He'd Rather Be Dead

by George Bellairs

  Why bother? I am weary of the suspense. My brain is failing as I write. I have had frightful headaches lately. The intense brainstorms which gripped me when I killed Ware and Grace have taken too much vital force from me. Changing for dinner on the night I went to the Jolly Sailor, I grew so mentally limp that a kind of amnesia seized me temporarily and I put on my pyjamas instead of my dinner clothes! Comic enough for a farce, were it not so tragic for me. I have made some awful mistakes in the surgery, too.

  Would that I had never set foot in Westcombe or seen its accursed sea! For, I suppose Westcombe owes its evil growth to the sea, which has raised Ware to fortune, too. Like Xerxes, I would fain scourge the waves for the evils they have wrought to me … What am I talking about?

  I have had my moments of elation of late, however. I have set the town, nay the whole country, talking about what I’ve done. Oh, the care with which I planned the crimes; the perfect timing; the dramatic climax of each; the relentless finale! They all give me the pride of an artist whose work sets the public agog and who experiences the satisfaction of self-expression perfectly achieved.

  All spoiled by Littlejohn! The whole scheme wrecked, the edifice sent crashing down and I, like Samson, destroyed by the ruins of it, all passion spent. Yes, all passion spent. My mother, to whom I owe all that has been worthwhile in my wretched existence and the only friend I ever could trust. Dead! Gideon Ware, her seducer, my father and the cause of the burdens my mother bore in life and which she bequeathed to me. Dead! Grace Latrobe, who could have made up to me for all the miseries of the past in a future bright with hope. Dead! Mr. Hardcastle, my benefactor and friend, who left me his practice and Mrs. Cherry. Dead! Thumb, first finger, second, third … and who’s the fourth? Yes. Alan Fenwick. Rattle the earth on his coffin. Alan Fenwick. Dead! What more have I to live for? I shall take the way I gave my father. A reparation. Like Smerdiakoff in Dostoievski’s Crime and Punishment, having brought vengeance on my mother’s betrayer, I can now die. My purpose is accomplished. Since my birth I have been fated for this, driven about like an outcast, a dog on a chain, whining at the free curs who pass him by, who sniff and ignore his howling.

  Littlejohn will be sure to call for me tomorrow. I’ve calculated it all out. A little time to collect his evidence and set his thoughts in order. Then, a warrant and … “Alan Fenwick, I arrest you …” He will not fail me.

  Tomorrow he’ll call for the last time. At least, I’ll get a good night’s sleep before it happens. I shall use morphia tonight. Not a fatal dose, however, for I’ve planned something better than that …

  *

  Littlejohn is coming. He is crossing the square, and he’s actually smoking his pipe! At the back of that man’s life is the good woman he rings up to bid good-night when he’s away from her. Lucky, happy man …

  He’s keeping his tryst with me. The syringe.

  Adrenalin first. A good dose, as before.

  Now the strychnine left over from my lamented father’s performance.

  I’ve done it. In the bottom gum.

  As Littlejohn strikes the door-knocker at the front, I shall go out by the back. To the Winter Gardens, there to die in the arms of a girl, my Solveig, to the music of the dreadful Sid Simmons. And just before I commence the dance of death, I’ll telephone my adversary to let him in at the final curtain.

  My pen flows along inspired. I could write for ever. My thoughts take shape in a way which could surely produce a masterpiece.

  But I am like the artist to whom inspiration comes as the daylight is fading. He seizes his palette and brushes … but it is already night. Endless night for me …

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE - LITTLEJOHN GOES HOME

  Mrs. Littlejohn removed her spectacles, rubbed her eyes and yawned. She had just finished reading the strange autobiographical document left behind by Fenwick. Her husband was in the habit of bringing home to her many of the queer things he encountered in the course of duty. He enjoyed her comments on them and liked to feel that she shared in his work, even in retrospect.

