The Lethal Sex

by Christianna Brand

  “You could have left a note,” muttered Dendy. “I thought you’d gone.”

  “Gone?” She stared. Then she remembered the button.

  He put his arm round her. “You’re shaking like a leaf. What is it, love? Did someone frighten you?”

  “They told me at the farm about Bette Rose. Dendy, have they got the man that did it?”

  He shook his head. “Not so far as I know. Could have been one of a dozen fellows, they were all round her like bees round a jar of honey.”

  She tried to twist herself free. “Look who’s talking,” she said.

  “Why, Mary, I hardly knew the girl, not more than to pass the time of day. But I knew of her. A reckless lass, they said.”

  “Seeing you didn’t know her,” panted Mary, “it’s a funny thing you should have a button off her coat in your pocket.”

  “So that’s where you found it. Aye, I’d forgotten. My torch picked it out on my way back last night, and I thought it was a pretty thing and I’d bring it home to you.”

  “One of her buttons?” The outrage was as whistling as the north wind.

  “How was I to know it came off her coat? I never saw her wear it. I didn’t even know she had a blue coat till the chaps told me—dinner-time that was, when the story broke. It seems some lads found her down by the pool in Maidment’s Copse.”

  “How—how was it?” She forced herself to utter the words.

  “Strangled, they say, with her own scarf. Not that I found the button near the corpse. They must have had a right ding-dong fight of it down the hill. Poor lass!

  “Wasn’t she a bad lot, like Ruby Jones said?” Her voice was jealous.

  “She liked her fun, but it’s hard to pay with your life. What’s Ruby got against her?” he added sharply. “Surely Will...?”

  “I don’t know. I never thought. When was it?’

  “Last night, they say. If I’d come back a bit sooner I might have seen the pair of them, but they were off the ridge road when I went by.” He shuddered. It could be she was down in the copse already. One thing, I didn’t see hide nor hair of her nor anyone else, and so I told the sergeant.”

  “Which sergeant was that?”

  “Sergeant Bates from Amberville. That’s where Bette lived. If that husband of hers had been half a man,” he added grimly, “he’d have seen to it she didn’t have the chance to get herself murdered.

  “You never spoke of the button last night,” she reminded him slowly.

  “Because, if you mind, you came at me like a young tiger-cat, I forgot all else. I never thought of it again till that sergeant started asking questions.”

  “And—where is it now?”

  He took it out of his pocket. “I was only waiting for you to get back to hand it over to the police,” he said.

  “To the police?”

  “It could be a clue, though I don’t know exactly how. Leastways, I could tell them where I found it and when. We don’t want it in our house, seeing where it came from.”

  She said quickly, “Do they know you have it?”

  “Not yet. Mary, what’s got into you?”

  “Or anyone else?” she persisted.

  “Only you and me.” His voice had that puzzled note again. “Mary, what’s to do?”

  She caught him by the arms. “Then, Dendy, don’t go to the police. Let’s just throw it away, let them find it for themselves.”

  “Mary, my dear, they’ve been combing the place for that button. They won’t believe it grew up out of the grass overnight, like a flower coming into blossom.”

  “Then throw it among the brambles. Why should we be mixed up in a case of murder? It’s not as though we could tell them aught that would help them.”

  He said, “What’s this about, my dear? Surely you don’t think I...if so, come into the open. Let’s have no secrets between us.”

  “It’s not what I think,” besought Mary. “There’s others don’t know you as I do, and the police must take someone. Do as I say, Dendy, and I’ll not ask you another thing for a year.”

  But he shook his head. “You don’t think what you ask. Why, if I had had a hand in poor Bette’s death, would I bring the button home to show my wife?”

  “But they could say you forgot,” she clamored, “and you didn’t show it to me. Oh, you meant to, I know, but if they ask me.”

  But she couldn’t move him. He had one final argument that he brought out with great reluctance.

  “I must tell them for both our sakes,” he assured her. “Otherwise, there’s no knowing one of these days it might come to you that it was a queer thing I agreed to suppress a clue, because that’s what the police would call it. Maybe he had his reasons, you might think.”

