The Dying of the Light: A Mystery

by Michael Dibdin

  With trembling fingers, Charles Symes struggled to undo the buttons of his trousers. The last one wouldn’t come free of the hole. After watching him fiddle with it in vain for some time, the woman reached across and tore the fastening loose. The trousers fell heavily to the man’s ankles, revealing the wrinkled, sheeny expanse of his buttocks smeared with a brown glutinous mess.

  ‘Oh my Christ!’ the woman exclaimed.

  She gazed at the spectacle in disgust for some time, wiping her hands on the front of her overalls.

  ‘What I ought to do,’ she remarked at length, ‘is make you lick it up and then cauterize your arse with a red-hot poker. But seeing as my hands are full with Channing I’ll settle for a cold shower and Dettol rub followed by a night locked naked in the outside loo to remind you what that facility is for. Now fuck off out of here before I puke, you filthy old bastard.’

  Holding his trousers loosely round his hips, Symes hobbled towards the door. The woman turned expressionlessly to the others. She walked over to Belinda Scott and plucked the paper poppy from her dress.

  ‘Remembrance Day’s long past, Lindy. Not that you have anyone to remember, do you? Or anyone to remember you.’

  She tore the flower apart, petal by petal, and let the pieces fall to the floor.

  ‘Do you?’ she insisted.

  ‘No, Miss Davis. Sorry, Miss Davis.’

  The woman nodded.

  ‘Still, look on the bright side, eh? At least you might still be in the land of the living come next Poppy Day, unlike some people I could mention.’

  She shot out a finger at Dorothy, who got to her feet. Rosemary also stood up. Miss Davis raised her eyebrows at her.

  ‘No one rang for you, Travis.’

  Rosemary squeezed her friend’s hand.

  ‘I’ll wait for you here, Dot. Don’t worry, it’ll be all right.’

  Miss Davis sauntered over to them. She leaned very close to Dorothy, searching her face.

  ‘Yes, it’ll be all right,’ she said. ‘Just as long as you keep your trap shut, don’t fidget, shoulders back, tummy in and knickers clean. Otherwise you know what’ll happen, don’t you?’

  Miss Davis stared at her intensely, her face a couple of inches from Dorothy’s. She leaned forward suddenly and kissed her on the mouth. Dorothy gave a muffled cry. When Miss Davis drew back, there was blood on her lips.

  ‘Yes, you know,’ she said. ‘You’ve dreamed about it, more than once. Only this won’t be a dream, my poppet. This will be real.’

  She snatched Dorothy’s hand and led her to the door while Rosemary looked on in helpless anguish.

  CHAPTER 4

  As dusk gathered beyond the plastic-shrouded windows, the light in the lounge imperceptibly faded, until the residents were no more than insubstantial shapes merging into the outlines of the furniture. For the most part they were silent, but from time to time one would suddenly burst into speech. This set others off, until soon the whole group was yattering inconsequentially away, all talking, none listening. Then as suddenly as it had begun it would stop, each speaker breaking off in mid-sentence until the final voice ceased and silence resumed once more.

  This time it was Samuel Rosenstein who started it. His name was actually Rossiter, but Rosemary and Dorothy had needed a Jew to complete their cast of suspects.

  ‘Hello? Hello?’ he shouted into the telephone. ‘Operator? Connect me to the police immediately!’

  Next Jack Weatherby chipped in with a few stray phrases from the news bulletins he had once read on the BBC World Service.

  ‘… on the clear understanding that the respect of such demagogues can only be won by a show of force, thus enabling any eventual negotiations to proceed from a position of …’

  ‘… turned my back for a single instant,’ cried Grace Lebon, whose real name was Higginbottom or something equally unthinkable, ‘to look at something which had caught my eye in a shop window, and when I looked round again the pram was empty!’

  ‘… can’t say when I’ve enjoyed myself so much,’ broke out Purvey, a retired accountant who had no more connection with the Church than Weatherby with the Army. ‘Unfortunately the last train seems to have gone, so if it wouldn’t inconvenience you too terribly I wonder if …’

  This brought Belinda Scott to her feet.

  ‘We’ve got to take under our wings, tra-la!’ she bawled at the top of her voice. ‘These perfectly loathsome old things, tra-la!’

