the village every day to clean house, cook my dinner, and see that my washing was done. She was sort of pretty in a way, blue eyes, golden hair and all that sort of stuff. She had a nice little figure too, even though her legs were an inch or so too short for her body. But the average guy might not notice that; an artist sees it straight away.

When I first came there, I didn’t see much of Nellie. I used to go out after breakfast every day with my canvases and easel, and paint pictures all day. There was no lack of subject matter; trees, creeks, funny shaped rocks and what you will. Of course I didn’t just paint photographs of the scenery. I took a few of those prissy, straight pine trees and put a few good twists into their trunks. Then I’d paint the rocks a sort of violet or magenta color, with all sorts of enticing bug-eyed creatures looking over the top, and crawling out of the cracks. I dare say you wouldn’t recognize some of the places I painted, but that’s the way I saw things, and when you’re an artist, that’s the only thing that counts — the way you see things.

I usually took some sandwiches with me so that I wouldn’t have to quit until it got dark. Nellie would just about have time to give me my dinner when I got back to the cottage, then she’d leave for home. That’s the way things would have stayed if it hadn’t been for George. I looked up from my painting one day, and there he was, Van Dyke, corduroys and all. I didn’t bother to ask him how he knew where I was. George just had a knack about those things and could find me any time he wanted. So I made some inane remark like “Who let you in?”

He laughed. “Your girl friend,” he said, then he winked at me.

“Oh, no,” I told him. “Site’s not my girl friend. She just cleans house for me.”

“Don’t give me that innocent stuff,” said George. “You’ve got a real beauty there, my boy.”

“But her legs are too short for her body,” I answered.

George was laughing himself sick. “I wasn’t suggesting you should paint her,” was all he could get out.

The next day George came again, and the next day, and the next day. Each day we spent more and more time talking about Nellie, and all the time I was getting more interested. Until then I hadn’t even tried to make a pass at her. I realized that I just hadn’t been interested in girls at all since I left the hospital. I suppose that was part of my illness, and now I was getting over it. After about a week or so, I found that I was terrifically interested, and sat there for a whole morning without painting a stroke, just thinking about Nellie.

At noon I went back to the cottage pretending that I wanted to eat lunch at home that day. Nellie seemed kind of surprised to see me, but didn’t make any comment except to ask me what I wanted to eat. She gave me my lunch, and the whole time I was eating she just went right on working, while I kept my eye on her. The more I watched her, the more I realized that George was right. That inch or two off her legs didn’t really make any difference; the part she had left was pretty good to look at, especially when she started to climb up the stepladder to dust the bookshelves.

I crept up behind her, and made a grab at her. She jumped down and pushed me away, so I tried again. This time, she pushed me away a bit harder. She was quite strong really, and she started to scold me like a mother might start scolding one of her kids. I can tell you I didn’t appreciate that at all. Nobody treats me like a kid and gets away with it. I decided then to go out again and paint, but I spent the whole afternoon brooding.

It was the same thing next morning, and by lunch time I made up my mind that something had to be done about it. I was going to show that little piece that it wasn’t a mother I was looking for. When I got back into the house, I locked the door behind me and went straight up to her. She must have seen that I really meant business because she started fighting and screaming before I had hardly touched her. But I managed to get a sort of bear hug grip on her, and squeezed her arms to her sides and forced her into the bedroom. I pushed her down on the bed and put my knee on her chest, but she still fought so hard I had to let my fingers slip round her throat to hold her down.

I was pretty mad myself by this time. I reckoned she had put up a good enough show, and it was time to quit. “What have you got against me?” I wanted to know.

“Nothing,” she gasped, “but I’m engaged to Billy Sands in the village.”

That was about the worst thing she could have said. Surely she wasn’t turning me down for one of those village yokels. Why, I bet this Billy Sands didn’t even know which end to hold a paintbrush. I know I’m no movie idol to look at, but it isn’t every day that a girl gets a chance at an artistic genius.

“You’re lying,” I said. “It’s George you mean, not Billy Sands.”

“I don’t know any George,” she shrieked. “Let me go, you’re choking me.”

“Not till you tell me the truth,” I shouted. “You’ve been meeting George up here, while I’ve been out painting.”

“I haven’t met anybody up here. Nobody ever comes around at all. Let me go.”

Now I knew she was lying. “I suppose you’ll be telling me soon that George doesn’t exist, like L. B. and H.”

She muttered something I couldn’t quite catch, and I grabbed her tighter and shook her like a dog shaking a rat. Then I noticed she was all blue and limp, so I let go of her and waited for her to come round. But she didn’t come round, and then I knew she wasn’t going to any more.

