Melissa (1966)

The Fosters are invited to a party hosted by racing driver Don Page. After an unsuccessful day, unemployed journalist and writer Guy Foster would rather stay home. His wife, Melissa, sets off for the party with their friends, the Hepburns. Some time later, Guy receives a call from his wife. She tells him to meet her at an address so they can meet a publisher she has met at the party, who might be able to help him professionally. Guy searches in vain for the address and soon learns that his wife, Melissa, has been found strangled in a park. Foster has no alibi for the time of the murder, since he had been home alone. In his murder investigation, Inspector Cameron comes across the psychiatrist Dr. Swanson. Swanson explains that Foster is his patient, though Guy knows nothing about this. The doctor’s receptionist, Joyce Dean, also confirms what he says and claims to know Guy. Swanson tells the inspector that Foster had been extremely jealous, that his wife had felt threatened, and that she had urged him to see a doctor for treatment of his psychological problems. After his wife’s death, Guy faces more surprises: a hatbox mysteriously disappears. He also discovers that Melissa had a large sum of money in a Swiss savings account, as well as expensive jewelry. A promissory note found among her belongings proves that Felix Hepburn had borrowed £1,000 from her. Guy also comes across a letter his wife had addressed to him, asking his forgiveness for having been the mistress of a man named Peter Antrobus. One evening, when Guy returns to his apartment, he finds a handkerchief on the floor bearing the monogram M, and a message in his typewriter saying that Peter Antrobus can be found in the village of Elvingdale. There, Guy discovers that Peter Antrobus is actually a twelve-year-old boy who lives with his sister Mary and their father, George Antrobus, who runs a gas station. He also happens to run into Joyce Dean, Dr. Swanson’s receptionist, who comes from the village. That evening, back home, Guy Foster gets drunk and falls asleep. He is woken by a phone call: he hears the voice of his dead wife, Melissa, pleading with him to come to their cottage immediately. On the drive there, Foster veers off the road and ends up in a field, where he falls asleep, still drunk. When he finally reaches the cottage several hours late, he finds Mary Antrobus dead there. She, too, has been strangled. When Inspector Cameron questions him, Guy wants to explain why he traveled to Elvingdale and that he first met Mary Antrobus there, so he tries to show him the letter from his wife that supposedly mentioned Peter Antrobus as her lover. But when he goes to take the letter from his desk, it turns out that it has been replaced with another, almost identical letter that contains no name. Later, when Guy is alone again, an armed man storms into his apartment, identifies himself as George Antrobus, and accuses Guy of murdering his daughter. Guy manages to calm him down. The man later tells him that Mary’s brother happened to find a note she had written. It said that she was supposed to meet a “Felix H.” and “M.” that evening at a tower near Elvingdale. Guy goes there to see what the meeting is about. At the same time, Joyce Dean is attacked and injured nearby. Dean gives the police a description of her assailant that matches Guy exactly. But this leads to the crucial turning point, after which Inspector Cameron begins to realize that Guy is probably not the culprit in any of the cases: among other things, Joyce Dean claimed that the man who had strangled her wore a distinctive metal watchband. Cameron, however, discovers that Foster carries a pocket watch; by chance, his watchband had broken and was at a watchmaker’s at the time of the attack on Dean. Cameron, too, now believes that a devilishly elaborate plot is underway. When Cameron and Guy go to Elvingdale to question gas-station owner Antrobus and check Guy’s account, they discover that someone else had visited him and pretended to be Antrobus. The impostor later turns out to be a con man and forger known to the police. The police had traced him through an entry in Joyce Dean’s notebook, which Guy had taken and handed over to Inspector Cameron. When the impostor is caught, he confesses that he attacked Guy on the orders of a professional blackmailer named Smith. Melissa Foster had formerly been this blackmailer’s accomplice, repeatedly using hatboxes to collect the extortion money. When Smith decided, for reasons that remain unclear, to get rid of his accomplice, he devised an elaborate plan: through further blackmail, he procured witness statements and planted clues, all designed to make Guy Foster look like the culprit. To uncover the identity of the real murderer and criminal, Inspector Cameron sets a trap, spreading the word that Guy Foster has a tape recording of Melissa making incriminating statements. Dr. Swanson is the first to fall for the trap. Initially to oblige his receptionist, Joyce, and later because she blackmailed him, he had procured heroin several times for Mary Antrobus, who was addicted to drugs. Guy claims that the tape reveals Swanson’s connection to Antrobus and persuades him to turn himself in to the police. As Swanson calls the police from a phone booth to confess, someone in a vehicle shoots at him. Swanson is seriously injured but survives. Later, Don Page visits Guy. He tells him that a few hours earlier he had confessed to the police that he, too, had taken part in the plot against Guy by giving false testimony: Page had been blackmailed over a traffic accident he had caused some time earlier while drunk. Finally, Felix Hepburn comes to Guy and demands the tape. He had blackmailed Melissa by claiming that she had already been married when she married Guy and had therefore committed bigamy. Now he tries to use the same leverage to get hold of the tape: although Guy knew nothing about Melissa’s other marriage, nobody would believe him if Felix made the story public. However, the police are listening in on the conversation between Felix and Guy; Hepburn is exposed and arrested. He is the mysterious “Smith,” who worked as a professional blackmailer alongside Melissa. Also present in Guy’s apartment is an actress, Carol Stewart, whom Felix had hired to convincingly imitate Melissa’s voice in the two fake phone calls to her husband. When Felix tries to shoot Carol during an identification lineup, the police stop him at the last second with a well-aimed shot. Felix is wounded in the hand. Perhaps for that reason, he is not handcuffed. He tries to escape after being escorted out of Guy’s apartment. A police officer shoots him dead.