1951 - In a Vain Shadow (23 page)

I dumped the grapple and cord down beside the well and raised the cover. My fingers were slippery with sweat and I was shaking like a leaf as the cover came of. A dreadful fetid smell came out of the well as I lowered the cover to the ground: a smell that turned my stomach and drove the blood out of my face. Holding my breath I edged forward and peered down into the dank opening. The water was as still as glass, reflecting in its blackness the boughs of the overhanging yew tree; floating in the water was the frog. It lay on its back, its yellowish belly blown up the size of a cricket ball, its arms and legs stiff in death.

The frog frightened me almost as much as if it had been Sarek. Even in death it seemed to me to be acting as a sentinel; guarding the dead man at the bottom of the well.

I had to get it out. I couldn’t use the grapple with that horror floating before me, and the thought of touching it sickened me.

I returned to the house. I had to have a drink. I knew I was wasting precious time, but I had to have a drink if I was going through with this job.

I found two inches of gin left in the bottle, and I drank it neat. It didn’t touch me. I raked around in the cupboard and found another bottle of gin with about half an inch of liquor in it. I drank that. My hands were shaking and my heart was pounding so violently, I could scarcely breath.

I fetched a long-handled mop from the kitchen, and as I was about to open the back door I heard the milkman drive up.

I waited, continually wiping my face and hands, and breathing in short, quick gasps. When I heard him drive away, I went down to the gate and collected the milk. Then I started round to the back of the house again, carrying the mop.

I knelt on the wall of the well and pushed the mop head gently into the water. The frog floated away. I tried to trap it in the woollen strands of the mop, but every time I got near it the movement of the mop in the water sent it farther into the darkness.

I waited for it to come into sight again, but it didn’t. The smell from the well nauseated me, and stirring the water with the mop seemed to make it worse. I decided to leave the frog where it was. So long as I couldn’t see it, I could manage.

I hoisted up the grapple. The tips of the hooks were as sharp as needles. There were five of them, separated by two short steel rods. I fastened one end of the line to the ring in the grapple and gently lowered it into the water. It was heavy and went down as fast as I could pay out the line.

‘Hello, there; what are you up to?’

The whole of my body recoiled in a shuddering start. I let go of the line. I was so frightened I couldn’t even bring myself to see who it was.

‘What an awful smell. I say, something ought to be done about that, you know.’

Slowly I turned my head without moving my body and looked over my shoulder; not breathing and as cold as ice. He was standing a few yards from me; the clerical collar looked very white in the thin winter sunshine; his long, inquisitive nose a little red from the wind.

‘I hope I didn’t startle you. I rang the front-door bell, but no one answered.’

I didn’t say anything; I couldn’t. My mouth was dry, and my tongue curled back like a strip of dry leather.

‘Have you lost anything down there?’

I had to say something. I opened and shut my mouth, opened it again and managed to get out: ‘Yes’.

‘You ought to be careful, you know. That smell’s dangerous. You could get typhoid from water like that. Perhaps I can help you?’

‘It’s all right.’

He was beginning to look uneasy. He didn’t seem to like my stillness.

‘There’s nothing the matter, is there?’

I stood up.

‘No; you startled me.’

‘Yes I’m afraid I did. I’m very sorry; it was stupid of me. I didn’t really expect to find you here. Now about this water. I shouldn’t be surprised if someone hadn’t drowned a dog in there. I remember when I was in Nairobi a horse fell down a well. Of course, it was a much bigger well than this. I was there at the time. The poor brute trod on the well cover and it broke. I shall never forget seeing it go down. And oddly enough a friend of mine had a similar experience in Patagonia. Only he told me they got the horse up; although of course they had to put it to sleep.’

I just stood there like a dummy, half-suffocated by the banging of my heart, and unable to think; my mind blank with panic.

He joined me at the well and peered into the water.

‘Bless my soul, there’s a frog in there; what an enormous brute. Is this your line?’

Before I could stop him he had taken hold of it and given it a quick jerk.

‘Hello! I seemed to have hooked something. Gracious me! It’s a tremendous weight.’

I took the line out of his hand. The touch of my cold, wet skin must have startled him, for he took a quick step away from me.

