The Body in the Dumb River

by George Bellairs

  Littlejohn drew up a chair and sat beside the couch.

  ‘Where was I?’

  ‘You said Ryder talked about moving into the best bedroom.’

  The ambulance men looked on wide-eyed. They hadn’t expected this. Now and then they officiated at a death-bed scene or a confession. But a murderer telling how he did it! This was something worth listening to. They strained to catch every word.

  The mention of Ryder’s impudence revived Scott-Harris. He raised himself on his elbow, his chest heaving, his eyes savage.

  ‘Yes. It wasn’t till I was alone that the full meanin’ of what Ryder said dawned on me. He thought he’d got me properly in his clutches and was goin’ to levy blackmail till he was the master and I was the servant. I had to think a way out. I couldn’t tolerate that. At first, I thought I’d better see my solicitor and if necessary, go to the police. On Tuesday night, Ryder came in the room and started to set the table for a meal. He laid two places…’

  Scott-Harris’s lips trembled and he gasped for breath.

  ‘I told him to damn’ well unlay one of them. He just smiled and did nothin’. So I gathered up the extra cups, plates, and the rest and chucked ’em in the hearth. Do you know what he said? “That’ll cost you another hundred quid, Major. I don’t take any more domineering from you. You’ve got to pay up for it, or else take the consequences.”’

  He turned to Littlejohn a bit pathetically.

  ‘I’m a hot-tempered man, Littlejohn. Can’t help it. It’s my nature. I just took hold of Ryder by the throat and shook him till his damned false teeth rattled. I couldn’t let the little rat go; I wanted to choke him. There was a cold pie on the table with a small carver beside it. Ryder struggled a bit and then took up the knife and struck me. I felt the blade enter my chest, but I had no pain at the time. The blood spurted out and that maddened me more. I held him by both arms and forced him into the hall. I really don’t know yet why I did that. He still had the knife and was trying to stab me again. I can see his silly little frightened face full of panic and wild with fear. He thought his last minute had come. I guess it was just the route our struggles took us… Out into the hall, and there I saw the cellar door open. Ryder must have been down. I keep some port there and I could smell it on his breath as we fought. He’d been celebratin’.”

  He looked at the circle of faces round him.

  ‘I don’t mind you all listenin’. It makes no difference now. Where’s the doctor?’

  The doctor, a tall Scotsman with a long rugged face, turned from examining one of the large pictures on the wall, a still-life with pheasants surrounded by tomatoes and onions.

  ‘I’m here, Major.’

  ‘I’ve nearly finished. Sorry to keep you like this, but I must get it off my chest in case I don’t come through.’

  Unusually polite for Scott-Harris, but then the whole affair was unusual. You didn’t know what was coming next.

  ‘The open cellar door… That’s what I was sayin’, wasn’t it? Well, I just pushed him along, gripping his two arms to keep the knife away and chucked him down the cellar steps. I heard him hit the bottom and then it all went quiet. I felt too ill to go down and see what had happened. I’d never have got back up the stairs again. I just locked the door. Since then, I’ve looked down with a light. He’s still there, just as he was when he fell. He’s dead.’

  Littlejohn could see it all again. The little blackmailer giving the major enough punishment to kill a normal man, but the great corpulent balloon resisted, surrounded him, rendered him helpless, and flung him into the darkness. He stood up and bent over the old man. He couldn’t help the compassion in his voice as he spoke.

  ‘And you cleared out his room and threw all his things on top of him. It made it seem as if he’d run away, didn’t it?’

  ‘That’s right. I had in mind buryin’ the body and the rest somewhere in the garden later, but my strength went gradually and I’d not enough energy to do it. That’s all.’

  Scott-Harris allowed Littlejohn to push him gently back on the couch. He seemed quite sober now. He was all in, a poor old thing with swollen legs and a body almost like an elephant.

  Steps along the path, and suddenly Elvira entered. She came in, panting, halted in the middle of the room, gave a dazed look round, and then put her hand dramatically over her heart.

  ‘They said the ambulance had come to take Father away…’

  Her eyes were fixed on the couch.

  ‘Father!’

  But she didn’t approach any nearer. She seemed held back by something, probably fear.

  ‘What is it?’ she asked the doctor.

  Nobody answered.

  The grandfather clock ticked on, the two ambulance men looked at one another and seemed inspired by the same thought. They’d no business there. They tiptoed out. The shoes of one of them squeaked and seemed to make a fearful row in the silence.

  Elvira remained in the middle of the room, her hands gripping her bag. She didn’t know what to say.

  It was all over. The case had worked itself out. The only thing to do now was to wait. The puzzle had fallen into shape. Elvira waiting for the money her mother had left tied up during Scott-Harris’s lifetime. The three girls, Elvira, Phoebe, and Chloe, hoping the old man would soon die. And Elvira suddenly faced with a chance to speed his end.

  The major slowly opened his eyes and saw her.

  ‘Oh, it’s you, is it? A nice mess you’ve landed me in. Why didn’t you tell the truth, instead of taking Ryder’s part. You knew I’d never have murdered Jimmie.’

  Littlejohn gently pushed him down again.

  ‘Don’t excite yourself, sir. You’ll make yourself ill.’

  ‘Leave me alone, Littlejohn. I’m speakin’ to Elvira. Listen. You think the old chap’s goin’ to snuff it, don’t you? Well, I’m not. I’ll be a model patient when I get to the hospital. I’ll do all they tell me, and more. I’m goin’ to live to eighty, or even ninety, just for the pleasure of seein’ you poor and needin’ money. When the girls are married, you’ll be alone, and you’ll have no Jimmie bringin’ in the money from his hoop-la. You’ll have to come beggin’ to me…’

  He shouted it in a hoarse voice. Then he sank back and closed his eyes. He seemed to be smiling to himself as though he were enjoying a good joke.

  ‘You can come and live here then and take Ryder’s job. Look after your old dad. It’ll brighten the place up to have some young blood about.’

  He said it with his eyes closed and actually laughed.

  ‘I’m ready, doctor.’

  The ambulance men came back and carried him off.

  Elvira did not move. Her nostrils had grown pinched and she looked years older. Her face had turned yellow and her eyes had sunk in their dark orbits. Then she fainted.

  It provided a bit of relief reviving her. Finally, she sat moaning on the couch.

  ‘Is he badly ill?’

  Nobody answered. There were only three of them there now. Littlejohn, Cromwell, and Naizbitt. They didn’t know how it was going to end.

  Littlejohn stood with his hands in his pockets, his pipe in his mouth.

  ‘We’ll take you home in the police car…’

  She looked up at him, fear in her face.

  ‘You knew Ryder killed your husband?’

  ‘I didn’t know. I thought it was Father. He said he’d kill him.’

  ‘But you didn’t give your father the benefit of the doubt.’

  ‘Ryder said Father did it…’

  ‘Knowing Ryder, how could you believe him against your father’s word?’

  ‘I… I…’

  ‘Let’s go.’

  Major Scott-Harris took a long time to recover, but he kept his word. He was a model patient and in the end, it looked as if he’d see eighty, with a bit of looking after. Finally, about
six months after the crimes, he appeared in court on a charge of manslaughter. He was in a wheel-chair, hadn’t touched alcohol since admitted to hospital, and put up a good show. A helpless, forsaken old man. The jury sympathised with him and he was acquitted.

  Elvira came out of it badly. Her knowledge of her husband’s death was against her, but she said to the end that she knew nothing about the disposal of his body. Or of Ryder’s death. A plea of mental breakdown arising out of her husband’s murder got her off.

  During the long wait to the trial, Teasdale’s three daughters left home. Irene wed the bookie, Barbara married her doctor and went to live in Edinburgh, and Christine eloped to Canada with the dentist, who had a wife already. Elvira, in spite of her pleading, was left alone in the shop. On her father’s return to Rangoon, she followed him, as he’d predicted, to keep house for him. Scott-Harris said when she arrived, that the public trial and airing of the family secrets was his insurance policy. Elvira daren’t try to hasten his end; the police had their eyes on her. He’s having an easy time, now, with everything done for him. Littlejohn often wonders how long the trio of sisters will have to wait for their inheritance. Elvira, Phoebe, and Chloe.