The Dark Corners Page 7

  He carried them downstairs, dumped the broken glass in a pail beneath the sink, then took the picture back into the living room and returned it to the table, repositioning it carefully before turning away with an air of tired finality.

  A cedar-wood box on the mantelpiece that he had failed to examine before yielded a handful of cigarettes. He took one, lit it with a book match that lay beside the box, and drew the smoke deeply and luxuriously into his lungs, ducking his head at the faintly dizzy reaction that this caused. The tobacco was stale, but not too unpleasantly so.

  He selected a book from the shelves, the science-fiction anthology he had picked out on the previous day, seated himself in one of the lounge; chairs, and began to read.

  He read unhurriedly for several hours. His absorption in the stories was complete, a period during which he was relaxed, cocooned in a kaleidoscope of other places and times, distant futures where men and other beings played out their destinies in bizarre and ingenious ways. He enjoyed the book enormously, as he had known he would.

  He finished it and selected another, sprawling back in the chair again, glancing once at the photograph on the table before opening the book and re-commencing reading.

  When he became hungry, he went out to the kitchen and heated soup, completing the meal with canned meat and fruit. He cleaned the dishes again, lit another cigarette, and returned to the living room.

  He read for a while, then placed the book on one side and rose to study the record player. It was battery-operated, and a faint hum replied to his pressing of the ON switch.

  He selected a record from the cabinet, placed it on the turntable, and carefully lowered the arm and needle onto its rim. The impressionistic patterns of Ravel languorously filled the room, a blanket of gentle sound that pricked nostalgically at his mind. He reduced the volume to a little above a whisper, then sat down again, his eyes closed and his hands crossed loosely in his lap.

  He spent the remainder of the afternoon alternately playing records and reading. Despite the streak of pragmatism that assured him of the true nature of the situation, he was immensely soothed, devouring the imaginative play of word and sound with the voracity of a starving man, as near to being at peace for the first time since—when? He couldn’t remember.

  His surroundings induced a sense of well-being that was unknown to him, a formula for serenity that he had never considered attainable and which, while he still saw it as an ingredient of some calculated trick of fate, he was at last able to accept without bitterness.

  The light was beginning to fade when he finally rose, replaced the book, and stood looking at the slowly darkening room for the last time.

  There was something fitting about this last sight of it, as though its gradually softening contours were deliberately dimming his memory, making his departure less of a wrench than if he had been able to see clearly.

  Finally he looked at the photograph, once again a blurred and featureless shape, and he nodded to it, briefly expressing regret for what he had done and also for what might have been.

  He went out to the kitchen and brewed coffee, staring through the window at the darkening tangle of the woods as he slowly drank, tentatively wondering which would be his safest route once he was in the clear.

  He washed and replaced the cup and saucer and once again took cans from the pantry, unhurriedly selective now, then opened the table drawer and took out a spoon, a can opener, and lastly a knife.

  Faintly, ever so faintly, a car engine sounded outside in the gathering dusk.

  He stiffened, his hand clamped on the wooden handle of the knife, an icy coldness abruptly gripping his throat and stomach.

  The sound was like a sudden violent blow, a thunderous buffet that crashed through the barrier of his tranquillity and savagely thrust him back into a world of shadows, a place where he could only run and hide, dwelling briefly in one patch of darkness before encroaching danger forced him to run and hide again, a compulsory and terrifying game that he must almost certainly lose.

  Dry-mouthed and sick, he stood motionless beside the table as the sound grew steadily louder, faded, then coughed gently to a silence directly outside the cottage.

  He heard the sound of a door opening, a muffled exchange of conversation, then a metallic slam. Footsteps came quickly toward the front of the cottage.

  He moved then, numbly turning to face the open door that led into the living room. A detached part of his mind told him that one rapid movement would take him up onto the table against which he rigidly leaned, another would release the window catch, and a third take him outside to where he could leap the low fence and be immediately lost in the darkening woods.