  “No, no.”

  “Folks change, and that’s a risk I’ll not take, gambler though I may be. Now, mind you bolt the door while I’m away. I’ll be no longer than I can help.”

  “I’ll not be left alone in this house with that murderer at large,” she told him flatly. “If you’ve made up your mind to go, then I’ll come with you.

  He realized she meant what she said and, indeed, it was what he had anticipated. He saw her pick up the button as if to reinforce her argument, and he took it gently from her.

  “It ’ull be safer with me,” he said. “I don’t want to go hunting through the brambles on hands and knees looking for where you dropped it by accident.

  She sent him a piercing glance.

  “Get your scarf on,” he said. “Oh, and we’ll give Rags his dinner while we’re away. We don’t need him with us, getting lost again. And when we come back, Mary, I’ve some news that’ll bring the light into your eyes. Old Ames’s house may be going begging after Christmas; they say he’s going to live with a married son now he’s a widower and I’ve put in for the house.

  She scarcely believed him; for the moment she half-forgot about the grisly business on which they were engaged.

  “A house of our own! Oh, Dendy!”

  She ran into the kitchen to feed the little dog; the remains of the milk were still scattered on the floor

  “Leave that till we come back,” Dendy suggested.

  When Rags saw the plate in her hand he came jumping round her, almost oversetting Dendy leaning against the table.

  “Be off with you,” he said, but not ill-naturedly. “You’ll be the death of me yet.”

  Shutting the kitchen door on the gobbling terrier they set out, making for the telephone booth at the cross-roads. It was a mite farther than the Jarvises, who would have lent them their telephone and welcome, but Mrs. Jarvis was the biggest gossip thereabouts, and only Heaven knew what story would go the rounds within four-and-twenty hours. Dendy suggested they should take the shortcut through the briars.

  “You’ll not lose your way with me,” he promised. “And we might even come upon the milk you set down. We’ll both of us be the better for a cup of tea on a night like this.”

  Soon the path narrowed till they had to walk in single file. Mary went first with her husband behind her, shining his torch on the road ahead. Now both fell silent, each occupied with his own thoughts.

  Mary felt a fresh stab of unease; something troubled her, something she couldn’t identify, something about Dendy’s story that didn’t fit in. Suddenly she knew what it was, and stopped so abruptly that he almost cannoned against her.

  “Why, what is it?” he exclaimed, “have you seen a snake?”

  Though snakes at this time of the year and this hour of the night were unlikely enough.

  She turned to him and in the torchlight he saw that her face was sheet-white. Like a corpse, he thought, like a corpse.

  “Dendy,” she said, “answer me something. Why didn’t you tell the sergeant about the button when he was asking questions this morning.”

  “And have him come down to the cottage, scaring the life out of you?”

  “Not if you were with him,” she insisted. “And me on piece-work? Be careful, my dear, or you�
�ll be persuading yourself I do know something about Bette’s death.”

  That ashen face still stared into his. “Dendy, you didn’t do it? You didn’t know her better than you say?”

  “If you’ve any doubts, Mary, you can tell the police when they come.” His voice was quite calm. Then suddenly it changed again. “Well, I’m jiggered. If we haven’t walked straight into the can of milk, and not even upset. There, under that bush—see.”

  She turned, stooping to look where he pointed. In a flash he had dropped the torch into his pocket and seizing the ends of her stout woolen scarf had drawn them tight—tighter. Her weight fell against him, but didn’t struggle as last night’s victim had done, being smaller and taken by surprise. In the darkness he couldn’t see her face, and the cry she would have uttered was smothered in her throat. There was another sound, though, a long warning hoot, and his heart jumped into his mouth. But it was only a passing owl, and birds can’t speak, birds can’t speak.

  He left her there in the dark, knowing she’d not be found before morning, and before then, long before, he’d have put out the alarm. Easy to see what the police would think—that she’d encountered last night’s killer on the way back—a maniac, maybe—they’d never suspect the truth. On the way home, he took the button and flung it into the heart of a nest of briars. It could lie there undetected till Judgment Day.