‘What do you want?’

My voice sounded as inhuman as the voice of a ventriloquist’s dummy.

‘I beg your pardon?’

‘What do you want? I’m busy. Can’t you see I’m busy?’

‘Well, yes, you certainly look busy. What have you lost down there? That’s heavy, you know. Shall I help you haul it up?’

‘No, I can do it. It’s a sack of potatoes. Just tell me what you want.’

‘Well, I wanted to see Mrs. Sarek.’

‘She and Mr. Sarek are in Paris.’

‘Are they? I thought I saw her in the village this morning in the car.’

‘She was on her way.’

‘How nice to be in Paris in the winter. I remember my late bishop telling me...’

‘I don’t want to hear what your bishop told you. I’m busy.’

‘Oh. Well, of course, I mustn’t keep you.’

‘Goodbye. I’ll tell Mrs. Sarek you called.’

‘I wish you would. I seem so unlucky never to find her in. Actually I wanted to ask her if she would care to give a little donation towards our organ fund. We are trying...’

I took out a pound note and thrust it into his hand.

‘Here, take this, and let me get on with my work.’

‘It’s extraordinarily kind of you. Perhaps you would like to come down and see the organ. I would be very happy to explain just what we intend to do. We shall want...’

‘I can’t waste any more time talking. I’m sorry. Goodbye.’

I tried to keep the snarl out of my voice, but I didn’t quite succeed.

‘But surely there’s no need to - to shout at me?’

‘Oh, get out!’

‘My dear young man.’

‘For Christ’s sake, get out!’

I was about to hit him, and he must have realized it, for he went white. He walked quickly away, his shoulders hunched, and he didn’t look back.

I followed him to the gate and watched him down the lane. He looked old and frightened.

As soon as he was out of sight I began to tremble. I had sweated right through my clothes.

The grapple was was held fast. The damned interfering old fool had sunk the hooks into something that wouldn’t move. I had been gently trying to disengage the hooks for the past hour, and now I was getting frantic. I began to jerk at the cord, which cut into my fingers, but there was no upward movement.

Had the hooks found him?

I wiped the sweat out of my eyes, and pulled again. Still no movement, so I exerted pressure, and hauled, throwing my weight on to the line. Something moved this time. There was a slight upward movement, not much, and I was now certain he was on the hooks. The weight couldn’t have been the coat.

It was much too heavy, and suddenly I let the cord go slack.

I couldn’t pull him up. I couldn’t see his face again.

I sat on the wall of the well for some time, wondering what to do. Somehow I had to work the hooks out of him and try again. I jerked on the cord, hoping to disengage the hooks, but they must have been well set into him. The quickest thing to do was to haul him up and get the hooks out of him when he was up, but I wasn’t going to do that. I’d rather the diamonds stayed down there than do that.

I took hold of the cord again and gave it a hard, savage jerk. I kept doing that, cursing under my breath; jerking and pulling, sinking the hooks deeper and deeper into him, hoping they would cut right through him.

I don’t know how long I kept that up: probably for over half an hour. I stood with my foot braced against the wall of the well, and in a frenzy of desperation, jerked, pulled and dragged. Then suddenly the hooks were free. I felt them tear loose reluctantly. I shuddered to imagine what could be on them They must have torn right through him.

But I had to keep on. I swung the grapple away from him, very gently guiding it along the bottom of the well, feeling for a new strike, every muscle in my body tense, and my breath rasping the back of my throat.

Then suddenly the grapple touched something. Tentatively I tried to swing it forward: the cord moved, but not the grapple. I gave the cord a little jerk; the hooks caught and held.

I jerked harder and felt the hooks sink into something. Was this the coat? I pulled. The grapple began to rise; the cord taut. I kept pulling, steadily and slowly. It took some minutes. The wet cord lay in coils at my feet as I kept hauling it in. I was leaning forward now, staring into the swirling water, waiting and watching for the grapple to break the surface.

Another ten yards of cord came in, then I saw it. Just below the surface of the water was the coat.

