SOLVED. short story: treasure thieves lose statue [s]

[Leela4]

I read this short story in a 1970s or early '80s Reader's Digest. It's one of those stories that's hard to recount out loud because if you forget even one detail you've wrecked it.:

International treasure thieves, one of whom is suffering from malaria, discover a chamber containing an exquisite lifesize statue of a woman looking over her shoulder. They pack it into a truck and make a run for the border in a torrential rainstorm but are caught by the authorities, who search the truck and then, mysteriously, let them drive on.

First chance they get they stop and check their cargo and find that it's gone. The narrator thinks the police took it, but the ill one starts laughing and says the statue had gone before the truck was searched. You see, he's just realized what the statue was made of and who it was....

[Fullfaun]

This sounds so good. I want to read it when you find it.

[Ann aka Iftcan]

Um, ok, I want to read this one too.

It sounds a bit like a Robert Heinlein short story, which I can't find right now. But I'll look for it later.

[Donna]

I'm pretty sure that's "She Fell Among Thieves" by Robert Edmond Alter.

It was originally published in a magazine in the 60s, but was also in an Alfred Hitchcock anthology and a copy of Reader's Digest. The Hitchcock anthology is probably the easiest place to find a copy, it's called The Master's Choice, and was put out by Random House in 1979.

There's what look like a ton of copies available through Abe Books, but my quick glance over the listings showed at least two volumes with that name and none on the first few pages seemed to have a list of story titles.

I've read a few of those Alfred Hitchcock collections and they're all pretty good, though.

[Ariana]

Awwww, Donna, I'd just found it before I saw your post. :)

I agree with Donna. It's 'She Fell Among Thieves' by Robert Edmond Alter.

[Philip]

Dang it. I finally saw one I know and two people got to it before me.

It's my favorite story in that Hitchcock collection - or at least it's the one I remember the most.

[Ann aka Iftcan]

Well, it got me interested enought to try to get a copy of the book. I hope I ordered the right one. :o)

[Philip]

Yeah, those Hitchcock collections were pretty good. I wonder why they don't remarket them. Some publishing company could be making some good money there.

[Leela4]

Wow, three votes of confidence! I'll put it in the Solved folder. Thank you so much!

> I've read a few of those Alfred Hitchcock collections and they're all pretty good, though.

I got Alfred Hitchcock's Ghostly Gallery a few months ago. When I was a preteen I liked Alfred Hitchcock's Haunted Houseful. I also read Alfred Hitchcock's Sinister Spies and was indifferent to it. Basically I'll try any anthology ghost-edited by Robert Arthur.

[Robert]

"She Fell Among Thieves" by Robert Edmond Alter appeared in the August 1981 issue of Reader's Digest, (pages 111-115). I still have those pages that I saved from that issue. It says it was condensed from "Alfred Hitchcock Presents: The Master's Choice."

[Audrey]

OK, there's a story that came before Alter's which was a copycat tale of one written by Theodore Roscoe in Adventure pulp magazine, short story “On Account of a Woman” from a 1936 Adventure pulp magazine. It ran again in Adventure in 1955 with a different title: “She Said ‘Take Me … If You Dare.’ ” A similar story "She Fell Among Thieves" appeared in a Random House Book: Alfred Hitchcock Presents: The Master's Choice by Alter. Then, on the Internet Movie Data Base, a similar tale is told on film in a Brithish-made episode of the Tales of the Unexpected, entitled "Would You Believe It?" The dramatization was written by Julian Bond and story credited to Alter. From Audrey Parente, author of "Pulpmaster: The Theodore Roscoe Story" available from Bold Venture Press