  He knew that it would take only seconds, but still he stood facing the doorway, staring fixedly through the shadowed living room at the dark patch of the front door.

  Then above the paralyzing thunder inside him he heard the scrape of an inserted key and the faint dick as it was turned.

  The door opened.

  For several seconds she failed to see him where he stood, statue-like, in the gloom of the kitchen. He saw her near-silhouette against the oblong of twilit trees, and then she was inside, setting down a small suitcase. Straightening, she paused, and in a flush of shame he knew that she had caught sight of the missing glass in the photograph frame.

  She stood motionless for a second, then her head darted in rapid, searching movements. She froze again when she finally saw him, her sharp intake of breath a small explosion in the deep silence of the room.

  He stepped forward, searching the shocked but still beautiful face with shy hunger, hoping to reassure her by unhurried movement, lifting his hands in a gently placatory way.

  “It’s all right,” he said. “I’m not going to—” He broke off in horror as the forgotten knife rose up before his eyes, its blade a flash of menace in the gloom. Then the woman screamed a name.

  “John!” She backed a solitary step, then screamed again, “John, John!”

  He blundered to a halt, jerking the knife fretfully, shaking his head rapidly from side to side. “No, no please—”

  Outside there was a startled exclamation, the sound of something striking the ground, then a pounding of footsteps. A shadow bulked in the doorway, paused momentarily, then lunged toward him.

  In the seconds before the man reached him, despite his terror he was conscious chiefly of a feeling of surprise. While he had never attempted to draw a picture in his mind of his emotional counterpart, he had assumed in a hazy and perhaps vain way that he bore at least a passing physical resemblance to himself.

  But the figure before him was tall and solidly built, contrasting sharply with his own slenderness, a dark and hugely handsome manifestation beyond his wildest imaginings.

  Confronted by it, he quailed, feeling himself shrink to an awed and insignificant shadow that crouched spellbound, a rabbit before the magnetically freezing approach of a stoat.

  The blow took him on the side of the face and he spun away from it, the knife still tightly in his fist, reeling back across the kitchen and colliding heavily with the table. A vice-like set of fingers gripped his shoulder and heaved him around. He stumbled and somehow broke free, and they confronted each other. He jerked the knife in front of him, sobbing.

  And then he looked across the heavy shoulder, past the darkly handsome face that held its own shadow of fear now, and he saw the woman, her hands squeezing flatly at the sides of her head, framing her agonized eyes and mouth, and in that still and terrible moment he knew that she must not be hurt, and also that to harm the man in front of him would be to mutilate himself in some obliquely bitter way.

  He stumbled back, lowering the knife and turning his eyes once again to the figure that loomed in front of him. “No—”

  The huge fist struck his face again, a shattering blow that had terror behind it, and he fell, striking the wall before slumping heavily to the floor, his fading mind mercifully blanketing the pain as the knife slid searchingly between his
ribs and the final darkness overtook him.

  “Get up,” the big man said, panting. “Get up, you dirty little toad.”

  Then he saw the slowly spreading blood that came from beneath the motionless figure on the floor, “Oh, God,” he said in a suddenly weak voice.

  The woman said, “What is it?” She moved shakily into the doorway, her hands still pressed against her face. She looked down and recoiled. “Oh, no!” She spun away and leaned shudderingly against the door frame.

  The man knelt and gingerly touched the body, fumbling at the wrist of a limply sprawled arm. After a few moments he rose.

  “I think he’s dead,” he said thickly.

  The woman moaned wretchedly. The man caressed his knuckle, scowling furiously, then abruptly dropped his hands to his sides. “We’ve got to get out of here,” he said.

  Bowed, the woman continued to sob. The man went rapidly to her and gripped her arm. “Betty, for God’s sake! We must go!”

  The woman turned to him, her face haggard, “But we can’t just leave him here—”

  “We have to,” the man said urgently. He stared at her uncomprehending face, then shook her again, “What the hell else can we do? Do you mean we have to take him somewhere and dump him? How do we know they won’t trace him back here somehow? We have to leave him and let somebody else find him, hope they think there were two of them, or something—” His voice trailed away at the shocked expression on her face.