  Littlejohn himself was enjoying his favourite meal of rarebit made in accordance with an ancient recipe bequeathed by Mrs. Littlejohn’s Grandmother Uprichard. It contained among other things, chopped onions, small supplies of which had arrived in Hampstead that day, and cheese accumulated from the detective’s rations unclaimed during his stay at the Grand. Propped against the sugar-bowl was a detective story which Littlejohn had bought on Westcombe station and in which he was so engrossed, that he almost believed that the mirage created by the eloquent author was real and he saw himself moving in a new and elegant Scotland Yard far different from the vast building which contained his own shabby quarters.

  “This poor chap didn’t stand much chance, did he? With his fixation on the mother who seemed to have completely monopolised him, his idée fixe concerning his illegitimacy, and his persecution mania, he was bound to come to grief,” said Mrs. Littlejohn turning over the pages of Chateaubriand’s Mémoires in which the confessions were interleaved.

  “Eh?” said her husband looking over his glasses, and marking his place with his finger. “Beg pardon.”

  “Fenwick was a terrible introvert. Lived in a tortured world of his own, didn’t he?”

  “Oh, yes, yes,” said Littlejohn. He always gave his wife the credit for being right on matters of psychology, for she was a member of a university extension class conducted by the refugee psycho-analyst, Professor Bloch of Vienna. “I think he went mad in the end. Kept following me about and wondering if I were on his track. All the same, the confession is a bit pathetic, isn’t it?”

  “Very sad, Tom. And his choice of book, too. Chateaubriand’s very morbid and introspective, isn’t he? … Fenwick seemed to admire you, you know. And he envied you, too.”

  “I’m not surprised, Letty, after he found I’d got you.”

  Mrs. Littlejohn blushed and began to scan the pages of Chateaubriand’s book. Meanwhile, her husband continued his meal, spreading on his toast liberal portions of honey supplied by his friend, the Rev. Ethelred Claplady, the enthusiastic apiarist, whose parish the Inspector had once cleansed of another mad murderer.

  Mrs. Littlejohn began to clear away the dishes and to wash them in the kitchenette. Her husband lighted his pipe, settled in his armchair, took up his book again and switched on the wireless.

  “Evenin’ folks. This is Sid Simmons and His Hot Dogs broadcastin’ to you from the Winter Gardens, Westcombe. Our first number’s a cute arrangement of a waltz by Brahms and Mick’s goin’ to sing you the words, ‘I’ve got a Hornet in my Cornet, Baby,’ … O.K. Boys. Give ’em the works …”

  It all came out before Littlejohn realised what was happening. He rose to his feet like one stung, and hastily fumbling for the switch, turned off the set.

  “I think I’ll help you with the washing up, Letty,” he said.

  Stripping off his jacket he assumed his official apron.

  If you enjoyed He’d Rather Be Dead, you might be interested in A Knife for Harry Dodd, also by George Bellairs.

  Extract from A Knife for Harry Dodd by George Bellairs

  1—Trouble at Mon Abri

  Two women were sitting in the drawing-room of Mon Abri, a small bungalow on the main road between Helstonbury and Brande. The lights were on and you could see inside. They never drew the curtains, thus giving a peep-show for passers-by.

  They were obviously mother and daughter. By looking at the old one you could tell what the young one would be like in twenty years’ time. They sat there among a lot of modern furniture, pink silk cushions with pink parchment lampshades to match, illuminated by a lot of little lamps instead of one from the ceiling. The old woman was knitting, her back straight, her lips moving, counting the stitches. The younger one was reading a novelette. She had her legs tucked under her in the large chair, and from time to time she helped herself from a box of chocolates on a little table nearby. In the hearth an electric fire glowed; two hot bars and beneath them a lot o
f illuminated cardboard coal and a fan revolving to make it flicker.

  The younger of the two still bore traces of good looks in a lush kind of way. She was small, with large eyes and yellow dyed hair. Her face was round, good-natured and self-indulgent, her figure full and rather attractive for those who liked them that way. A smell of cheap powder hung around her. The way she was sitting showed a good five inches of pink flesh above the top of her stocking. The old woman leaned forward and, with a tightening of the lips, decently adjusted her daughter’s dress.

  Mrs. Nicholls, the old one, was the thinner of the two, a worried-looking woman with a mass of white bobbed hair and always dressed in black. She wore rimless spectacles and seemed to be ever on the alert, as though expecting something to happen at any minute. She knitted interminably. Scarves, jumpers, stockings, gloves, caps. It kept her arthritic finger-joints from stiffening and found her something to do to while away the time.

