'Oh, Howard,' I cried, 'I don't want either of us to die. I want us both to live and be happy together and perhaps to have a baby and live a good life and give the kid a good education and die nicely in our old age.' I was sobbing properly. 'I do love you,' I said, 'and that's why I don't want to part from you, because it said when we got married "Till death do us part" and that'll be the end of everything, oh, Howard, Howard.' I was sobbing fit to break my heart and Howard very gently put me down in my chair and knelt down in front of me but still kept his hands gripping me so that I shouldn't get away, not trusting me at all.
'Not the end,' he said. 'There's another world, very likely, and we shall be together in that other world, happy for ever, the two of us. And if there's no world afterwards we shall be at peace in the grave, lying together in eternal rest.' This was really meant to be consoling to me, I supposed, but it only made me cry worse than ever. 'There, there,' he said. 'These old writers that I won the quiz money with, they knew all about it, they all believed in a life after death, a heaven, so to speak, where loved ones could be happy with each other for ever and ever.'
'There's hell, too,' I cried, sobbing away. 'There's eternal fire and torment and doing away with yourself's a terrible thing and there's this fire and punishment for ever. It's not fair,' I yelled. 'I don't want that. I don't want to go to hell, I want to stay alive.' And looking through my tears at the fire I could see it needed coal on it, daft fool as I was. Howard smiled very sadly at me as if I was not right in the head, not wanting to die but wanting to live instead, and he stroked my hair with one hand, using the other to stop me getting away. He said:
'What we're going to do is this. We'll bring our pyjamas down here and get ready for bed, death being really a kind of sleep when all's said and done, and then you'll go to bed first and while you're in bed I'll give you your tablets. Then when you've had your tablets in about twenty minutes you'll feel very very sleepy, and then you'll just drop off and fade out, and that'll be the end of everything. And then when I'm quite sure that you're sleeping away nicely I'll take my tablets and go to sleep beside you, with my arms round you perhaps, and that'll be the end of both of us.'
'No,' I said, 'Oh, no, no, no.' And then, being a woman and a bit curious, even in a position like this, I said, 'What tablets? What tablets are you talking about? '
Howard, still holding on to me with one hand, put his other hand in his trousers pocket and pulled out a bottle of brown like capsules. 'These,' he said. 'Don't you recognise them?' And I did recognise them. I said:
'Those are the ones Myrtle took that time. You pinched them,' I said. 'You had this in mind all the time, didn't you? A real dirty trick, I call it. Those are not your property, anyway. Those are Myrtle's. You can't use those because they're not yours to use.'
'They worked very nicely on Myrtle,' said Howard, 'or would have done if you hadn't interfered. That's why I took them and kept them. They seemed to work very smoothly. If I'd got other tablets they might not have worked the same. That's why I took these and kept them. I reckon if we took about thirty tablets each that should be enough. Myrtle took about twenty.'
'You're not being fair,' I said. 'She's my sister.' I don't know why it seemed to me he was not being fair on Myrtle. Then I said, 'You can't do it, anyway. Not today you can't. You invited Myrtle to tea tomorrow.' I was sort of triumphant. Howard smiled in this sad way and said:
'I knew what I was doing. The front door won't be locked or anything and Myrtle always just walks in as if she's one of the family -'
'So she is,' I said. 'She is one of the family. She's one of my family. So she is.'
'- So she'll walk in tomorrow calling our names and then when she doesn't see us downstairs she'll call upstairs and she won't get any reply, so then she'll come upstairs and then she'll see us both in bed, then she'll say, "Come on, you lazy pair," and then she'll see that we'll never wake up again, and then she'll call the police and the doctor and so on and then it won't be long before we're in our graves and it'll all be over.'
'That's not fair on Myrtle,' I said, 'giving her a shock like that. And who's going to pay for everything? The funeral and the graves and everything else?' I was going on at Howard as if it was two other people who were going to die, and not me and him.
'That's all right,' said Howard. 'There's about five hundred pounds left in the bank to take care of all that. I left it there deliberately. And there'll be no danger of the milk bottles collecting outside and the newspapers on the mat and us two rotting upstairs. No, everything will be taken care of properly. And now,' he said, 'we'd better get ready.'
'I won't do it,' I said. 'I just can't.'
'Look, honey,' he said, 'if you won't take your tablets and die properly like a good girl you know what I'll have to do, don't you? I'll have to do you in myself in some nasty way.'