  As the tumult rose about her, Rosemary gave a panicky glance at the clock, which of course still stood at ten past four. How long had Dorothy been gone? Rosemary had said she would wait for her, but how long would that be? Would she return at all? They might already have dragged her off to hospital, trussed and gagged on a stretcher like Channing on his bed.

  As the realization of what her friend’s absence was going to mean came home to Rosemary for the first time, she felt her control begin to slip away. For years now they had been at each other’s side night and day. It was always Rosemary who had taken the initiative. It was she who introduced new twists and turns in the story which they had elaborated together, she who kept all the strands of the plot in play while still managing to accommodate – and thus to some extent control – the real horrors which surrounded them.

  In contrast, Dorothy’s had been the subordinate role. Her task had been to fill in the gaps which Rosemary left blank for her, to spot the errors which Rosemary had deliberately planted for just that reason, to approve and criticize, suggest and reject. Thus when Rosemary had allowed herself to consider the possibility of Dorothy being sent away to hospital, she had seen it in terms of her friend being cut off from her, and hence from the source of the comforting narrative which had sustained them both for so long. Now she was forced to acknowledge that her own position would be little better, in that respect at least.

  The stories were a collaboration, she realized now, and although Rosemary had always been the dominant partner she could no more keep them going by herself than one player, however brilliant, could have a game of tennis with no one on the other side of the net. A sense of panic gripped her at the thought of her coming isolation, of the fear and uncertainty and loneliness she was going to have to endure, night and day, without respite or relief. She would end like the others, just another voice in that chorus of manic despair.

  She felt someone touch her arm and looked round to find Mrs Hargreaves gazing down at her with an expression of concern. Hargreaves was in fact the woman’s real name, although Rosemary had tacked on the ‘Hiram’ and ‘III’ to make her sound more like a rich American widow. By now she had grown so accustomed to thinking of Mrs Hargreaves as a petulant, cold, selfish hypochondriac that she was initially shocked rather than comforted to hear her say kindly, ‘You look just about at the end of your feathers, Miss Travis.’

  ‘I’m fine!’ Rosemary rapped back in a manner which challenged the woman to deny it.

  ‘You’re sure there’s nothing I can do you for?’

  ‘I can manage perfectly well on my own, thank you,’ Rosemary shouted, only to find that the tumult of competing voices had died away. To make amends for her rather aggressive tone, she added, ‘I felt a bit giddy for a moment, but it’s passed.’

  ‘I’ll just come and sit with you until she gets back,’ said the woman, taking Dorothy’s place.

  ‘There’s no call for that, Mrs Hargreaves. I’ll be quite all right now.’

  ‘Call me Mavis.’

  Rosemary, who had no intention of ever calling anyone Mavis if such a thing could possibly be avoided, smiled remotely.

  ‘Terribly kind of you, I’m sure, but …’

  ‘Two hands are better than one, I always say.’

  Rosemary’s smile became still more distant.

  ‘You and Mrs D,’ ventured the other woman cautiously, ‘you’re very … very close, aren’t you?’

  Sitting in Dorothy’s chair, Mrs Hargreaves had her back to the window. In the gathering darkness, it was
impossible to make out the expression on her face.

  ‘We’re friends,’ said Rosemary.

  ‘Oh I didn’t mean there was anything, well, you know …’

  Rosemary kept silent.

  ‘Not that I’d mind one way or the other,’ Mrs Hargreaves went on breezily. ‘I used to be quite partial to a touch myself at one time.’

  Rosemary decided it was time to regain the initiative.

  ‘I gather that Mr Anderson is endeavouring to persuade you to alienate your estate in his favour, Mrs Hargreaves.’

  ‘Mavis.’

  There was a silence.

  ‘Mavis,’ Rosemary conceded.

  ‘Now then, what was that about Mr A?’

  ‘I just said that it sounds as if he’s trying to get his hands on your money,’ said Rosemary.

  Mavis Hargreaves giggled.

  ‘Well, you know men.’

  ‘I shouldn’t take anything for granted.’

  ‘Oh I didn’t mean you, dear! I wouldn’t dream of …’

  ‘Anything Mr Anderson may say, I mean,’ Rosemary explained stiffly.

