The Games People Play Box Set

by Barbara Gaskell Denvil

  “Very proper, Mrs. Knight,” Sylvia told her. “Nor would we. But Carol gave us your address. We’ve just left her, and she asked us to give you a message. As ex-detectives, we’re working on the case, although somewhat informally. If you care to telephone Carol, she’ll tell you. Sylvia and Harry, and we’d be most grateful if you consent to let us in for just a few moments. This vile monster must be caught, you know.”

  “Certainly he must.” And she opened the door.

  They sat on the edge of their seats, refused tea, and discovered nothing new. “We understand the appalling trauma such an experience brings,” Sylvia murmured, “and I do sympathise, Mrs. Knight. But if there’s anything extra you could tell us?”

  Even smaller but far wider than her daughter, the woman was in need of reassurance but had little to offer except to relate Carol’s past life and many virtues. But one thing was of interest.

  “She told me he spoke of his wife. Of course it could have been a lie. And he limped, but she thinks he changed legs, because he was just pretending anyway. But then, when she scratched his face, there wasn’t any hair. No stubble, though it was evening. No eyelashes. No sideburns. She thought he was hairless.”

  A bald and hairless lump of a man with huge hands and feet might be more remarkable. “Eyebrows?”

  “She didn’t know because of the hood on his jacket. But she said his hands weren’t just big. The fingers were big too. Really thick and knotty.”

  Returning to Rochester Manor, they found Ruby waiting for them, one red paper rose stuck behind her ear. It wasn’t murder she wanted to talk about, it was weddings. But neither Harry nor Sylvia had yet made any plans, apart from the initial agreement, and the decision to share Sylvia’s Rochester apartment.

  “When are you moving in, then? I won’t be able to come dancing into Sylvia’s room every morning,” Ruby twittered, “like I usually do. I’ll have to be a normal neighbour and just say hello over the morning toast.”

  “No. I mean yes,” said Sylvia. “But is there anyone you can think of that we know, or ever met, who smells a bit and has great big hands and feet. And no hair.”

  “Yul Brynner,” Ruby said eventually.

  “Apart from being dead years ago,” Harry objected, “I never noticed particularly large hands or feet. I seem to remember him being fairly well proportioned.”

  “Half the men here are bald,” Ruby nodded. “But nothing else unusual.” She shook her own red curls. “Have some more wine.”

  Isabel swung the frying pan. “Perhaps it is you after all.”

  “Don’t be a bloody fool, Issy.” Tony crossed from the kitchenette to the plastic armchair and flopped down, grabbing the remote control and clicking it at the television in the corner.

  It was a minute flat, rented for a week in Brighton, and cheap being out of season. The winter winds swept in from the unseen horizon, a whistle of ice from the sea mist. The waves lay slumped as though tired, with a twist of spray where the wind caught the tips. The streets were empty, and the small shops mostly closed.

  “And why are we here? Nothing to do. Nothing to see. You just wanted to run away.”

  Tony was now watching the football. Man. United. “Shut up, Issy, I’m sick of your moaning.” He held a beer can, half empty. “Go on home if you want to. Or go running to the police and tell them where I am.”

  Standing solidly between her husband and the television, Isabel planted her feet apart, and put both hands on her hips. “I cooked dinner and you didn’t even wash the dishes. And the police wouldn’t be interested. You like to think you’re so important and Scotland Yard is chasing all over Europe for you, but they aren’t. You’re boring, Tony.” Her voice rose over the cheering of the crowd as someone or other kicked a goal. “Some idiot told the papers you were a suspect. Probably that feeble friend of Harry’s, nasty woman she is. But it’s all lies. No one wants you, Tony, including me.”

  “Egg and chips,” muttered Tony. “It’s always sodding chips.”

  “So crawl down to the pub and order pie and mash.”

  Tony got up, pushed her out from her stance in front of the television, glared at her, and returned to his chair. “Shut up woman. Nag, nag, nag. Chips, chips, chips. Like the repeat button on the recorder. Shut up and bugger off.”