  “You mean let Peter and I find him when we come down here again?” the woman said. “Do you think I shall ever be able to come here again? Oh, God, do you think 1 could bear to come, knowing what we’d find?”

  She wrenched herself away from him.

  “You don’t realize what you’ve done,” she whispered. Her voice was barely audible.

  “Done?” the man said. His voice rose. “You bloody fool, I saved you from getting knifed, didn’t I?”

  The woman moved away from him into the living room. He followed her, his voice still high and furious. “Well, didn’t I?”

  She turned toward him, her face an empty, tear-stained mask.

  “Peter will never forgive me,” she said, “when he finds out about us and my bringing you here.” Her voice was low and cold. “Here, of all places.”

  They stared at one another in a confusion of fear and sudden hatred as the light faded and the shadows slowly filled the room and the still and silent kitchen beyond.

  THE GREAT GOLF MYSTERY

  The 4th Tee murderer was a small man with rimless glasses, a mouse-like moustache, and a nervous twitch of the left nostril. This last acquisition was the only outward sign of emotion he had displayed since his trial, an understandably tension-fraught affair at which he had reluctantly been fid guilty by twelve low-handicap men; and a concerted murmur of sympathy and admiration had sounded throughout the barred corridors of the prison on the morning he was taken to the death cell.

  His lawyer visited him later that day, a trace of understandable embarrassment detectable in his demeanour. A previous commitment to participate in the local pro-am tournament had necessitated his delegating the case to a new, and it now appeared, incompetent substitute, and while his absence had been excusable he felt that common courtesy demanded he put in an appearance, if only to say goodbye.

  He was himself still a young man, but a nasty slice and a great deal of time spent in bunkers had matured him beyond his years, and his heart went out to the bowed figure he found listlessly toying with a putter, a pile of treasured score cards beside him.

  The lawyer murmured a greeting, and seated himself.

  The 4th Tee Murderer glanced up from his reverie, blinked, and twitched his left nostril at him.

  “Ah, my dear fellow,” he said. His voice was low, but a hint of his old defiance could be heard beneath the dispirited tones. “Good of you to come and see me off like this. Hope I haven’t put you out in any way.”

  “No, no,” the lawyer said, greatly relieved. His client’s lack of animosity plainly labelled him a man of superior intellect and deep understanding, one who fully appreciated that you can’t win them all. The lawyer’s nervousness vanished, and his features assumed a look of sombre commiseration.

  It was true that he had been booked to play in a foursome that afternoon, but he felt that all things considered it would have been churlish to have mentioned it.

  “My only wish is that I could do more. At times such as these, one experiences a sense of inadequacy comparable only to one’s earliest youth, when the hook, slice, and top were one’s shameful everyday companions.” He coughed delicately. “Are you quite sure there is nothing that I can do? A fresh supply of practice balls? A new Swing-Rite Practice Companion with Double-Strength Air-Flite ball on Triple-Strength elastic, perhaps?”

  The 4th Tee Murderer laughed bitterly.

  “And what benefit would I derive from these things, these painful reminders of all that has made life worthwhile? They would only serve to make the end even more unendurable, though mind you, there might still be time to correct an unfortunate tendency to hook slightly with the dashed niblick.”

  He paused thoughtfully, then sank back into his former state of despair, “Ah, well. A flaw remains—perhaps symbolic of the unattainable perfection that we all seek and fail to find m this brief but blessed span, when we stride on springy turf—occasionally soggy, I grant you, especially in June, July, and August—learning to drive straight and true down the fairway of life, resisting the lure of bunker and the snare of rough, purifying ourselves little by little as we grope fumblingly toward par, and then—the Great Beyond.”

  “Amen,” the lawyer said humbly.

  The Murderer fixed him with a look of grim melancholy.

