The Resurrection Man

by Charlotte MacLeod

  “Humph! Just like a man, always where you don’t want them to be. Oh, my God, George! George, what’s to become of me now?”

  That was when she really fell apart.

  6

  NO DOUBT ABOUT IT, the Old Guard were tough. Anora’s breakdown lasted all of three minutes, then she was on her feet, letting Max and Sarah lead her away from the dreadful scene. Once in the morning room, with the sun streaming in through the southeast-facing bay, Sarah noticed for the first time how appallingly stained and dabbled her old friend’s robe and nightgown were. She sent Phyllis for hot water and fresh garments and told Max to go out to the kitchen, check on Cook, and not come back till he got the word.

  Together, she and Phyllis got Anora cleaned up and decently garbed. By the time Phyllis was sent to make fresh tea and tell Max he was free to return, Anora was respectably settled on the button-tufted red-plush Biedermeier chaise with her feet up, a knitted afghan screening her nether limbs, and four sofa cushions stuffed behind her back.

  “Shouldn’t she be lying down?” was Max’s first reaction.

  Anora took umbrage. “I’ve never yet taken anything lying down, I’m not about to start now. And if you don’t like watching me cry, you can go peddle your papers. I’ve got a right to do as I please in my own house, even if I am a damned fool for doing it. What’s all that hullabaloo outside?”

  “I expect it’s the ambulance I sent for,” Max told her. “And the police.”

  “The police? Are you out of your mind? What did you do that for?”

  “I had to, Anora. You do realize that George has been murdered?”

  “Oh yes, I know he has. I don’t believe it, but I know it. Who did it, Max?”

  “That’s what we need the police for, it’s their job to find out. Do you feel up to letting them ask you some questions?”

  “No, but I suppose they’ll ask me anyway. For heaven’s sake, Phyllis, quit bleating like a lost sheep and go let them in. And bring me that tea I asked you for half an hour ago. I don’t know what’s got into everybody this morning. Max, maybe you’d better let them in yourself, they were your idea. Just don’t bring them in this room until I’ve had time to drink my tea, assuming I ever get any.”

  Anora had plenty of time to drink her tea, the police were stopped cold by what they found in the hall. Sarah had no desire to go out and watch what they were doing, it was bad enough listening to their voices and the sounds of their feet. They’d have to take out the spear, most likely, in order to fit George into the ambulance. Was that what all the scuffling was about?

  Perhaps Anora had slipped partially back into her earlier fugue state; she drank a second cup of tea under Phyllis’s pleading that she had to keep up her strength and even managed a bite or two of toast. That small victory attained, Anora allowed herself the grace of a short nap with two of the sofa cushions temporarily laid aside. Once she was settled, Sarah decided this was a good time to slide out to the kitchen and see for herself whether Cook was in any real trouble.

  She found her old friend relatively free of palpitations and in a quandary about the luncheon menu. It was a relief to stand there debating whether the consommé ought to be served heated or jellied. The weather forecast was on the jellied side but it could not be gainsaid that, no matter what the temperature, hot foods were more comforting in time of trouble. Unless the trouble happened to be tonsillitis or fever, in which cases Cook pinned her faith to lemon sherbet. Mrs. Protheroe didn’t have fever on top of everything else, did she?

  Sarah was able to assure Cook that she didn’t. Anyway, it was too late now to freeze lemon sherbet for lunch; what about a nice baked custard? Foods that slipped down easily stood the best chance of getting past the lump in a new-made widow’s throat, Sarah knew that from past experience. She’d better go back to the morning room and see whether Anora was awake yet.

  “Wouldn’t you like to sit down and have a cup of tea first?” It was plain to see that Phyllis, having served her mistress, was now ready for one herself. “Oh, there’s the doorbell. I have to go.”

  “I’ll get it,” said Sarah. “Sit down, Phyllis, you’ve earned a rest. That’s either more police or Dr. Harnett.”

  It was the doctor. George was having his picture taken now, preparatory to being taken away. The spear was still in his chest, they must be leaving it for the pathologist to cope with. Dr. Harnett was too much a professional not to stop and take a look.