  “I might well bugger off,” Isabel said, voice piercing in fury. “This is a horrid squat little dump of a place, and we have a perfectly nice house of our own. The beach is just full of stones and there’s nothing to do except watch the seagulls.”

  “That’s just what you sound like,” yawned Tony. “A damned squawking seagull. Buzz off and join them,” once again turning his attention to the television screen. “The defence was playing better than the forwards. “Attack,” Tony roared at the television.

  So Isabel did. Still holding the frying pan, Isabel swung it again and with a better sense of direction since Tony was sitting down. It thumped down with majestic accuracy and force on the top of her husband’s head. Tony leapt from his chair and dragged the pan out of her hand. Advancing on her, she thought his eyes turned from their usual light blue into black. She backed, but the wall was behind her. Isabel squeaked, “Pig. Murderer,” but the words didn’t help Tony’s mood.

  “You want a killer, eh? You want a murderer for a husband?”

  “Remember I’ve got high blood pressure,” squealed Isabel. “Be careful what you do. My heart isn’t strong.”

  Tony faced his wife, swung the frying pan and crashed it down over her head. It cracked like glass. Isabel slid down the wall and sank into a clump, pale blue polyester and blue fluffy slippers, rather like a puddle, and remained silent. Slightly alarmed, Tony stared at her, listening attentively. There was a faint gulp of air, so he was confident that she was breathing, and not one drop of blood showed in her hair nor on her face. So he returned to the television.

  Manchester United scored a goal, and Tony settled cheerfully into the armchair. “Just remember,” he said without bothering to turn around, “we’re supposed to be going out for a pint later on. The landlady here says the corner pub’s a good one. Meanwhile, when you finally get up and stop pretending, I’ve finished my beer, and I fancy a cup of tea.”

  Receiving no answer, Tony was unperturbed. Clearly she was in a sulk, and since he felt a little guilty for the wallop of the frying pan, he didn’t press the request. He was quite happy to watch the rest of the match in peace now the score was two nil to the side he supported.

  18

  The man sat on the old chair in the shed and stared at the rug’s bloody globules dried into black patterns. The long trestle table at one side of the space was also thickly stained, for it was the ideal place to chop and dissect, examine and decapitate. Small pieces of rotten flesh and old bone were scattered, for he purposefully did not clean up. He adored the memories and he wallowed in the smells. This was the place where he felt his life had meaning, and power lay in his hands.

  Naked from the waist down, he lay back regarding the pins he had inserted in both thighs. The stinging pain was pleasurable but not exciting. Nothing new. No hope of experimentation. Only his own tired legs. His thighs were thick enough, but the skin was ugly. He wanted fresh young skin, smooth flesh and the tears of agony that could be heard only by him.

  The last bitch had got away, but the next would not. He had bought a syringe.

  Tomorrow he was due back at work, and this would be a problem. He didn’t believe he could sit at work for all those hours with his mind racing, desperate for playtime. Unplucking the pins, one by one, his mind returned to the depression that billowed into his head in great black heaving clouds when he needed confidence but could not find it. Black Dog, Churchill had called it. No, far worse. He’d kick a black dog from his path, kill it, strangle it with his bare hands, or throw it under a train. His depression was a dragon spreading its wings to shut out the light. He called it Olga. Olga dived from the sky, where she was little more than a black streak, then landed on a mo
untain top. She sat there, watching him, her tail twitching, her wings folded. All through his life from childhood, he had felt her and known she wanted to eat him. He had always feared her like the creature of hell’s doom, which she was,

  And then, when he was denied the boiling, blasting need he felt for blood and play and power, yet was thwarted, and all his simmering excitement came tumbling down into shattered fragments, so the dragon swooped. She faced him, her wings outspread, and the world went black. He pushed past but could not find the light. Olga began to wrap her leather spiked wings around him.

  That was when he knew he should kill himself. He was diseased and ugly. He was insignificant and impotent. He had no value, nor right to claim value. If he was denied the fulfilment his mind and body demanded, then death was all that was left beyond the utter hopeless living death of humiliation.