  “Let me tell you the full bitter story,” he said. “Let me tell you about the murder I committed on the fourth tee at Huggins’ Hollow, the indubitably justifiable homicide that has resulted in my present incarceration and forthcoming demise. And I hope you have a strong stomach, for it is a tale that would sicken all but the stoutest. I speak metaphorically, you understand,” He paused courteously. “If you can spare the time, of course. Sure I’m not keeping you from anything?”

  “No, no,” the lawyer said. “Not at all. I shall be most interested. As a matter of fact, what with one thing and another, the details of the case—” He coughed, eyed the bright sunlight that showed beyond the barred window, and suppressed a small inward sigh. “Pray proceed.”

  “It began,” the Murderer said heavily, “as many other mornings have begun. I rose, showered, shaved, dressed, and proceeded downstairs to breakfast alone, leaving my wife to her slumber, or so I thought. And there I was, studying the previous day’s match scores in the Dally Golfer, about to sip my fourth cup of tea, when it happened. There was a bellow in my ear of “Surprise!”—and I chokingly emerged from my cup to find my wife beside me, fully attired in—golfing clothes!”

  The Murderer was pale, and his hands tautened on the shaft of the putter that he held, employing, the lawyer noted absently but approvingly, an orthodox reverse overlapping grip.

  “You will understand my dismay when I tell you that in our fifteen years of married life she had flatly refused to exhibit the faintest glimmer of interest in the finer things, contenting herself merely with running the house, painting impressionist landscapes which she sold disgustingly large sums of money, writing best-selling novels and occasional smash-hit musical, composing a symphony now and then, managing her dress salon, and so on. A wasted life,” the Murderer said sadly.

  “However, it had happened at last. In her insatiable search for the new, the untried, she had finally decided to inflict herself on the most testing field of endeavour yet devised by man, confident in her butterfly fashion that she would sail blithely round in par as soon as she was let loose upon the hallowed ground.

  “I pleaded, arguing the necessity for lessons, the need to parade one’s naked unfitness before the humbling eye of the pro; but she wou
ld have none of it. She sulked, she whined. She said that I had ulterior motives in wishing her not to play. She said that I didn’t love her. She said that she would go home to her mother.”

  The Murderer sighed. “You may wonder at this point why I failed to settle for what would unarguably have been the lesser of two evils, the sad truth being that despite her inherently shallow nature and lack of imagination and initiative, I loved my wife. And despite my certain foreknowledge of the dark happenings ahead, I clung desperately to a vain hope that she would fall prey to some disease, preferably noncontagious, en route to the club, or fall and break an arm or leg before it became possible for her to shame me with her first attempted swing.

  “Alas, it was not to be. At length I capitulated, and it was with a leaden heart that I watched her, one hour later, grasp my driver in a vice-like grip and address her ball for the very first time.

  “The stance that she had chosen, despite repeated appeals on my own part, would be difficult to sum up in a phrase. Her toes were turned inward, her knees bent outward, her arms stiffly crooked at the elbow, and her posterior was as kickably projected as any man less iron-willed than myself could have wished. The total effect was similar to a clumsily stuffed penguin I had once seen as a child, an item that had afforded me considerable amusement at the time but now only caused me to reflect deeply on the tasteless humour of adolescence.

  “She lifted her head toward the hole, presumably to verify that it had not been moved while she adopted her position, then swung the club—a sudden violent movement that was obviously intended to catch the ball while its thoughts were elsewhere.

  “There was a muffled click, a square foot of turf sailed past my left ear, and I was astounded to see the ball limp to a halt over a hundred yards away, positioned directly in the centre of the fairway.

  “I made haste to congratulate her on her success. To strike a golf ball at one’s very first attempt is a quite remarkable achievement in itself, and its presence on the fairway instead of somewhere to the extreme left or right of the tee mercifully meant that we could immediately put distance between ourselves and the clubhouse, where horrified gazes were plainly visible at the window.