The Perfect Murder

by Ruskin Bond

  He was hospitalized on a diagnosis of gastroenteritis; and, thus freed from his wife’s ministrations, soon got better. But on returning home and drinking a glass of nimbu pani brought to him by the solicitous Mrs Browning, he had a relapse from which he did not recover.

  Those were the days when deaths from cholera and related diseases were only too common in India, and death certificates were easier to obtain than dog licences.

  After a short interval of mourning (it was the hot weather and you couldn’t wear black for long), Mrs Browning moved to Agra, where she rented a house next door to William Jones.

  I forgot to mention that Mr Jones was also married. His wife was an insignificant creature, no match for a genius like William. Before the hot weather was over, the dreaded cholera had taken her too. The way was clear for the lovers to unite in holy matrimony.

  But Dame Gossip lived in Agra too, and it was not long before tongues were wagging and anonymous letters were being received by the Superintendent of Police. Enquiries were instituted. Like most infatuated lovers, Mrs Browning had hung on to her beloved’s letters and billet-doux, and these soon came to light. The silly woman had kept them in a box beneath her bed.

  Exhumations were ordered in both Agra and Meerut.

  Arsenic keeps well, even in the hottest of weather, and there was no dearth of it in the remains of both victims.

  Mr Jones and Mrs Browning were arrested and charged with murder.

  ‘Is Uncle Bill really a murderer?’ I asked from the drawing-room sofa in my grandmother’s house in Dehra. (It’s time that I told you that William Jones was my uncle, my mother’s half-brother.)

  I was eight or nine at the time. Uncle Bill had spent the previous summer with us in Dehra and had stuffed me with bazaar sweets and pastries, all of which I had consumed without suffering any ill effects.

  ‘Who told you that about Uncle Bill?’ asked Grandmother.

  ‘I heard it in school. All the boys were asking me the same question—“Is your uncle a murderer?” They say he poisoned both his wives.’

  ‘He had only one wife,’ snapped Aunt Mabel.

  ‘Did he poison her?’

  ‘No, of course not. How can you say such a thing!’

  ‘Then why is Uncle Bill in gaol?’

  ‘Who says he’s in gaol?’

  ‘The boys at school. They heard it from their parents. Uncle Bill is to go on trial in the Agra fort.’

  There was a pregnant silence in the drawing room, then Aunt Mabel burst out: ‘It was all that awful woman’s fault.’

  ‘Do you mean Mrs Browning?’ asked Grandmother.

  ‘Yes, of course. She must have put him up to it. Bill couldn’t have thought of anything so-so diabolical!’

  ‘But he sent her the powders, clear. And don’t forget—Mrs Browning has since…’

  Grandmother stopped in mid-sentence, and both she and Aunt Mabel glanced surreptitiously at me.

  ‘Committed suicide,’ I filled in. ‘There were still some powders with her.’

  Aunt Mabel’s eyes rolled heavenwards. ‘This boy is impossible. I don’t know what he will be like when he grows up.’

  ‘At least I won’t be like Uncle Bill,’ I said. ‘Fancy poisoning people! If I kill anyone, it will be in a fair fight. I suppose they’ll hang Uncle?’

  ‘Oh, I hope not!’

  Grandmother was silent. Uncle Bill was her stepson but she did have a soft spot for him. Aunt Mabel, his sister, thought he was wonderful. I had always considered him to be a bit soft but had to admit that he was generous. I tried to imagine him dangling at the end of a hangman’s rope, but somehow he didn’t fit the picture.

  As things turned out, he didn’t hang. White people in India seldom got the death sentence, although he hangman was pretty busy disposing off dacoits and political terrorists. Uncle Bill was given a life sentence and settled down to a sedentary job in the prison library at Naini, near Allahabad. His gifts as a male nurse went unappreciated; they did not trust him in the hospital.

  He was released after seven or eight years, shortly after the country became an independent Republic. He came out of gaol to find that the British were leaving, either for England or the remaining colonies. Grandmother was dead. Aunt Mabel and her husband had settled in South Africa. Uncle Bill realized that there was little future for him in India and followed his sister out to Johannesburg. I was in my last year at boarding school. After my father’s death, my mother had married an Indian, and now my future lay in India.