  ‘Don’t you worry about that! I wouldn’t trust our Mr A as far as I could kick him out of bed.’

  ‘After all, Hilary Bryant made her money over to him shortly before she died, and much good we saw of it.’

  Mavis Hargreaves nodded.

  ‘Keep them chasing the carrot at the end of the rainbow, that’s what I always say.’

  She placed a plump white finger on Rosemary’s knee, which instantly twitched aside.

  ‘It’s your friend you should be worried about, by the sound of it.’

  Rosemary bit her lip.

  ‘I’m sure there’s no truth in that.’

  ‘Mr A seems to think there is.’

  ‘What does it matter what he thinks?’ demanded Rosemary shortly.

  There was a creak of hinges at the far end of the room, then Dorothy’s voice.

  ‘Rose?’

  She was on her feet in a moment.

  ‘Coming, Dot!’

  The room was in almost complete darkness by now. Rosemary made her way slowly towards the door, her one thought to help her friend face up to the terrible news which had just been broken to her, and very likely in the most casually brutal fashion. She must get Dorothy out of there, she thought, away from the inquisitive Mrs Hargreaves and all the others, up to her room, where she could go to pieces without making a spectacle of herself.

  ‘I can’t find the light switch,’ Dorothy called faintly from somewhere near by.

  ‘Never mind, I’m nearly there.’

  A few moments later they were in each other’s arms, and Rosemary had guided her friend to the sofa beside the door. They sat in silence for some time, holding hands.

  ‘I know, Dot,’ Rosemary said at last.

  ‘The news, you mean?’

  Dorothy’s face was just a blur, but her voice sounded strangely calm. Rosemary nodded, then realized that she was invisible too.

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘When I was upstairs, I overheard Dr Morel talking to …’

  She sat there in silence, despising herself for her selfish weakness in breaking down at the very moment when her friend was more than ever in need of her strength and support.

  ‘I don’t know what to say, Dot,’ she added lamely, when she could trust herself to speak.

  ‘I know,’ Dorothy murmured. ‘It’s like a miracle.’

  As a child, Rosemary had an uncle whom her mother pronounced ‘common’, just about the worst failing in her book. Murdering someone didn’t necessarily lower you socially, but the said uncle’s tendency to bark ‘Eh?’ when he failed to hear, understand or approve of a statement made to him she regarded as an unforgivable lapse of taste. The young Rosemary’s attempts to imitate this shameful trait had been ruthlessly repressed, but she could not now prevent herself emitting the vulgar vowel, such was her astonishment.

  ‘Just think!’ Dorothy went on. ‘There you were telling me how vital it was for me to get away from here before I became the next victim. And now, as if by magic, that’s what’s going to happen! Miss Davis took me to Mr Anderson’s office. Dr Morel was there. He told me that the tests I had showed that I needed to go into hospital straight away …’

  She broke off. Rosemary squeezed her hand. Dorothy gave a little laugh.

  ‘So there we are! Isn’t it wonderful?’

  Rosemary finally understood, among many other mysteries, why Dorothy had pretended to be unable to locate the light switch. She too was grateful for the darkness, which reduced all the intolerable complexities of what they were suffering to a mere exchange of dialogue characteristic of the parts which they had elected to play. She had created these parts herself in an attempt to make a fictional virtue of the factual necessity for Dorothy to return to hospital. The idea of the alphabet murderer had been a feeble contrivance, stolen – as Dorothy had not scrupled to point out – from a half-remembered whodunnit, but it was the best she had been able to do in the time at her disposal, still numb with the shock of what she had overheard Morel and Anderson saying.

  Dorothy, for her part, had evidently decided to accept it in the spirit in which it had been offered. She did not really believe that her life was in imminent danger, of course, but was pretending to do so in order to spare both of them the pain and confusion that would otherwise be unleashed. It was a supremely civilized piece of behaviour. Neither was taken in by the other’s act, but each would play her role to the end.

  ‘Wonderful,’ echoed Rosemary.

  But Dorothy had not exhausted her capacity to surprise.

  ‘For me, yes. But what about you, Rose?’

  ‘What about me?’

  Dorothy withdrew her hand.