  It was a chilly night, but by the time he reached the cottage he was in a lather of sweat. He’d never intended to go to these lengths, and he told himself fiercely it was Mary’s own fault. If she hadn’t gone mucking about with the coat she’d never have set eyes on the button that unaccountably he’d forgotten, what with the up-and-downer they’d had on his return. When he’d picked it up the night before there’d been no thought in his mind of doing Bette harm. They’d been wrestling and tugging in a loverlike way for, no doubt of it, he was over the moon with love for her. He’d never have offered her a ring, mind you, but she excited him, did something Mary had never done; she was like a potion in his blood, he couldn’t free his senses of her. And she’d sworn he was the only one, the only one, and then last night she’d teased and taunted, till she let on he was only one of a string, and half not knowing what he did he’d caught her gay blue scarf...

  He shuddered. When he came back this evening and saw the button on the table, he knew there was only one thing to be done now. He couldn’t afford to let Mary live; sooner or later she’d let a word slip and it ’ud be curtains for him. She was a quiet one, true, but she’d showed him last night she could fire up like a Chinese cracker, and Dendy Arthur was a man that loved his life.

  Rags was barking fit to burst when he got back. “Stop that!” he shouted, flinging open the door. The little terrier shot past him into the dark. Dendy called him but he paid no heed, and really it was best he should go, all of a piece with the story he, Dendy, was going to tell.

  He put on the kettle to make some tea, then remembered there was no milk. He looked at his watch. Wait a while longer before raising the alarm. If there’d been a spark of life left in Mary, give it time to sink and die.

  A doctor called Osborne was driving from Amberville to Bowton Hill about an hour later when his attention was caught by the persistent frantic barking of a dog. He put his foot on the brake.

  “The brute’s lost,” he remarked. “Give me the torch, Andy.”

  His companion looked amazed. “You’re never going to search for a lost dog on a night like this? You might as well look for a fish knife in a garbage dump.”

  Osborne said tersely, “I lost a dog of my own once. Heard him barking, like this one, and thought he was simply after a rabbit and ’ud come back on his own when he was through. The next morning-next morning, mark you—a farm-hand found him with his foot in a trap. The foot was practically wrenched off. I had to shoot him, of course. I’ll not take a second chance.”

  He went off in the direction of the barking, and sooner than Andrew Foot anticipated, his voice came booming through the dark.

  “Andy, here, quick. Give me a hand.”

  Hurrying up, Foot found the doctor holding the collar of a small frantic dog, whose color was indistinguishable in the darkness.

  “There’s a body here,” said Osborne grimly. “A woman. Unless I’m much mistaken, it’s a case of murder. Where’s the nearest telephone?”

  Being strangers, they knew nothing of the box at the crossroads, but Andrew recalled the farm they’d passed not long since, and he volunteered to take the car and drive back. They’d be sure to have a line there.

  “Take the dog with you,” Osborne suggested. “Maybe someone ’ull recognize him. And tell the police not to waste any time. It’s as cold as Christmas, and one corpse at a time is plenty.”

  “Eh, that’s Rags,” exclaimed Mrs. Jones, when Andrew marched in. “Mary Arthur’s dog. She was here this afternoon, poor lass. I warned her about going back alone, but she wouldn’t heed. Did you say dead?”

  Andrew nodded. “My friend, who found her, thanks to this fellow, is a doctor. I must get the police.”

  While they waited for the authorities Andrew asked, “Has she a husband?”

  “Ay, Dendy Arthur. He’ll be wondering where she is. Everyone knows Mary don’t like being out alone after dark.”

  And, indeed, the police had only just arrived when there was yet another pull at the bell and Dendy himself came in.

  “Have you got my Mary here, Mrs. Jones?” he asked, as she opened the door. “Evening, Ruby. Evening, Bob. Oh, you’ve company, I see.”

  “What made you think your wife might be here?” asked the sergeant.