That was when I saw George standing there, leaning against the doorpost and grinning like a devil, with his arms folded across his chest. I wondered for a moment how he’d got in. It came to me in a flash. He’d been there all the time, and had seen the whole thing.

“You’ve done it this time, old man,” he said.

“Looks like it,” I answered. “What do you think I ought to do?”

He was very casual about the whole business. Made me think he must have previous experience in this sort of thing. “Why don’t you take her out and bury her? There’s a big, fallen trunk down by the creek. You could roll that over the grave, and they’d never find her.”

I asked him to give me a hand, but he just laughed. “Not likely, old man. This is your pigeon. I’ve got my own problems to look after.”

I really hadn’t expected any help from that clown, so I carried the body out and put it on a cart that was used for bringing fire logs up to the cottage. It took me the whole afternoon to bury her, and then, with the aid of some ropes and poles, I managed to push the tree trunk over the grave. After that, I stamped the earth back into place, and covered over the tracks of the cartwheels. The ground didn’t look to me quite the same as before, but then I’m an artist and notice these details. Only another artist would be likely to spot them.

I had to cook my own supper that night. When I’d eaten, I tidied up the place, read for a while, then went to bed. The sheriff got me up at two o’clock in the morning to ask me if I knew where Nellie was. She hadn’t been home and her folks were worried.

“She’s probably skylarking with Billy Sands,” I told him.

“Who’s that?” he asked.

“Her boy friend.”

“How do you know about him?”

“She told me,” I said. “As a matter of fact, I seem to remember something about her having a date with him for tonight.”

He apologized for troubling me and then went off. Soon after he’d gone, it began to rain like mad, and when I got up in the morning, I went outside to see what the earth looked like. It was washed so clean, even I couldn’t see where I had made the cartwheel tracks. I got my own breakfast, then went down to the creek to paint. It was still half full of water and made a nice picture. “The Waters of Lethe” I was going to title it.

In the middle of the afternoon, the sheriff came back with another couple of men. I heard them wandering about the estate looking for me, and it took them half an hour to find out where I was.

“Any luck?” I shouted.

He came right up to me. “No, she seems to have disappeared entirely.”

“That’s a pity,” I said. “She was a good worker. I’ll have to get another girl to do the house cleaning.”

He was looking at me hard. “This is the last place anybody knows she was.”

“Well, the fellow who knows where she is doesn’t seem to want to tell anybody, does he?”

“I reckon not,” said the sheriff.

The other two men had been wandering about near the old tree trunk. One of them called him over, and was pointing to the ground. I heard him send the other fellow back to the car for some shovels, and I ambled over, rather carelessly, to see what they were looking at. Where the tree trunk had been lying, there was a long, narrow hollow. I suppose the ground under it had been soft, and the rain had washed away the loose earth leaving a sort of gully. In fact, it looked a little bit like a sunken grave.

I didn’t stand around while they were digging, but after a while, it was obvious they weren’t finding what they were looking for. Then they went into a sort of huddle, and I could see by the way they were stretching their arms out they were making rough measurements of the tree trunk, and comparing it to the space where they had been digging. They started trying to move the trunk, but it was heavy and it had got itself jammed between some old tree stumps.

The sun was just going down, so I packed up my painting stuff, and left them working, while I went back to the cottage. It was quite dark when they came to get me, and they had Nellie’s body wrapped up in an old blanket.

“It looks mighty bad for you, son,” the sheriff said.

“I know,” I answered, “but there’s nothing I can do about it.”

“You got any theories about it?” he asked.

“Yes. It must have been Billy Sands.”

He shook his head. “Nope. We’ve been asking all over the village about him. There ain’t no such person.”

So I had been right after all. The little witch had invented him, just to cover up for George. “You don’t really think I did it,” I said.

“You’re number one suspect.”

“But I’m a sick man. I only got out of the hospital a short while ago. You don’t think I could have done all that by myself.”

“That makes half sense,” he answered. “Who else could it have been?”

That was where I had my inspiration. “Well, I didn’t want to make trouble for him, but it must have been George.”

“George who?”

“George Poldroon.”

The sheriff sniffed. “Who is this George Poldroon?”

“He’s a fellow who’s been hanging around here for a week or two, chasing after Nellie.”

“What’s he like?”

I gave him a hundred per cent detailed description of George. They let me take my painting stuff with me to the jail, and I drew him several pictures of George, full face, profile and different angles. The sheriff had copies made and passed them around.

I don’t mind being in jail. I could almost enjoy it if the old man and my uncle didn’t keep coming down and crying on my shoulder. Yesterday they sent the attorney over to see me, Victor Krantz. I made him sit in front of me so that I could paint his portrait while he talked to me. It was funny, but the face came out like a woman’s; it might almost have been Nellie.