  ‘Oh, I know what you must be thinking!’ she exclaimed. ‘ “It’s all very well for Dot, but what about the rest of us?” And it’s true, Rose. I’ll be safe enough, but you will still be here, in his …’

  She laughed.

  ‘… or her power.’

  The breeziness of her tone quite disconcerted Rosemary. For a moment she felt a shiver of apprehension, as though something uncanny was afoot, something she had not planned and did not understand. It was quite in order that Dorothy should wish to appear calm and collected. What was disturbing was that at moments Rosemary had a distinct sense that she really was. Ever since learning that she might have to go to hospital, Dorothy had been on the verge of a tearful collapse at the mere idea, yet now the worst had occurred she seemed immune, floating above it all, as though it were a matter of no personal concern to her at all.

  ‘His or whose power?’ she murmured vaguely.

  Dorothy gave a snort of impatience.

  ‘The murderer’s, of course!’

  The door swung open and all the lights came on.

  ‘Murderer?’ cried Mr Anderson. ‘What murderer?’

  He stood over the two women, nosing his tumbler of whisky. As Rosemary’s eyes adjusted to the glare, she made out Miss Davis circling round from the other side. She was holding a tall stemmed glass filled with layers of different-coloured liquids – tawny, green, red, blue and yellow – topped by a miniature umbrella.

  ‘You’ll get fucking murdered, if you don’t watch out,’ she said.

  Ignoring her, Rosemary looked at Anderson.

  ‘We were discussing a book.’

  ‘A book?’ Anderson replied.

  He raised his eyebrows and then frowned, sipping his drink.

  ‘I dimly recall that among the amenities available to residents under the former regime was a selection of trashy whodunnits and mawkish romances such as might be expected to appeal to persons of low taste and declining faculties, but they’ve long since gone the way of everything else round here that isn’t nailed down. Might I therefore ask to which book you allude, Miss Travis?’

  Rosemary waved airily.

  ‘Oh, one Dorothy read years ago, during a wet weekend in Wales. She was just describing the
plot to me.’

  Miss Davis lifted the paper umbrella from her drink. Her lips englobed the maraschino cherry impaled on the stick below.

  ‘Liar,’ she said.

  ‘Now, now,’ murmured Anderson. ‘Don’t let’s spoil the party.’

  He took a gulp of whisky.

  ‘Nevertheless,’ he continued, ‘given that Mrs Davenport cannot always be relied upon to recall with any accuracy what she had for breakfast, it does at first sight seem hard to believe that she should be waxing lyrical, still less logical, about some shilling shocker she once read in Rhyl.’

  ‘Pwllheli,’ Dorothy put in.

  ‘Bless you, dear!’ murmured Rosemary.

  Miss Davis sucked at the upper layer of her cocktail.

  ‘Lying bitch,’ she said.

  Anderson fixed Rosemary and Dorothy with a penetrating stare.

  ‘I put it to you, ladies, that so far from discussing a whodunnit, you were in fact concocting one.’

  ‘Well?’ said Rosemary. ‘And what of it?’

  Anderson glanced at Miss Davis.

  ‘Did you hear that, Letty?’

  ‘I did, William. I did indeed.’

  ‘Miss Travis wishes to know what of it.’

  ‘Impertinent cunt. Do you want me to take steps?’

  ‘Not at present, I think. After all, we must make due allowance for the situation in which the two ladies find themselves. Parting is such sweet sorrow, and so on. Partir, c’est mourir un peu – or, in Mrs Davenport’s case, a lot. Let us therefore endeavour to rise above petty considerations and address her question.’

  He turned back to Rosemary and Dorothy.

  ‘I realize that time can hang pretty heavy round here, especially so, paradoxically enough, for those with very little left. Nor has it escaped my attention that your favourite way of passing it has been to work up elaborate scenarios of imaginary mayhem featuring those who have left us feet first as the victims, the dwindling band of survivors as the suspects, and your good selves as the intrepid sleuths. Hitherto I have had no particular reason to take exception to this, but the case is now altered. If an outsider were to witness an exchange such as the one which Letty and I just overheard, the resulting disruption to the life of our little community would be quite intolerable. I must therefore ask you, Mrs Davenport, to put these tall tales of dark deeds at Eventide Lodge very firmly out of your mind.’