Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine, December 1956 — page 77: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

San Diego in about twenty min- utes. “Train?” Duke pouted. “Oh, you don’t want to ride those nasty old trains, honey. Pll let you drive my car.” “Huh!” Mitch made a fast re- covery. “Well, that'll certainly be a lot better, Duke. I can—” “And would you mind terribly, darling? You won’t mind if I ride along with your” 6. Mitch gaped. Laughing gaily, Duke gave him a push toward the stairs. “Move, honey,” he said. “You'd better get moving!” Mitch moved. Duke’s big black Cadillac was parked at the curb. Mitch slid un- der the wheel, and Duke climbed into the back seat. He murmured approval as Mitch cautiously moved: the car out into the stream of afternoon traffic. “That’s fine, darling. I do get nervous so easily, and when I get nervous... Even with a silencer, I just simply loathe the sound of a gun.” The warning was unnecessary. Mitch hadn’t the slightest notion of pulling anything. After all, he’d gotten a total of four Gs from Mame and Bette, to which add ' half the profit, at least, from sell- ing the chalice—another four thou- sand. That was enough for twenty- four hours of hustling. Enough, ' THE CELLINI CHALICE - at least, to prevent his risking a bullet for a few thousand more. They left the city, and hit the highway for San Diego. It passed through some of the most beau- tiful scenery in America, a semi- tropical expanse of orange groves and gleaming white-sand beaches. A salt-sweet breeze swept in from the ocean; air that one wanted to gulp down like champagne. And Mitch settled back in the seat, very relaxed and content, feeling that this world he had been born into was indeed a wonderful place to live. There was no need, he decided, to feel troubled about Bette. Hell, he’d really been pretty nice to her. — Taught her a valuable lesson; re- lieved her of money which she didn’t know how to spend prop- erly and would only worry about. Yes, he’d been very fair and decent to Bette. He wasn’t like some guys —this character Duke, for exam- ple. Now, there was one for you. Straight out from under the rug. He’d climb a tree to give you trouble when he could stand on the ground and be friends. Mitch didn’t dig the Duke at all. Duke was up to here in the chips; he was so loaded that it was mak- ing him stoop-shouldered to carry it around. Still, he went right on grabbing for more, and the nastier he could be about it the better he liked it. Take that talk of his. That was meant to rub you against the grain. 7) ecomichbooks.co