  I did not see Uncle Bill after his release from prison, and no one dreamt that he would ever turn up again in India.

  In fact, fifteen years were to pass before he came back, and by then I was in my early thirties, the author of a book that had become something of a bestseller. The previous fifteen years had been a struggle—the sort of struggle that every young freelance writer experiences—but at last the hard work was paying off and the royalties were beginning to come in.

  I was living in a small cottage on the outskirts of the hill-station of Fosterganj, working on another book, when I received an unexpected visitor.

  He was a thin, stooped, grey-haired man in his late fifties, with a straggling moustache and discoloured teeth. He looked feeble and harmless but for his eyes which were pale cold blue. There was something slightly familiar about him.

  ‘Don’t you remember me? he asked. Not that I really expect you to, after all these years…’

  ‘Wait a minute. Did you teach me at school?’

  ‘No—but you’re getting warm.’ He put his suitcase down and I glimpsed his name on the airlines label. I looked up in astonishment. ‘You’re not—you couldn’t be…’

  ‘Your Uncle Bill,’ he said with a grin and extended his hand. ‘None other!’ And he sauntered into the house.

  I must admit that I had mixed feelings about his arrival. While I had never felt any dislike for him, I hadn’t exactly approved of what he had done. Poisoning, I felt, was a particularly reprehensible way of getting rid of inconvenient people: not that I could think of any commendable ways of getting rid of them! Still, it had happened a long time ago, he’d been punished, and presumably he was a reformed character.

  ‘And what have you been doing all these years?’ he asked me, easing himself into the only comfortable chair in the room.

  ‘Oh just writing,’ I said.

  ‘Yes, I heard about your last book. It’s quite a success, isn’t it?’

  ‘It’s doing quite well. Have you read it?’

  ‘I don’t do much reading.’

  ‘And what have you been doing all these years, Uncle Bill?’

  ‘Oh, knocking about here and there. Worked for a soft drink company for some time. And then with a drug firm. My knowledge of chemicals was useful.’

  ‘Weren’t you with Aunt Mabel in South Africa?’

  ‘I saw quite a lot of her, until she died a couple of years ago. Didn’t you know?’

  ‘No. I’ve been out of touch with relatives.’ I hoped he’d take that as a hint. ‘And what about her husband?’

  ‘Died too, not long after. Not many of us left, my boy. That’s why, when I saw something about you in the papers, I thought—why not go and see my only nephew again?’

  ‘You’re welcome to stay a few days,’ I said quickly. ‘Then I have to go to Bombay.’ (This was a lie, but I did not relish the prospect of looking after Uncle Bill for the rest of his days.)

  ‘Oh, I won’t be staying long,’ he said. ‘I’ve got a bit of money put by in Johannesburg. It’s just that—so far as I know—you’re my only living relative, and I thought it would be nice to see you again.’

  Feeling relieved, I set about trying to make Uncle Bill as comfortable as possible. I gave him my bedroom and turned the window-seat into a bed for myself. I was a hopeless cook but, using all my ingenuity, I scrambled some eggs for supper. He waved aside my apologies; he’d always been a frugal eater, he said. Eight years in gaol had given him a cast-iron stomach
.

  He did not get in my way but left me to my writing and my lonely walks. He seemed content to sit in the spring sunshine and smoke his pipe.

  It was during our third evening together that he said, ‘Oh, I almost forgot. There’s a bottle of sherry in my suitcase. I brought it especially for you.’

  ‘That was very thoughtful of you, Uncle Bill. How did you know I was fond of sherry?’

  ‘Just my intuition. You do like it, don’t you?’

  ‘There’s nothing like a good sherry.’

  He went to his bedroom and came back with an unopened bottle of South African sherry.

  ‘Now you just relax near the fire,’ he said agreeably. ‘I’ll open the bottle and fetch glasses.’