  The radio was going at full blast. A smart comedian cracking jokes and pausing for laughter, which came regularly like a roar created by some monotonous machine. Neither woman heeded the wireless. It provided a background of noise; otherwise it might just as well not have been on.

  ‘Is that the telephone?’

  The old woman cocked an car in the direction of the door. Above the chatter of the comic they could just hear the rhythmic noise of the bell.

  ‘Shut that thing off…’

  The younger woman lazily turned and flicked up the knob. The bell kept ringing.

  ‘Hello…’

  The old woman’s voice grew affected.

  ‘Hello…’

  She listened, gingerly laid down the instrument, and returned to the room.

  ‘It’s Dodd. He wants you…Quickly, he says…’

  She always called him Dodd when he wasn’t there. It was her way of showing lack of respect for him. Her daughter, Dorothy, had worked in Dodd’s office in Cambridge until six years ago. Then the pair of them had run away together. A terrible scandal, because Dodd had a wife and grown-up children.

  The old woman turned her ear in the direction of the hall, trying to hear what was going on.

  Dodd hadn’t wanted his wife to divorce him, but the family had pushed it through. His son took over the business in which the bulk of his mother’s money was invested. He made it pay better than his father did. Harry Dodd was a funny, lackadaisical sort, who liked knocking around in old clothes, free-and-easy, talking and drinking with common people. His family pushed him off in spite of their mother, and the price at which they bought out his shares in the firm was quite enough to keep him.

  And then Dodd hadn’t married Dorothy Nicholls at all. He’d bought Mon Abri in Brande, taken her and her mother to live with him, and started a ménage á trois. Dorothy called herself Mrs. Dodd in the village. Dodd never objected, but he slept in his own room, a sort of cockloft over the bungalow, and treated his two women like relatives. Dorothy didn’t seem to object. Dodd kept her well in funds and was polite to both of them. The old woman felt her presence there gave the union a kind of respectability…

  ‘But you know I can’t, yet…’

  Dorothy sounded scared.

  ‘All right then…If it’s that important. I’ll get it out…’

  She hung up the receiver and almost ran into the room, her bosom heaving as if she were ready to have a good cry.

  ‘He wants me to take the car and meet him in the village…’

  ‘But…’

  ‘He says he’s ill and can’t get up the hill. I’ll have to try. He sounds bad. I could hardly hear him at the end.’ But you’ll smash it up. You never were any good at it. Didn’t you stop learning because you hadn’t confidence…?’

  ‘I’ll have to try. He might die. I don’t know how I’m going to turn round, once we get there…’

  ‘I’m coming with you.’

  They hurried to the garage at the side of the house. In the confusion it took them twice as long to get the door open and light up the drive.

  ‘Where is he?’

  ‘In the phone box at the bottom of the hill.’

  Every night Dodd walked down the hill for a drink at the village pub; then he walked back. Sometimes he got in very late, but the women left his supper and went to bed if he wasn’t in by eleven. Now it was just after ten.

  ‘I’ve forgotten how to start it…’

  The old woman never tired of talking about when her father had a carriage and pair, but she knew nothing of motor vehicles.

  ‘I’ve forgotten the ignition key…’

  She ran indoors, rummaged in a drawer, found the key, and this time got the engine turning over.

  ‘Don’t you have to put the lights on?’

  She fumbled with the dashboard again and this time illuminated the whole of the car, inside and out. The head-lights shone full and fair into the road, with moths flitting about in the beams.

  Dorothy went through the drill, like a child practising something. It was nearly two years since she had tried to learn to drive. Dodd used the car quite a lot himself and took the women with him now and then. Dorothy had once taken a fancy to driving, but could never pass the tests. Finally, she had abandoned it.

  ‘What if you’re caught? You haven’t got a licence. It’s not fair of Dodd…’

  Clutch out, gear in, brake off, accelerate, clutch in…Dorothy ran through the routine and then tried it out.

  ‘I say, it’s not fair of Dodd. What if…?’

  ‘Oh, shut up, mother. It’s bad enough…’

  The car leapt forward, down the drive and into the road with a wide sweep. It was a good job nothing was coming in the other direction. Dorothy was scared about changing gears. She decided to run downhill in bottom. They progressed uncertainly down to the village, Dorothy clinging tightly to the wheel, keeping unsteadily to the left.

  The headlamps blinded oncoming traffic and cars began to signal frantically. Dorothy didn’t know what it was all about…

  Then, near the bottom of the hill, they saw Dodd. He was not a tall man, but now he looked like a little hunchback. His arms swung limply in front of him, his head was bowed, his shoulders sagging. He could hardly put one foot after the other.

  Dorothy frenziedly tried to remember how to stop. But before she could act, Dodd had fallen on his face in the road. his arms spread out above his head, his hat in the dust. More by good luck than good management, Dorothy stalled the engine and found the brake in time.

  It was only when they picked him up that the pair of them discovered that Dodd had been stabbed in the back. Whimpering, they struggled to get him to his feet, and then they found the blood. All they could think about was how to get him in the car. He was a heavy little man, and they tussled and dragged him between them and finally sat him on the floor. Not another vehicle passed, or else it might have been a different tale. As it was, Dorothy contrived to get the car home by taking a loop road instead of turning, and when they got Dodd to his own fireside, he was dead.

  Although the Nicholls women drove Dodd home just before eleven, it wasn’t until hours later that they finally did something about it. P.C. Wilberforce Buckley had long been in bed and was annoyed when they roused him. Dr. Vinter, the police surgeon from Helstonbury, who had just retired after a rather hectic night at the Medical Ball, was even more annoyed.

  ‘Why did you put it off till now, Mrs. Nicholls? ‘asked Willie Buckley.

  Willie was a young officer whose father had been in the force before him. He was a tall, heavy, red-faced constable, with the beginnings of quite a formidable moustache on his top lip, and heavy black eyebrows, which looked like little moustaches as well. He had a comfortable wife and four children. The youngest had started to howl when the telephone rang, and Buckley had left him yelling his head off.

  ‘We didn’t realise he was dead…We didn’t quite know what to do…It was so sudden, like…’

  Frantically Mrs. Nicholls tried to find excuses, whilst her daughter, alternat
ely scared by the situation and anxious about the future, wandered from room to room, weeping now and then, with a wet handkerchief screwed tight in a ball in the palm of her hand.

  At first, the women hadn’t believed Dodd was dead. They had put him in his pyjamas, fixed up his wound with plaster and lint, and put him to bed. Then, they’d realised he had died quietly whilst in their hands. It troubled them, not so much out of affection, although, in a way, it was nice to have him about the place. What bothered them was what was going to happen to them now that supplies were cut off.

  Harry Dodd had been a genial enough man, but very self-contained. He never mentioned his family, they never visited him, and the Nicholls pair didn’t even know their address, except that it was somewhere in a suburb in Cambridge. He had an only brother, too, somebody well known in politics. Dodd had betrayed that once when Dorothy had found his brother’s picture in the paper and had asked Dodd if he were any relation. He had been the image of the man in the paper; you would have said it was Dodd himself. Harry Dodd had grown annoyed and impatient whenever asked about his personal affairs, but Dorothy had looked it up in the reference books at the library, and as Harry and William Dodd were both from Cambridge and had both gone to the same school, she had put two and two together.

  The Nicholls women were anxious to know if Harry had left a Will. If he hadn’t, it meant they would soon be out of Mon Abri without a cent.

  ‘It’s not good enough,’ said the old woman. ‘Here he’s died and made no provision for you. And you as good as his wife, and more good to him than his beastly family…’

  They started to turn the place upside down to find any documents Dodd might have left behind. He seemed to have had no private papers. A cheque-book—all stubs and no forms—a lot of old sweepstake and lottery tickets, some seed catalogues and a few paid bills were all they could find in his desk, and when they forced open the only locked drawer, they found it full of homemade dry-flies for Dodd’s fishing trips. In the loft it was the same, except that there they found a locked trunk which resisted all efforts to open it.