In a Lonely Place1950

Dixon Steele:
[setting up a reenactment] You put your right arm around her neck. You get to a lonely place in the road and you begin to squeeze. You're an ex-GI. You know judo. You know how to kill a person without using your hands. You're driving the car and you're strangling her. You don't see her bulging eyes or her protruding tongue. Go ahead, go ahead Brub, squeeze harder. You love her, and she's deceived you. You hate her patronizing attitude. She looks down on you. She's impressed with celebrities. She wants to get rid of you. Squeeze harder. Harder. Squeeze harder. It's wonderful to feel her throat crush under your arm. [pause] Now, are you convinced?

Sylvia Nicolai:
You forgot my hands. I could scratch his eyes out before he could kill me.

Dixon Steele:
Ah, but you didn't. Your first instinct was to grab his arm, try to loosen his grip. That's where you lost the battle, just as Mildred did. I've had a lot of experience in matters of this kind. I've killed dozens of people, in pictures. [pause] No, Sylvia, I didn't do it. I assure you, I could never throw a lovely body from a moving car. My artistic temperament wouldn't permit it...You see, we so-called creative artists have a great respect for cadavers. We treat them with the utmost reverence. Put them in soft beds, lay them out on fur rugs, leave them lying at the foot of a long staircase, but we definitely could never throw them from a moving car as though they were cigarette butts.