  He went to the kitchen while I remained near the electric fire, flipping through some journals. It seemed to me that Uncle Bill was taking rather a long time. Intuition must be a family trait, because it came to me quite suddenly—the thought that Uncle Bill might be intending to poison me.

  After all, I thought, here he is after nearly fifteen years, apparently for purely sentimental reasons. But I had just published a bestseller. And I was his nearest relative. If I was to die, Uncle Bill could lay claim to my estate and probably live comfortably on my royalties for the next five or six years!

  What had really happened to Aunt Mabel and her husband, I wondered. And where did Uncle Bill get the money for an air ticket to India?

  Before I could ask myself any more questions, he reappeared with the glasses on a tray. He set the tray on a small table that stood between us. The glasses had been filled. The sherry sparkled.

  I stared at the glass nearest me, trying to make out if the liquid in it was cloudier than that in the other glass. But there appeared to be no difference.

  I decided I would not take any chances. It was a round tray, made of smooth Kashmiri walnut wood. I turned it round with lily index finger, so that the glasses changed places.

  ‘Why did you do that?’ asked Uncle Bill.

  ‘It’s a custom in these parts. You turn the tray with the sun, a complete revolution. It brings good luck.’

  Uncle Bill looked thoughtful for a few moments, then said, ‘Well, let’s have some more luck,’ and turned the tray around again.

  ‘Now you’ve spoilt it,’ I said. ‘You’re not supposed to keep revolving it! That’s bad luck. I’ll have to turn it about again to cancel out the bad luck.’

  The tray swung round once more, and Uncle Bill had the glass that was meant for me.

  ‘Cheers!’ I said, and drank from my glass. It was good sherry.

  Uncle Bill hesitated. Then he shrugged, said ‘Cheers’, and drained his glass quickly.

  But he did not offer to fill the glasses again.

  Early next morning he was taken violently ill. I heard him retching in his room, and I got up and went to see if there was anything I could do. He was groaning, his head hanging over the side of the bed. I brought him a basin and a jug of water.

  ‘Would you like me to fetch a doctor?’ I asked.

  He shook his head. ‘No I’ll be all right. It must be something I ate.’

  ‘It’s probably the water. It’s not too good at this time of the year. Many people come down with gastric trouble during their first few days in Fosterganj.’

  ‘Ah, that must be it,’ he said, and doubled up as a fresh spasm of pain and nausea swept over him.

  He was better by evening—whatever had gone into the glass must have been by way of the preliminary dose and a day later he was well enough to pack his suitcase and announce his departure. The climate of Fosterganj did not agree with him, he told me.

  Just before he left, I said; ‘Tell me, Uncle, why did you drink it?’

  ‘Drink what? The water?’

  ‘No, the glass of sherry into which you’d slipped one of your famous powders.’

  He gaped at me, then gave a nervous whinnying laugh. ‘You will have your little joke, won’t you?’

  ‘No, I mean it,’ I said. ‘Why did you drink the stuff? It was meant for me, of course.’

  He looked down at his shoes, then gave a little shrug and turned away.

  ‘In the circumstances,’ he said, ‘it seemed the only decent thing to do.’

  I’ll say this for Uncle Bill: he was always the perfect gentleman.

  THE INTERRUPTION

  W.W. Jacobs

  The last of the funeral guests had gone, and Spencer Goddard, in decent black, sat alone in his small, well-furnished study. There was a queer sense of freedom in the house since the coffin had left it; the coffin which was now hidden in its solitary grave beneath the yellow earth. The air, which for the last three days had seemed stale and contaminated, now smelt fresh and clean. He went to the open window and, looking into the fading light of the autumn day, took a deep breath.

  He closed the window and, stooping down, put a match to the fire, and, dropping into his easy chair, sat listening to the cheery crackle of the wood. At the age of thirty-eight he had turned over a fresh page. Life, free and unencumbered, was before him. His dead wife’s money was at last his, to spend as he pleased instead of being doled out in reluctant driblets.

  He turned at a step at the door, and his face assumed the appearance of gravity and sadness it had worn for the last four days. The cook, with the same air of decorous grief, entered the room quietly and, crossing to the mantelpiece, placed upon it a photograph.