The hands of the clock on the mantelpiece pointed to five minutes to two. The buttons lay on the table: twelve big ones and eight small ones. The bits and pieces of the coat lay in a soggy, stinking mess in the hearth.

I was practically at the end of my tether. My teeth were chattering, and my hands shook so I couldn’t light the cigarette that jumped and bobbed between my lips.

I had only another two hours before she returned. There was still much to do, but before anything else, I had to see the diamonds.

I bent over the table and stared at the buttons. I picked up one, but my hands were so unsteady I could scarcely hold it.

I went across to the sideboard and took up a pair of nutcrackers. Carefully I guided the button into the jaws of the nutcrackers and squeezed, but the button jumped out and went rolling under the table.

Muttering to myself, I dropped on hands and knees and searched for it; found it and put it on the table again.

Once more I guided it into the jaws of the nutcrackers and holding it tightly in the palm of my hand, crushed it. The shattering bits of the button stuck to my sweating hand. I stared at them: there were no diamonds.

I picked up another button and crushed that; still no diamonds. With growing fury and fear I went on crushing buttons until there were none left.

A pile of broken bone lay on the table, but no diamonds: not one solitary diamond to reward me for the awful hours I had spent in getting up the coat.

I had to get out, and get out fast now. Emmie had played me for the sucker I was. I could see that now. She must have known something had happened to Sarek. What other reason had she for telling me the diamonds were in the buttons except to trap me into producing the coat: for she must have guessed where the coat was, Sarek would be too.

I hadn’t a moment to waste. Any second she might turn up here with the police.

I ran up the stairs and began to fling my things into my suitcase. I would have to risk cashing those five-pound notes.

So long as I was out of the country before they were traced it didn’t matter. I had to cash them. I had no other money.

I was feverishly strapping up the suitcase when I heard a board creak behind me, I swung round.

Rita stood in the doorway. She smiled at me: an awful little smile that flickered at the corners of her mouth. In her right hand she held Sarek’s gun: the sight was centred on my chest.

‘Hello, Frank.’

I couldn’t think of anything to say. I wanted to say something, but I just couldn’t think of anything to say that would stop her killing me. And she was going to kill me: I could see that in her green, glittering eyes.

‘Don’t move. I want to talk to you. She had you properly fooled, Frank. I couldn’t resist watching you fish up the coat. Did she tell you they were in the buttons? And you thought you were going to get them and leave me flat, didn’t you? You ought to have known Emmie better than that, and you ought to have known me better than to think I’d let you get away. I knew you were up to something. You were so anxious for me to go, weren’t you? I left the car at the bottom of the lane and came back to see what you were up to. I could have saved you the trouble of getting the coat, but I thought you might as well amuse yourself while you could.’

‘Look, Rita ...’

‘Just keep quiet, Frank, and don’t move. I’ve got the diamonds. Do you hear? I’ve got them. I found them last night in your mattress. They were hidden in the handle of the dagger. It’s my dagger. I knew the handle unscrewed and there was a hollow tube in it where diamonds could be hidden, but I didn’t want you to know about the dagger, Frank. I hoped I would get it before you did.’

I ran my tongue over my dry lips.

‘Well, that lets me out, Rita. You’re entitled to keep them. I - I won’t bother you anymore.’

‘No; you won’t bother me anymore, Frank, because you’re going to join him at the bottom of the well. That’s why I came back. I might have let you of if you hadn’t kept the knife. I killed him because he held the knife over me, and that’s what you were going to do, wasn’t it? You’re going to join him, Frank...’

There came a sudden loud rat-tat on the back door.

Rita started and looked over her shoulder.

I jumped forward and smashed the gun out of her hand and grabbed her. She kicked, bit and clawed; holding her was like holding a wild cat. For a moment or so we fought like a couple of savage animals. She got one hand free and reached behind her. I tried to catch her wrist as she stabbed at me with the dagger. The blade ripped through my sleeve and I felt a sharp pain in my arm. I gave her a violent shove and sent her reeling across the room.

We stood looking at each other. Blood ran down inside my sleeve and dripped from my fingers to the floor.

‘It’s my turn now, Rita. That was the baker. Had you forgotten him? Well, this is it. You weren’t clever enough.’