Stranger on the Third Floor

Michael Ward is the key witness - the only eyewitness - for the prosecution in the trial of Joe Briggs, who is accused of killing Nick Narbajan, the proprietor of the coffee shop across the street from where Michael lives. As such, he, a reporter, gets a front page byline story at his newspaper, The New York Star, the story his first hand account, which includes his one and only previous encounter with the accused providing some grounding for motive but which does not include him actually having seen the accused kill the victim. With the high profile story comes a $12 raise, which will allow him enough financial security to marry his girlfriend Jane and move out of the rooming house where he lives. Everyone around him is certain Briggs will be convicted largely on his testimony. Although he is willing to testify if only to provide an account of what he saw, he, seeing the situation through terrified Jane's perspective, begins to question whether Briggs should be convicted if the strongest evidence against him is his testimony. Part of that self-questioning includes his own thoughts toward his next door neighbor, Alfred Meng, against who he has said to himself proverbially "I could kill him" after each of their many antagonistic encounters and whether he either truly meant it any of those times or could actually kill if provoked. Another part of that questioning is lately seeing in the neighborhood a strange looking man, whose behavior is suspicious enough potentially to be tied to murder.