  “God! Right through the heart. That thing must be sharp as—it’s a wonder Anora didn’t drop dead too instead of just going into shock. Where is she—ah—Sarah Kelling, isn’t it?”

  “Sarah Bittersohn, actually. I’ve remarried.”

  Five years ago, but the doctor wouldn’t remember. Dr. Harnett’s wife came to Anora’s parties but he hardly ever did, he always had patients to see. They lived nearby and raised tropical fish, as a child Sarah had been taken to see their aquarium. There’d been one huge gourami who’d had a tank all to himself, Mrs. Harnett had said his name was George. She hadn’t explained whom they’d called him after, but Sarah had noticed a resemblance. Her eyes stung with sudden tears. She hustled Dr. Harnett into the morning room.

  “Anora, Dr. Harnett’s here.”

  Anora already had a man with her, standing next to the chaise, looking as if he could use a good night’s sleep, wearing a summer-weight tan suit that could have done with a pressing. A plainclothes policeman, Sarah assumed. He scowled as she and the doctor approached.

  “Sorry, miss. I’ll have to ask you—”

  “Oh, shush.” Sarah wasn’t a bit afraid of policemen; she’d had too many dealings with them, one way and another. “This is Dr. Harnett, he’ll tell you when she’s ready to talk. I’m Max Bittersohn’s wife, Sarah.”

  “Oh. Okay, Mrs. Bittersohn. Levitan, Homicide.”

  Anora ignored the policeman but managed to raise the ghost of a smile for the doctor. “Hello, Jim. Sarah, you’re getting to be more like your Granny Kay every day of your life.”

  “Save it, Anora, I want to take your temperature.” Dr. Harnett stuck a thermometer under her tongue, fitted a blood-pressure cuff around her flaccid, flabby upper arm, took her wrist in one hand and his stethoscope in the other, and listened. He took out the thermometer and shrugged.

  “You’ll live.”

  “I’d prefer not to.”

  “Humbug. So this is Kay’s granddaughter? The little girl who came to see our fish? I thought that was Walter’s daughter.”

  “This is Walter’s daughter, Jim. They grow up, you know. Don’t you think she favors Kay?”

  “Very much, now that you mention it. Kay was a lovely woman. I never could understand why she married that brother of Theodore’s. Albert, was it?”

  “No, Howard, the handsome one. Howard wasn’t such a bad fellow. At least he wasn’t always off chasing after some skirt, like Albert.”

  “But he wrote poetry.”

  “You can’t hang a man for that, Jim. Though I will say Howard carried it too far. I don’t see why people who insist on reading their own verses out loud every chance they get always have to put on those dying-duck voices. That was the one thing in the world George dreaded, Howard Kelling coming at him with a piece of paper in his hand.”

  Anora was talking fast and loud now, working off some of her shock in the way most natural to her. “George wasn’t afraid of anything living or dead, except having to listen to Howard’s poems. Most people didn’t realize that, you know, they thought George was just a dim old stick. But I swear to you, George Protheroe was as brave as any man who ever lived. He’d have outfaced a charging lion. Who did this man say he was?”

  The man in the tan suit stepped closer. “Lieutenant Levitan, Mrs. Protheroe. I’m in charge of homicide. So you’re saying your husband wouldn’t have been afraid of somebody coming at him with a spear?”

  “Lord, no. Spear or cannon, it wouldn’t have made a particle of difference to George. He’d have walked straight up to th
at murdering devil and laughed in his face. And I suppose that’s exactly what he did.”

  “Who found him, Mrs. Protheroe?”

  “I—” Anora choked up. Sarah took her hand.

  “It’s all right, Anora. Don’t talk if it hurts.”

  “Huh. Do you think anything could hurt worse than I’m hurting already? I found him myself.”

  “When was this?” asked Levitan.

  “I don’t know. Half-past seven, maybe. Eight o’clock. We’re not an early-rising household. We’re all old, we nap a lot.”

  “Pretty bad, wasn’t it?”

  “Yes. It wasn’t so much that George was dead, you know. I was prepared for that, as much as one can ever be. I knew something was bound to happen fairly soon. It was the spear I couldn’t stand. And the blood. So horribly much blood.”