'Oh, no,' I said. At that moment he really stopped being Howard who I loved. 'No.'
'I haven't got a gun,' he said. 'All there is is a poker or hammer or that heavy pair of pliers I bought. I don't want to do that. It'd look horrible and it'd give me great pain, having to do that to the girl I love. Because I do love you and always will, right to the end of time and the end of eternity, if eternity can be said to have any end. I couldn't bear to leave you behind, for some other man.' So that was it, I thought, selfishness. 'We've got to go together, so let's go sweetly and lovingly, without any trouble.' And he dragged me out of the living-room into the hall and then sort of pulled me upstairs after him. Then he got his pyjamas and my nightdress and our dressing-gowns, all in one hand, holding me with the other, and dragged me downstairs back to the fire. 'You don't realise how cold it is,' he said, 'till you get away from the fire.'
Chapter 25
What could I do really except do what he said? I got undressed in front of the fire and put my nightie on and, like a daft fool, I kept thinking all the wrong thoughts, seeing myself lying dead in bed and hoping that I didn't look silly with my jaw dropped, and putting my hair in a ribbon so it would be tidy when I was dead and even putting some lipstick on to make a lovely corpse. You may laugh, if you like, you people who've never had this experience, but you wait till you do and see what happens then. As I looked at my hair in the mirror I said to my hair, 'Good-bye, golden hair. You'll never be admired again, except by the worms underground.' I did, and I don't care whether you believe me or you don't. And another of my thoughts was that my life was very tidy as far as the actual time was concerned, because I was dying to the very day twenty-four years after I was born and there weren't many people about who you could say that. There were no odd months and weeks and days, and that gave me some satisfaction, I don't know why. All the time, of course, I was also trying to work out schemes for getting away or perhaps knocking Howard on the head, and Howard, although he wasn't actually holding on to me, was looking at me very watchfully all the time. When he was ready and I was ready he came over to me and just looked at me and smiled, and I said, 'Well, perhaps we'd better go upstairs.' Howard said:
'All right.' So I made as to go first. Then I dashed into the hall, yelling like mad, 'Help, help, help!' and tore at the front door to open it, but it was locked. Howard grabbed me and said, 'Silly girl, I thought we'd agreed not to have any trouble and here you are making a fuss all over again,' and pulled me away from the door. 'When you're nicely asleep,' he said, 'I'll come down and unlock that door so we can be found with no trouble by Myrtle and Michael tomorrow. But you're not getting out of this house, that's certain. You're going upstairs to bed to sleep your last and everlasting sleep.' And he pushed me upstairs very roughly, not loving at all. Then I said:
'Oh, oh, I'm going to be sick.' And I sort of staggered on the landing.
'You'll soon be past all sickness,' said Howard, not very sympathetic. 'Soon there'll be no more sickness for you or for me either. And the best place if you're sick is in bed, so go to it.' And he pushed me into the bedroom, very roughly, not like the Howard I'd married. 'Go on,' he said, 'g
et into it.'
'Oh,' I said, thinking fast, 'give me a few minutes till I feel better.' I got into bed and I'm quite sure that I looked very sick. 'If I feel sick,' I said, 'I won't be able to keep those tablets down, will I? They'll all come up, won't they? They'll all be wasted.' And I made a sort of going-to-be-sick noise. What I needed was time to think, and I was thinking like mad all the time.