  ‘I thought you’d like to have it, sir.’ She said, in a low voice, ‘to remind you.’

  Goddard thanked her, and, rising, took it in his hand and stood regarding it. He noticed with satisfaction that his hand was absolutely steady.

  ‘It is a very good likeness—till she was taken ill,’ continued the woman. ‘I never saw anybody change so sudden.’

  ‘The nature of her disease, Hannah,’ said her master.

  The woman nodded, and, dabbing at her eyes with her handkerchief, stood regarding him.

  ‘Is there anything you want?’ he inquired, after a time.

  She shook her head. ‘I can’t believe she’s gone,’ she said, in a low voice. ‘Every now and then I have a queer feeling that she’s still here—’

  ‘It’s your nerves,’ said her master sharply.

  ‘—and wanting to tell me something.’

  By a great effort Goddard refrained from looking at her.

  ‘Nerves,’ he said again. ‘Perhaps, you ought to have a little holiday. It has been a great strain upon you.’

  ‘You, too, sir,’ said the woman respectfully. ‘Waiting on her hand and foot as you have done, I can’t think how you stood it. If you’d only had a nurse—’

  ‘I preferred to do it myself, Hannah,’ said her master. ‘If I had had a nurse it would have alarmed her.’

  The woman assented. ‘And, they are always peeking and prying into that doesn’t concern them,’ she added. ‘Always think they know more than the doctors do.’

  Goddard turned a slow look upon her. The tall, angular figure was standing in an attitude of respectful attention; the cold, slaty-brown eyes were cast down, the sullen face expressionless.

  ‘She couldn’t have had a better doctor,’ he said, looking at the fire again. ‘No man could have done more for her.’

  ‘And, nobody could have done more for her than you did, sir,’ was the reply. ‘There’s few husbands that would have done what you did.’

  Goddard stiffened in his chair. ‘That will do, Hannah,’ he said curtly.

  ‘Or, done it so well,’ said the woman, with measured slowness.

  With a strange, sinking sensation, her master paused to regain his control. Then he turned and eyed her steadily. ‘Thank you,’ he said slowly; ‘you mean well, but at present I cannot discuss it.’

  For some time after the door had closed behind her he sat in deep thought. The feeling of well-being of a few minutes before had vanished, leaving in its place an apprehension which he refused to consider, but which would not be allayed. He t
hought over his actions of the last few weeks, carefully, and could remember no flaw. His wife’s illness, the doctor’s diagnosis, his own solicitous care, were all in keeping with the ordinary. He tried to remember the woman’s exact words—her manner. Something had shown him Fear. What?

  He could have laughed at his fears next morning. The dining-room was full of sunshine and the fragrance of coffee and bacon was in the air. Better still, a worried and commonplace Hannah. Worried over two eggs with false birth-certificates, over the vendor of which she became almost lyrical.

  ‘The bacon is excellent,’ said her smiling master, ‘so is the coffee; but your coffee always is.’

  Hannah smiled in return, and, taking fresh eggs from a rosy-cheeked maid, put them before him.

  A pipe, followed by a brisk walk, cheered him still further. He cane home glowing with exercise and again possessed with that sense of freedom and freshness. He went into the garden—now his own—planned alterations.

  After lunch he went over the house. The windows of his wife’s bedroom were open and the room neat and airy. His glance wandered from the made-up bed to the brightly-polished furniture. Then he went to the dressing-table and opened the drawers, searching each in turn. With the exception of a few odds and ends they were empty. He went out on to the landing and called for Hannah.

  ‘Do you know whether your mistress locked up any of her things?’ he inquired.

  ‘What things?’ said the woman.

  ‘Well, her jewellery mostly,’

  ‘Oh.’ Hannah smiled. ‘She gave it all to me,’ she said quietly. Goddard checked an exclamation. His heart was beating nervously, but he spoke sternly.

  ‘When?’

  ‘Just before she died—of gastro-enteritis,’ said the woman. There was a long silence. He turned and with great care mechanically closed the drawers of the dressing-table. The tilted glass showed him the pallor of his face, and he spoke without turning round.