  Levitan wasn’t letting her drift off again. “What about that spear, Mrs. Protheroe? Where did it come from?”

  “I don’t know. There’s so much stuff in this house. I don’t remember any spear, but I’m old. I forget. Anyway, there it was sticking up out of him like a bean pole. From his heart. He had an enlarged heart, didn’t he, Jim?”

  “Yes, Anora. George had a big heart in every way, God rest him.”

  “I couldn’t have stopped him, Jim. Nobody could. I just wish I’d gone with him.”

  “You can’t go yet, Anora,” Sarah protested. “We need you here.”

  “Fiddlesticks! George needed me, nobody needs me now. And don’t you go trying to cheer me up, Sarah Kelling. If I want cheering, I’ll hire a band.”

  Yet Anora was sounding a shade less desolate. Phyllis came in with tea and a basket of tiny cornmeal gems, hot from the oven. Cook’s palpitations must have subsided. Sarah poured, Anora took a cup, Phyllis pressed her to try the gems.

  “Please take one, Mrs. Protheroe. Cook’s feelings will be hurt if you don’t.”

  “Huh. And I’m not supposed to have any feelings, is that it?” But Anora picked up one of the steaming morsels, eyed it resentfully for a second, bit off a nibble, and washed it down with a mouthful of tea. Levitan, who’d been sipping gingerly from the all-but-transparent china, put down his empty cup with a faint sigh of relief and got back to business.

  “How come your husband was the first one up, Mrs. Protheroe? Were you aware that he’d gone downstairs?”

  “I was aware that he hadn’t gone up. George had been sleeping down here in his study for quite a while, the stairs had got to be too much for him. It was either this or install an elevator up to his bedroom, we didn’t want all that mess and bother.”

  “You don’t have one of those chair-lift things?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. You’ve seen my husband, or what’s left of him, poor soul. George could never have fit on one of those things, and I’d never have let him try. He was too fat, like me. But he did still enjoy his food, God bless him. We’d had a nice little roast of pork for dinner, with applesauce and sweet potatoes and a strawberry parfait to follow. Last thing on earth we should have been eating in this hot weather, but that was what George said he wanted and I’m glad we gave it to him, though I don’t suppose I’ll ever be able to face a roast of pork again.”

  Anora groped vainly in her dressing-gown pocket. “Blast! Hand me one of those tissues, Sarah. I must look like the devil, sitting here snuffling like a pig after truffles, but I can’t help it so you’ll just have to put up with me.”

  “We don’t mind, for goodness’ sake. What did you do after dinner?”

  “Sat for a while and watched some idiotic television program. Then George started nodding off, you know how he always did. I shook him a little by the shoulder and told him he’d better go to bed or he’d be spending the night in his chair and wind up with a crick in his back. Once he’d got to sleep, I’d never have been able to handle him alone. Phyllis is about as much use as a butterfly. Anyway, I helped him into the study and got him settled. By that time I was ready to call it a day myself.”

  “Are you still sleeping upstairs?” Sarah asked her.

  “Oh yes. You know me, I like my creature comforts. I read till about midnight, then dropped off to sleep and didn’t wake up till about seven o’clock, which is pretty good for me these days. I don’t know whether George got up more than that once during the night. He generally did, his kidneys were in awful shape. Weren’t they, Jim?”

  “Pretty bad,” the doctor agreed. “How could they have been anything else, considering the way he ate and drank? I told him he was eating himself into the—well, I was wrong, wasn’t I? You know, Anora, what’s happened here is a dreadful thing for us, but a quick death isn’t the worst that could have happened to a man who’d been abusing his body for eighty-five years. Sorry, I suppose that was tactless.”

  The doctor’s apology actually drew a hint of a smile from Anora. “Since when have you ever bothered yourself about tact? Just tell me one thing, Jim. Did it hurt him much?”

  “I should say very little. I haven’t examined him myself, you know, but the spearhead appeared to have stabbed straight into the heart, which would have caused almost instant death. George’s reflexes were so sluggish that it was very likely all over before he’d begun to feel pain. I don’t know whether there’d be any point in doing an autopsy, that will be for the medical examiner to decide. Strange as it may seem, considering the length of time I’ve been in practice, I’ve never been involved in a case like this. I don’t see how it could have been misadventure, unless George had been trying to act out one of his yarns about spearing an elephant or something.”