'All right,' said Howard. 'I'll just go and get your glass of water so it will be ready for you when you stop feeling sick.' And he went out to the bathroom, which was just across the landing. What I had to do then was to act very quick, so the first thing was to jump out of bed, though I really was feeling sick now and my limbs had turned to pure jelly. I could hear Howard swilling out the glass several times and from where he was I knew he couldn't see me and I thanked God I was in my bare feet. Panting terribly I dashed like mad and was tearing down the stairs and I had a peculiar thought, which was one that I knew I didn't have time to think about and chew over now, and that was that the house was sort of sympathetic towards me, every room in it and every bit of furniture in it was sort of trying to say that they'd help me if they could but they were sort of all tied down by magic and couldn't do a thing. Then, when I was just rushing into the hallway and not knowing which way to turn I heard Howard come out of the bathroom and he was calling, 'Janet, where are you? Where are you, Jan? I don't want any tricks, Jan, I know you're under that bed, come out now, like a sensible girl.' That gave me time again, and I dithered, moaning to myself, my idea being to run and run, but he'd locked the whole house up and there was no good shouting, as I knew, so then it struck me that I'd have to hit poor Howard and knock him out cold and get the police so I had to look for something to hit him with. I'd always been pretty strong, that was one good thing, though we hadn't done much in the way of PT at school, them trying to interest us girls mainly with ballroom dancing. I dashed into the kitchen and looked around like a mad woman, I could sort of see myself with my eyes all staring, to find something to hit him with. And like a daft fool again I remembered that I'd forgotten to buy tea, seeing the tea canister there on the kitchen side-table. There was my stroke of luck, though, now, for on top of the coal-bucket was a hammer used to break up the big pieces and I'd always told Howard not to do that in the kitchen because of the mess, but it made no difference, he went on doing it. And I saw that it seemed a real waste to build up the fire like we had done when we were going to bed to snuff it. It's amazing what thoughts can fly through your mind, it's as though your mind has become a sort of animal like a puppy or kitten playing about on its own, like you could imagine a kitten playing with a bit of string when it had said on the radio that the end of the world was coming in ten minutes time and everybody to stand by. And this was pretty near the end of the world, wasn't it?
I stood behind the kitchen door with this hammer clutched very tight in my right hand and I could hear Howard coming down the stairs shouting, 'Jan, Jan, honey, don't play the fool, time's getting on.' Don't play the fool, indeed. 'Jan, Jan,' he was calling in the bit of the hallway that's between the living-room door and the cupboard under the stairs where the vac was kept and where the electrical fuses were kept. 'Jan,' he called as he came into the kitchen and I could see him looking a bit bewildered. I remembered seeing on the television a play in which the woman killed her husband by hitting him on a spot just behind the ear. I didn't want to kill Howard, of course, I just wanted to knock him out and stop his nonsense and then get the police and a doctor and so on, but I had to make sure I knocked him out properly. It was just perfect, the way he stood in the kitchen facing towards the electric cooker with his mouth open, wondering where I could have got to, and out I came from behind the door with my hammer in my hand and caught him this beautiful clonk right behind his right ear. He didn't fall down or anything and I was in ghastly fear that now there'd be no second chances and I'd really have had it this time if I didn't do the job properly, so I gave him another real hit and this time he went down. He went down heavy, and I remember thinking that nobody had ever gone down like that in our house before and you could tell these council houses weren't all that well built because the whole house shook, ornaments rattling and ringing and a tea-cup coming off the shelf and cracking all white pieces on the floor beside Howard. It was like little hard flower petals for Howard. I swear by Almighty God I didn't mean to kill him. It was him who wanted to kill himself, but I didn't want to kill him. My idea was to knock him out so as he'd come to his senses again. He'd gone a bit mad, that was it, and it was all tied up with his photographic brain. But there he was on the kitchen floor dead, and there was no blood to be seen, not a drop, but he was dead all right. I could tell he was dead because he'd stopped breathing. The last bit of breathing he'd done was when I hit him the second time and he sort of groaned. He'd stopped breathing and his pulse had stopped, too. I was feeling his pulse all over the place and there was no beating of it at all. I swear by God Almighty that it wasn't my idea to kill him at all. But there he was on the floor, done in by this coal-hammer.
Chapter 26
The best first thing to do, when you've got a dead body and it's your husband's on the kitchen floor and you don't know what to do about it, is to make yourself a good strong cup of tea. So I put the kettle on and got the tea-things down from the shelf, having to step round Howard to do it. I made myself a really strong pot of tea and I opened a tin of evaporated milk to have with it, more like cream than milk. I don't know why I wanted that instead of milk, normally we just had it with tinned fruit salad, but I felt that I deserved a special cup of tea somehow. Then I sat down in the living-room, sipping this tea and wondering what was best to do. I should really get dressed and go for the police, but was daft again and saw this sort of picture of the police in the station with the wireless on listening for the football results and checking their coupons and I saw their faces when the telephone rang or I just walked in saying it was urgent. They wouldn't be pleased at all. Then I thought perhaps I'd better get through to London, Scotland Yard, Whitehall 1212, this being more their line, a dead body in the kitchen, and they were sure not to be checking their coupons. And then I thought that I needed help and somebody to talk this over with, because I could be in a very funny position, I saw that. The thought of this very funny position made my legs go very weak. I only just saw this very funny position now for the first time as I was pouring myself a second cup and I made the cup rattle against the saucer. Murder. Murder. Murder. But he'd been going to murder me and it was only self-defence what I'd done. You only murder your husband when you hate him and I loved Howard, everybody knew that. Or you murder him when you want his money for yourself or else you want to go off with another man. And none of that was true about me. And then I felt really sick when I remembered about Red, Redvers Glass, and me going off in my mink that time to see him in the hotel and saying I was his sister, and that bitch behind the desk having a good long look at my mink and remembering it. Oh dear oh dear oh dear. And yet it was Red who could help me if anybody could. But where would he be now? Would he be in that hotel? He might even be back in London. The police station would know his address perhaps, but it seemed a bit queer going to the police station to ask for that and saying nothing about me having killed Howard and him lying there on the kitchen floor.