  “Shit. I’ll do it.” He stared around him at the implements and thick blood stains, the memories that no longer held any charm, and the absurdities of pain given, and pain received. “Pain’s the essence of life,” he mumbled to himself, pulling out the rope from under the couch. “I’ve given it. That was a gift. To me and to them. Pain matters. So I’ll give it and take it and find what happens next.”

  He had known Olga, and named her, since the great dragon had descended upon him, suffocating him and crushing him as a child of three or four. That had been when his father left. Before that he’d had a bed, even some toys. His father had read him a story about a fairy called Olga. But some weeks later, his father had disappeared.

  Confused and dismal, desperately missing the cheerful presence of comfort and expressed affection, he had wept, but been given no answer. His mother had changed overnight. His toys, books, bed and bedclothes were sold, and he slept on the floor with a towel over him. But it got worse. He hadn’t known before of his deformity. He’d seen doctors about his constantly growing hands and feet but had never realised it was ugly. Now his mother told him. “Disgusting. You disgust me. I look at you, and vomit.”

  “Where’s Daddy? He don’t fink me ‘gusting.”

  “You should have been a girl, his mother spat. He could still remember her voice. “A pretty girl with pretty hands and little toes.”

  He could also vividly remember when she had tried to castrate him. Terror had turned Olga huge, blinding him. and he had tried so hard not to piss, but panic had produced the opposite effect and he had pissed all over his mother’s hard little hands. But she had been too drunk to cut straight and instead had sliced open his small thigh.

  After that, almost daily, it had been the thrashings. She’d wanted him to die. It would have been easier back then. Finally a teacher at his primary school had seen the bruises and called the police. His mother went to prison. Then she’d died. He hadn’t gone to her funeral. But she didn’t seem dead. He’s wondered if his father was dead too. His father’s name was Simon, but he’d never heard from him again.

  He was knotting the rope, and slinging it across the ceiling beam, when he became aware that it was another game. He was playing. Not with vivisection, but with his own pretences. “I’m not going to do it.” He spoke to himself. “I want someone else. Tonight. Shit. I won’t wait any longer. Tomorrow I’ll phone in sick. But I won’t be sick. I’ll be as happy as life – and pain – permits. And this time I’ll win. No stupid bitch will beat me. I’ll thrash her to an inch of her life, the bitch. This – is – my – turn.”

  Life listened. He pulled off the blood stained shirt he liked to wear in the shed and dressed himself for discovery. Always exciting. He pulled on the tight white underpants. They cradled his erection and kept him warm and well cuddled. Then jeans. And the boots, extra-large, He locked the shed door behind him and climbed into the car. A different road this time, perhaps. Take some risks. A main road. This time, instead of offering help, he’d ask for it. And this time, the bitch wouldn’t get away.

  This time he drove further. Inconvenient of course, but he couldn’t afford to let the police guess he lived nearby. Late November had brought freezing winds, but the clouds were swept into high white threads and did not threaten rain. So he parked the car back under the bushes and bracken, exploring the country lanes for whatever seemed most likely to bring success. This was a spot he’d never visited before, but it wasn’t so far from town. Someone, eventually, would pass.

  Like Olga, he was accustomed to waiting. He knew that was part of the never-ending picture.

  “Give me an early Christmas present. Move in with me.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Are you prevaricating?” demanded Sylvia. “If you don’t want to, just say it. I promise not to collapse with a heart attack.”

  “I suppose I’m nervous.” Harry scratched his earlobe. “We’ve never lived together. We’ve never spent a whole day together yet. I still can’t really believe you want to marry me. Or is ‘want’ the right word? Do you just think it’ll be convenient? What if I get on your nerves?”

  “Then don’t.”

  “And what if you get on my nerves?”

  “I probably do already.” She stared at him, only half a smile displacing the frown. “That sort of thing happens. And there’s nothing wrong with convenience. But I think you’re bloody incredible, so I can live with a little touch of irritation, and then the happiness will take over. But don’t sell your house yet. Give us a month or two, and then decide whether to make it permanent. Or not.”

  “Have you told Lavender?” he asked.