  “Don’t be such a mealymouth, Jim Harnett. Of course it’s not misadventure. My George was murdered, you know that as well as I do. Somebody deliberately broke into this house with a spear in his hand and skewered poor George like a joint on a spit.”

  “But why would anybody do such a ghastly thing?”

  “Don’t ask me, unless it was a crazy Eskimo who took George for a walrus. Anything’s possible these days, the whole world’s gone crazy. A fine way for my mother’s daughter to wind up a widow, thank God mother’s not around to see this day. Sarah, you tell Max I want him to find that brute and bring him to me. After I get through with him, this fellow here can come and gather up the pieces. What did you say your name was?”

  “Lieutenant Levitan, ma’am. It’s not Mr. Bittersohn’s job to find the perp—er, the criminal. It’s up to the police, that’s what people like you are paying us for.”

  “Bah. Then what are you standing around here for? Why aren’t you out perping?”

  “Because I’m still hoping to get some help from you, Mrs. Protheroe. You say you woke up at seven o’clock this morning. Did something wake you?”

  “Yes, a full bladder. Write that down so you won’t forget. Do you want the full details, or will you take my word for it that I went to the bathroom, did what I’d gone for, then came back to get my robe and slippers? I know, you’re about to ask why I didn’t put on the robe and slippers before I went. The answer is that I was in too much of a hurry. The reason I put them on when I did is that it looked like a pleasant morning. Instead of going back to bed, I decided to make myself some tea and toast and take it out to the back veranda. It’s cool then, and I like to watch the early birds catching their worms. My cook and maid can testify that this is something I often do in the summertime. We don’t normally have breakfast till nine, and I like a little something while I’m waiting. Their feelings are always hurt because I don’t wake Cook to make the tea and Phyllis to carry it out to me. Why should I? They need their rest, and I find it far less bother to wait on myself. Less bother to me, anyway. I always leave the kitchen in a mess and they have the fun of cleaning up.

  “So that’s what you did this morning?”

  “No, that’s what I meant to do. What I did was stumble over my husband’s body at the foot of the stairs. Don’t ask me what I did after that, because I can’t remember. I think I sat down beside him. I must have stayed like
that quite some time; I was still there when Sarah came, whenever that was. I do remember thinking I ought to take the spear out. It looked so dreadfully uncomfortable, sticking up out of him. George hated being uncomfortable.”

  “Did you touch the spear at all, Mrs. Protheroe?”

  “No, I just couldn’t. I was afraid something vital might come with it. This was a new experience for me, you see. I’m afraid I’m not handling it very well. I’d always thought of myself as a fairly commonsensical person but one never knows, does one? Do you think I’ve got hardening of the arteries, George? I’m sorry, Jim. My grandmother used to say that if you accidentally spoke the name of an absent person, it meant that he was thinking about you. Poor George, maybe he’s thinking of me now, wherever he is. I’m going to miss him horribly, you know.”

  Sarah hugged the bereft old woman a little harder. “Of course you are. But you couldn’t miss George unless you’d had him, Anora. Not everyone’s lucky enough to have someone to miss. There’s nothing the matter with her, is there, Dr. Harnett? Don’t you think what happened is that Anora went into shock? That’s a perfectly normal reaction. Wouldn’t you say so?”

  “Certainly I would. No doubt you do have some hardening of the arteries, Anora, as anyone your age naturally would; but I can’t see any sign that it’s affecting your mind. Do you remember anything else about when you were sitting there with George?”

  “Well, I do recall thinking that I must do something about George before Cook and Phyllis came down and went into fits. I’d managed to convince myself by then that he really was dead. He was so cold, and he hadn’t moved, and his eyes were so still. So terribly still. He seemed to be looking at me, but I could tell he wasn’t seeing me. I believe I had some thought of getting up, but I’m none too nimble at the best of times, and I felt so weak, and there was nothing handy to haul myself up by. Except the spear, and I couldn’t touch that. I felt—oh, frozen, like in one of those nightmares where something awful’s chasing you and you can’t move.”