What I did when I'd finished my tea and emptied the teapot and rinsed the cup and saucer and plate on which I'd had a couple of ginger snaps, was to go upstairs and get dressed again. It seemed a bit queer to me now that when I got undressed to die I'd put my clothes (it was a beige costume I was wearing) in the wardrobe very neatly. But that's what I had done and that's what Howard had done too. We were both very neat people really. I put my beige costume on again and tidied myself up and went downstairs. The lights were on in the house now, of course, and the kitchen light shone down very strongly on poor Howard lying in his pyjamas and dressing-gown on the kitchen floor. He was sort of curled up but his eyes were half-open. Poor Howard. Then I rem
embered that Howard had locked up the house, back and front, and my front-door key - the one that Red had had when he was staying in the house - had been taken from him by Howard when he'd left the house, and I didn't know where either of the two front-door keys were. I had a long search round and it dawned on me at last that if Howard's idea was to open up the front door as soon as I was snoring away in my last sleep the key would perhaps be on him. And so it was. It was in his dressing-gown pocket and he was lying on it. I had to turn his body on to its back to get into that pocket and the body (I couldn't see it as Howard any more) groaned a bit. I could have hit Howard, he'd been so stupid about everything, and now look what a mess he'd got me into. But Howard was somewhere else and there was this big lump of a body, very heavy and difficult to move.
I put my mink on and went out. My idea was to go to the Swinging Lamp first of all to see if Red was there or if he'd left an address or anything, so I walked quickly, it was very cold, towards the bus-stop for town. And then who should I meet walking along very slowly and heavy-footed but this very policeman who'd been to our house twice before and both times with Red. It was under a lamp, the bus-stop, and I'd just reached it when this copper said, in a very proud way, 'I reckon yer've ad noah more trooble, ave yer, missis? With im, I mean. Haw haw haw.'
'Who?' I said. 'What?'
'That pawit chap as was botherin yer. E's bin oop ere again this evenin an I sent im back. Threatened im with chargin im with disturbin the peace, we did. Haw haw.' This policeman was very pleased with himself.
'Where is he?' I asked. 'I've got to find him.' I had to think fast of a reason why I'd got to find him so I said, 'He's got our front-door key.'
'As, as e? Well, we cawn't ave that, missis. Well, ah saw im arf an hour ago gaw inter the Stag an Ounds and av not sin im coom out yet.' The Stag and Hounds was a pub Howard and I never went into because it was a bit rough. But it was a pub I'd have to go into tonight. So I thanked this copper and went off to the Stag and Hounds which was off Shoe Lane. I didn't much fancy going in there but it was very early in the evening and the pub wouldn't long have been open so there wouldn't be many drunks there. So off I went. It wasn't much of a walk, really. And there was the Stag and Hounds with a light shining on its sign-board, this showing a stag's head and one or two dogs barking up at it. I went into the saloon bar and there were three men there drinking light ale and talking in an angry sort of way about the afternoon's football. They turned when I looked in to give me a good long stare so I made a sort of face at them and went out, Red not being there. I went round the corner into the public bar where women were not supposed to go, and there I was very relieved to see Red sitting at a table with a pint in front of him and he was talking very hard to this other one, the one who'd written about the coal-mines and how he wasn't going to have that sort of life, no sir, Higgins was the name I remembered. There were only a couple of young lads playing darts besides Red and Higgins, so I went straight up to Red, whose head was turned away from me with his talking, and I tapped him on the shoulder. He looked surprised and a bit relieved to see me. I said, 'Come with me, I've got something to tell you. It's very urgent.' He said: