An Untidy Death

by Simon Brett

  But the face had taken a vicious battering. It looked like that of a boxer just before the fight was stopped. His eyebrows were split and swollen. So were his lips. His nose was a shapeless mass, like butcher’s meat. The backs of his hands were cut and bloody, presumably from attempts to protect himself.

  The beam of my headlights glinted on the fresh blood but also on the eyes whose lashes flickered. Which told me he was alive.

  ‘Dodge,’ I whispered, ‘are you all right?’

  Even as I said the words, I realized what a stupid question it was. I had only to look at him to see that he was far from all right.

  ‘Been better.’ The reply cheered me. Not only did it prove he was conscious, it also had an edge of humour to it. I also realized that, because of his limited mobility, Dodge was actually looking me in the eye. For the first time in our relationship. So that’s what it took.

  ‘Has Mary called an ambulance?’ I asked.

  ‘No, I told her not to.’

  ‘But, Dodge, you’re in no state—’

  ‘I don’t want to get caught up in the system,’ he said, in a voice that brooked no argument.

  I didn’t like leaving Mary Griffin on her own, but Dodge’s need was greater. He winced with pain as I got him upright but did not allow himself to cry out. Then I manhandled him into the back of the Yeti, having first covered the seats with a waterproof sheet. (My car’s well used to carrying messy detritus, so I’m equipped for most eventualities. Fortunately, the threat to its upholstery is not often blood.)

  Telling Dodge I wouldn’t be long, I went to check on Mary. She was still in a terrible state but I managed to get from her that she hadn’t actually witnessed the attack. Dodge had arrived early evening with a desk he’d made for Amy, again decorated with Frozen stickers. Mary had offered him something to eat or a drink, but he’d refused and said he had to get back.

  It was only when she’d gone upstairs to check Amy was asleep that she’d seen the Morris Tipper was still parked outside and gone to investigate. Her first instinct had been to call for an ambulance, but Dodge had managed to persuade her against the idea, just as he had me. So, she knew he wasn’t dead. What she’d said to me on the phone was a by-product of hysteria.

  The reason for that hysteria was her conviction that her husband had attacked Dodge. I tried to persuade her that was impossible because Craig was locked up in prison, but her mind wasn’t receptive to logic.

  I asked if she’d got anyone, family, or friend, who could come to sit with her, but there wasn’t anyone. As is so often the case with coercive partners, Craig Griffin’s controlling jealousy had made her cut off all contacts of that kind. I found myself wondering whether Walt would do the same for Alexandra. But then I hadn’t got the impression she had much of a social circle, anyway.

  All I could do was to tell Mary Griffin to make sure the house was securely locked up. I said I’d ring in the morning.

  By the time I got back to the Yeti, Dodge had fallen asleep. Probably best thing for him. He’d mumbled as I got him into the car that he wanted me to drive back to his place, but there was no way I was going to do that. Not until I’d checked the extent of his injuries, anyway. If they were really bad, I was determined to overrule his resistance to calling an ambulance. I had no desire for him to die on me.

  His body had stiffened up on the drive to Chichester and he was clearly in a lot of pain as I manoeuvred him into the house. But the fact that he could stand and move, albeit with difficulty, suggested no bones were broken.

  As he leant against me in the hall, he said, ‘I asked you to take me back to my place.’

  ‘I know you did. But there’s no way I’m going to do that until I’ve cleaned you up a bit.’

  Fear sparked in his eyes as he said, ‘While I was asleep in the car, you didn’t call an ambulance, did you?’

  I reassured him that I hadn’t. ‘Dodge, do you think you can make it up the stairs to the bathroom?’

  ‘I can try.’

  It was hard, and I was glad of the fitness that constantly moving cardboard boxes about had given me. The blood had stopped flowing so my carpets didn’t suffer much. Not that I would have minded if they had. I like the house to be clean but I’m not obsessive about it. That’s a gene I don’t have, though Jools does. Everywhere she lives is almost antiseptically tidy. Another point of difference between mother and daughter.

  I got Dodge to the bathroom and ran hot water into the basin. I produced towels from the airing cupboard and laid one on the floor. ‘It’ll get filthy,’ he protested.

  ‘That’s what towels are for. Come on, let’s get everything off and see the damage.’

  Removing his clothes, I was as gentle as I could be. Getting his trainers off was easy. Next the socks, which were thick with blood. Jeans no problem, belt, and zip. Underneath he wore old-fashioned white Y-fronts, also spattered with blood.

  But getting his sweatshirt over his battered head was going to be trickier. I reached for a pair of hairdressing scissors which I sometimes use to tidy up my fringe. ‘Going to be easier to cut you out of this.’

  ‘Don’t you dare,’ said Dodge, characteristically putting the health of the planet above his own comfort. ‘There’s still years of wear in that sweatshirt.’

  Obediently, I edged it up over his head. Then the T-shirt he wore underneath. Both had been washed so many times that it was impossible to guess at their original colour. Both were rusted with blood.

  The scraping of fabric against Dodge’s head wounds started some of them bleeding again. I looked at him in shock.

  There were few open wounds on the rest of his body, but it was a patchwork of swellings. Most were still red, but some had started to take on the darker discolouration of bruising. Thank God, a cursory examination seemed to confirm that no bones had been broken, though there might be fractures in his hands, which had been stamped on.

  Dodge stood still on the towel while, as delicately as I knew how, I used a face cloth to sponge him down, starting at the lacerated head. The cloth filled quickly with blood and I had to keep rinsing it.

  Dodge tensed when the wounds stung. He must have been in terrible pain, but still he did not cry out.

  I slipped off the bloodied Y-fronts to reveal swollen testicles which had undergone a fierce kicking. I could not imagine how great that pain was.

  It struck me, with perverse timing, that this was the first time since Oliver’s death that I’d been in a room with a naked adult man. Never had a situation felt less sexual.

  ‘Who did this to you, Dodge?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Who could possibly do this to another human being?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Whoever did it is still out there. And, God knows, quite capable of doing it to someone else. He must be stopped. We must call the police.’

  ‘No. I don’t want to get caught up in the system,’ Dodge repeated stubbornly.

  I finally persuaded him that, though he was desperate to be back in his own place, he was in no condition to travel any further that night. The bed was made up in Ben’s room (reflecting my slightly pathetic hope that he’d suddenly turn up one day). Dodge could stay there overnight. I promised I wouldn’t contact either medical or police services until we’d had a talk in the morning.

  Having cleaned him up, I was able to see more clearly the injuries to his head. They weren’t as bad as I’d feared – facial wounds do always produce a disproportionate amount of blood. There were a couple of gashes on his eyebrows which I thought might need stitches but I didn’t tell him that. He was at first unwilling to have plasters put on any of the cuts. Dodge believed in naturopathic medicine and didn’t like using anything produced by the pharmaceutical industry. I only persuaded him to have the plasters on by saying it was to protect Ben’s sheets and pillows.

  Dodge had the same reaction when I offered him a sleeping pill. I’d had some Zopiclone prescribed by my GP during those terrible months
after Oliver’s death. They were way beyond their expiry date but still might have helped him to sleep through the pain. But he rejected them, anyway.

  He also refused the offer of an alcoholic drink. The Merlot was still open and in a kitchen cupboard there was a bottle of whisky, another precaution in case my son suddenly appeared. Ben liked his whisky. Perhaps too much. I sometimes worried about his consumption of alcohol. Oliver had had his battles with the booze and Ben was like his father in so many other ways …

  I’d found Dodge an ancient pair of Ben’s pyjamas. Since he was a good eight inches taller than my son, they looked slightly ridiculous on him. But they did cover the worst of the bruises.

  We were still in the bathroom. Dodge said he could manage to get to Ben’s room on his own. He said he’d just have a pee and then go to bed. I hoped peeing wasn’t going to be too agonizing for him.

  As I gathered up the bloodied clothes, towels, and face cloth, he said, ‘Sorry to have made such a mess, Ellen.’

  It was long after midnight. I was tired but not yet ready for bed. I put everything of Dodge’s in the machine on a hot wash and sat down in the kitchen to drink the glass of Merlot I’d abandoned when Alexandra Richards rang, in what felt like another lifetime. Back then I’d put a saucer on it to keep off the flies and it still tasted fine.

  I took a long, grateful swallow and finally confronted the tangle of thoughts which had been building up in my mind.

  The beating-up of Dodge. The identity of his assailant. There was an unpleasant chain of logic developing there, which I didn’t want to confront.

  And, of course, Dodge’s unwillingness to get ‘caught up in the system’. That I’m sure was another reaction to the breakdown he’d had which had ended his career in the City. From the minimal information he had volunteered about that time, and from the fact that he now worked as a counsellor for a Portsmouth drug rehabilitation charity called ReProgramme, I reckoned drugs must have been involved. Which would explain his unwillingness to have anything to do with the police. But what his objection to the NHS was, I had no idea. Maybe he’d been scarred by some treatment he’d received and that had turned him against traditional medicine. I had no means of knowing.

  I still thought, given the savagery of the attack, the police should be informed. But that argument with Dodge could wait till the morning.

  Next on my disturbing thought list was the suspicion that Alexandra Richards might have had a hand in her mother’s death. A thought which had been uncomfortably around since I first heard the news of the fire in Brunswick Square. But which had been given more definite shape by what Niall Connor had said.

  With the suspicion came the unpleasant feeling that I might have been set up by Alexandra. That she had only contacted me so I could confirm to the police that Ingrid Richards lived in a firetrap. Which would have cast me in the unenviable role of a pawn in Alexandra’s game of murder.

  But, more powerful than all of these was my anxiety about Ben’s mental state. First and foremost, always, I am a mum. And, given the family history with Oliver …

  I knew I wouldn’t sleep unaided that night.

  I took one of the expired Zopiclones. It worked.

  It was a long time since I’d taken a sleeping pill and I woke up muzzy and disoriented. My first thought on hearing someone moving about downstairs was that I’d been burgled. Then the events of the previous evening came back to me. I slipped on my dressing gown and went down.

  Dodge was standing in the kitchen, supporting himself against the table. He looked ghastly, the paleness of his face emphasizing the bruises and cuts, from which he had removed the plasters. The redness of his injuries had turned overnight to a kaleidoscope of greens, yellows and purples. He was dressed in his own clothes, which meant he’d been up for long enough to take the washing out of the machine and tumble-dry it.

  When I entered the room, he looked away. That moment of eye contact we’d had when he was lying on the ground was not about to be repeated.

  ‘How’re you feeling?’ I asked.

  ‘Fine,’ he lied.

  ‘Did you get any sleep?’

  ‘A bit.’ Probably another lie. Then, urgently, ‘Can you take me back to my place?’

  ‘Now?’

  ‘As soon as you can.’

  ‘But I don’t want to leave you there in the state you’re in.’

  ‘Please!’

  I knew better than to argue with Dodge. It was something we had never done. I was aware that he was a complex of neuroses, some of which I began to understand. But I also knew of his suspicion – possibly even fear – of people. He was permanently uneasy in company, even my company. Though he was the least aggressive person I had ever met, I didn’t want to cross him. I valued his friendship far too much to put it at risk.

  ‘All right,’ I said. ‘Just let me put some clothes on. If you want anything to eat or drink …’

  ‘No, thanks.’

  I looked at his split and swollen lips. ‘Does it hurt too much to swallow?’

  ‘I’m fine,’ said Dodge, lying again.

  I could tell from his wincing how much the journey hurt. Bruising is always more painful on the second day. I tried to guide the Yeti as smoothly as possible but there were a lot of winter potholes that hadn’t been mended on the back roads to Walberton. Each one sent an agonizing shudder through him, but still Dodge didn’t cry out.

  I tried to get him to talk. ‘You’re sure about not seeing a doctor? I could take you to A & E at St Richard’s.’

  ‘No, thank you,’ he said. ‘I’ll sort myself out. I’ve got everything I need back at my place.’

  ‘Herbal stuff?’

  ‘Yes. Comfrey’s good. Also called “knit-bone”. Did you know that?’

  I confessed that I didn’t.

  ‘It works. I don’t think I’ve got any broken bones, but it’s also good as an anti-inflammatory. Inhibits infection too.’

  ‘Do you use arnica?’ I asked.

  ‘A bit, but I’ve found other things more effective.’

  ‘Like?’

  ‘Aloe vera, parsley … cabbage.’

  ‘Cabbage?’ I echoed in amazement.

  ‘Yes. The humble cabbage. Make compresses with it. Good for bruises.’

  The Yeti turned in the narrow track that led to his home. ‘Dodge,’ I said, ‘I’ve got to ask you. Do you have any idea who attacked you?’

  ‘No,’ he mumbled, avoiding eye contact more than ever.

  I couldn’t stop myself from saying, ‘It isn’t anything to do with drugs, is it?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Look, I know you’re involved in that ReProgramme thing in Portsmouth …’

  ‘Yes.’ It wasn’t something he liked to talk about.

  ‘Well, I just wondered if, through that, you might have got on the wrong side of some drug dealers or …’

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘The attack was nothing to do with that.’

  I brought the Yeti to a halt in the space between the house and the two corrugated-iron-roofed outbuildings. ‘Then what did it have to do with?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  I couldn’t tell whether that was the truth or not. ‘But surely you must want to know who did that to you …?’

  ‘No,’ he said.

  ‘You must be curious. Just to know his identity. I’m not talking about seeking revenge or—’

  ‘I don’t believe in revenge,’ he said.

  I was beginning to get quite angry with him. ‘Dodge, I’ve heard about turning the other cheek, but this is ridiculous. You can’t just accept a savage beating like that without wanting to know the reason for it.’

  ‘Shit happens.’ He began to shrug, then realized that the movement would be too painful. ‘I must get my van back,’ he said.

  ‘Yes, I’m sure I can sort out some way of doing that. If you give me the key …’

  ‘At least,’ he went on, as he handed the key over, ‘whoever it was didn’t touc
h the van. He probably didn’t realize it belonged to me.’

  I keep getting close to thinking I understand Dodge, and then he says something which instantly dismantles everything I’ve ever thought about him. Like what he just said then. It sounded as if he was more concerned about the survival of his 1951 Morris Commercial CV9/40 Tipper than he was about his own.

  Which, knowing Dodge – as I inadequately do – was entirely possible.

  I stopped in a layby on the A27 to call Mary Griffin. Things with her were as I had feared. She sounded more paranoid than ever.

  ‘It was Craig,’ she said.

  ‘What was Craig?’

  ‘Dodge. Craig did that.’

  ‘Mary, you know that’s impossible. Craig is in prison and he’s going to stay in prison for some time yet. You’re quite safe from him.’

  ‘No, I’m not.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘The man who attacked Dodge, he’d just come out of the same nick. Craig set him up to watch the house. He’d heard from someone that Dodge had been seen here. Only delivering furniture for Amy, but Craig was never going to believe that, was he? So, he set up this ex-con to give a beating to any man who came out of the house … and poor Dodge …’ She was overcome by hysterical tears.

  ‘Mary,’ I said, ‘maybe it’s time we called the police.’

  I was worried about betraying Dodge, but in fact Mary was even more against the idea than he had been. ‘No. Craig would find out! We mustn’t call the police!’

  ‘Are you sure Craig was behind the attack? Do you have any proof?’

  ‘He texted me.’

  ‘Craig? From the prison?’

  ‘Yes. God knows how he managed it.’

  ‘What did the text say?’

  Controlling her emotion, she read: ‘That’s what’ll happen to any other man you start seeing behind my back. You’re still my wife, Mary, and it’s about time you started behaving like my wife.’

  ‘Oh, Ellen,’ cried Mary Griffin, ‘I’m so terrified!’

  I saw it as soon as I opened the front door. A familiar backpack, slumped in the hall where he always chucked it. I ran upstairs and opened his door.