Why is Alfred Hitchcock's face on the covers of only the first three hardback books?

Readers and collectors who have the first three mysteries of the Three Investigators in hardback may have noticed that Alfred Hitchcock's face appears in the cover paintings of all three books. In the first cover ("Terror Castle"), his face is set in part of the bricks of the wall in Terror Castle; in the second cover ("Stuttering Parrot"), his face is on a bust on the file cabinet in Headquarters, and in the third cover ("Whispering Mummy"), his face is on the wall wearing the headgear of an Egyptian noble, probably a pharaoh.

I suspect that the reason for the faces was to continue Hitchcock's tradition that he had started in his movies: that is, Hitchcock appeared onscreen in every movie he directed, usually in a bit part or as a random passerby. It became a game to many people to watch all of Hitchcock's movies and try to pick out which character was being played by Hitchcock himself.

Why the practice of placing Hitchcock's face on the covers did not extend beyond the third volume is unknown. Personally, I think it would have been fun if it had continued.

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