  “Sort of tentatively.” The smile bloomed. “But I’m going to tell her now. I need to get Pam’s mother’s address off her, and I’ll explain everything at the same time.”

  “She’ll think you’re mad. Or perhaps she already does.”

  “No. Or at least, if anything she’s probably thinking I’m mad not to have done this sooner.”

  Pam’s mother lived in a thatched cottage two villages away in Tussock under Cleeve. She was clearly wretched with utter misery, and hadn’t bothered to wash, comb her hair or eat. Sylvia wrapped her arms around the small woman. “You need family and friends,” she murmured. “It’s a nightmare, I know it is. Tell me anything, absolutely anything I can do to help.”

  Mrs. Barnstable had once again burst into tears. “No one can help,” she wept, voice muffled against Sylvia’s coat.

  “Can I use your kitchen?” asked Harry. “Can I make you some tea? Breakfast?”

  “If you’re hungry –?” the woman stuttered.

  “No. For you. And I’ll wash the dishes. And don’t worry, I do this sort of thing all the time.” Which wasn’t true, but Harry hoped it was the right thing to say.

  Sylvia ushered Pam’s mother into the living room and onto a comfy chair, and left Harry to make tea, toast, and light the fire. Drinking her tea and watching Harry’s disappearing trouser waistband as he crouched over the fireplace, blowing on the reluctant flames. “Tell me about Pam,” she said. “Anything and everything. Just talk. I loved her too, you know, she was so sweet and so helpful. But I never knew her well enough. I’d love to hear what you say.”

  For two hours they talked. Very little was said about the tragedy. “Was Pam too trusting?”

  “I never thought so. But everybody liked her. Perhaps that made her think people were always nice.”

  “So perhaps she might have known the man?”

  “How can anyone be friends with a psychopath?”

  “Detective Inspector Morrison’s here to see you again, Mrs. Greene,” Ralph Tammy poked his head around the living room door and smiled.

  “Another one? Oh no.”

  “Not this time. It’s your Tony Allen’s been found. He gave himself up?”

  Both Sylvia and Harry stood in a hurry, and Harry dropped the papers from his lap. “He is the murderer after all? And he’s confessed?”

  “Not actually,” Ralph said. “Seems he’s confessed to something entirely different.”

  When Morrison marched in, he found both Harry
and Sylvia in a panic. The two glasses of wine on the table were empty, and Harry was searching for the bottle. Morrison nodded, and his distraught hosts stopped in mid-yelp. Sylvia flopped down onto the smaller couch and said, “Go on. Tell us the worst.”

  “I’m afraid it’s not good news,” said the detective, also sitting down although no one had invited him to do so. “It appears that your friend Tony Allen took his wife to Brighton for a holiday. This was evidently to keep out of the way of both the press and the police, and to try and forget the dismal turn of recent events.”

  “Shit,” said Harry. “Bugger. So what now?”

  “He has confessed to killing his wife as an act of mistaken and accidental defence,” Morrison continued. “In a fit of agonised guilt, Mr. Allen admitted that he’d often acted as a bully at home. This was principally because he felt insignificant and wanted to reassert himself. He says his wife was going to leave him. She also hit him with a frying pan. He retaliated, but certainly never meant to kill her. Once he realised she was dead, which took him some time since he was watching football, which evidently took precedence, he phoned for an ambulance and immediately afterwards reported to the local police down in Brighton. I intend travelling down there, but I wanted to talk to you first. I want to know what you’ve witnessed yourself of Mr. Allen’s behaviour towards his wife in the past.”

  “Oh, good God,” Harry said, and answered at length.

  Sylvia raised one eyebrow, and Morrison said, “Did you ever witness this abuse?”

  “No, not really, but she turned up on my doorstep one day and demanded to move in because she was leaving him. She said he was always a bully. But of course, I know from him before that she punched him too, threw stuff at him, shouted and screamed, and tipped hot water over him when he was pissed. He hated her cooking. So anyway, they weren’t the ideal couple. She planned to leave him until she heard he was suspected of being the Ripper. Then she felt sorry for him and ran back home.”