  “It was just a hunch. I saw there’d been a spill with the milk and the can’s missing, and the dog, too, so I did my piece of arithmetic and guessed she’d come along up, and maybe you’d told her about Bette Rose.” He spoke to Mrs. Jones rather than the policeman.

  “She came all right,” said Mrs. Jones. “We told her about poor Bette...”

  He was staring from one face to another. “Well, she’s here still, isn’t she? Why, what’s this ...?”

  “I begged her to wait till Bob could bring her back, but she wouldn’t be told. Said she had the dog.”

  Rags, who had been out at the back having a drink of water, here nosed the door open.

  “Where’s your mistress?” Dendy demanded.

  Rags stood back, one forepaw lifted.

  “It’s bad news, Mr. Arthur,” said the sergeant. “You’d best come along with us in Mr. Foot’s car, if he’ll be so kind. They’ve took your Mary to the hospital, but . .

  “No,” said Dendy, in a voice of controlled violence. “It can’t be true.”

  “True enough, Dendy. Mrs. Arthur had been set on, the same as poor Bette last night, and I don’t doubt by the same fellow. If it hadn’t been for Rags here she’d not have been found till daybreak.”

  Dendy drew the dog’s chain from his pocket and stopped to secure the little beast. For once he was glad of the awkward catch, it gave him a chance to hide his face.

  He was still fumbling when the telephone rang. The sergeant took the call. “What’s that? Not...? A chance? Yes, the husband’s here. I’ll tell him. We’ll be right along.”

  He hung up the receiver. “That was the hospital, Mr. Arthur. And good news, we hope. That chap was in too much of a hurry, or maybe the dog frightened him. Mary’s not dead. Oh, it’s only a chance and they think she may not remember what happened...”

  “Not dead?” repeated Dendy. His voice was as dazed as a sea-mist. “Would she have seen the chap, do you think?”

  “There’s no knowing. Come, we’d best be getting along.”

  Dendy looked down at the little dog. “It’s a pity you can’t talk,” he said. “Then you might be able to tell us something about this chap who goes around murdering women.”

  There was a new sound in the room, a sound so shocking it horrified them all. Someone was laughing. It was the town-bred girl, Ruby Jones. Mrs. Jones cau
ght her arm.

  “What’s come over you, Ruby? Are you out of your head? Laughing at a minute like this.”

  But her face betrayed no shame. Instead, she lifted her hand and pointed at Dendy and the dog.

  “Maybe he can,” she declared. “Maybe we won’t have to rely on what Mary remembers or don’t remember. For there’s one thing I recall, and Mother here will back me up. When Mary was along for the milk, she had that dog’s chain in her pocket. She stopped and put it on his collar, and we all saw the awkward clasp. So how does it come to be in your hands now, Dendy Arthur, if you didn’t see Mary after she left the farm?”

  They hanged Dendy Arthur for the murder of Bette Rose. One wonders if he remembered his own words as they led him out to die.

  “You’ll be the death of me,” he’d said to the little dog, Rags.

  And so he was.

  The Withered Heart

  JEAN POTTS

  At the sound of the car turning into the driveway, Voss was instantly, thoroughly, awake. Not even a split second of fuzziness. His mind clicked at once into precise, unhurried action, just as it had last night. He sat up on the edge of his bed—Myrtle’s, of course, was empty—and reached for his watch. It was only a quarter to eight.

  Already? he thought as the car stopped in the driveway. He had not expected anyone quite so soon. Not that it mattered; he was ready any time.

  He waited for the next sound, which would be someone knocking on the screen door of the veranda. The bedroom seemed to wait too, breathlessly quiet, except for the whir of the electric fan, tirelessly churning up the sluggish air. The heat—the relentless South American heat—shoved in past the flimsy slats of the window blinds. Even now, in the early morning, there was no escape from its pounding glare. He ought to be used to it; he had been here long enough. More than ten years stagnating in this unspeakable climate, in this forsaken backwater where nothing ever happened except the heat...