Dead Man's Gift and Other Stories

by Simon Kernick

  ‘I was found not guilty, remember?’

  ‘So was OJ Simpson. The prosecution also said you’d been violent to her in the past.’

  ‘You seem to have a very good memory. So good, anyone would think you were a journalist. Is that what you are?’ He takes a step towards me. ‘Was all this a ruse, so you could come on here and get a confession out of me? Are you taping this?’

  ‘No,’ I say firmly. ‘And I’m not a journalist, either. I’m exactly who I say I am. A woman travelling alone on holiday, who made the big mistake of getting on this boat. And now I’d like to get off.’

  His whole stance softens and he suddenly looks very vulnerable. ‘You know, I don’t usually talk about this. But I’m going to tell you, because I actually like you. I know we’ve only just met and we don’t know anything about each other, but you seem like the kind of person I could fall for. Yes, I wasn’t perfect, but then neither was she. We had a volatile relationship. We had some pretty crazy arguments. I even hit her once, but it was self-defence. She was trying to beat the shit out of me at the time.’ He pauses. ‘But I loved her too. And I think she loved me. One night we had an almighty argument and she stormed out, telling me it was over, and got in her car. I never saw her again. And that’s the truth.’

  ‘Do you think she’s dead?’

  ‘I really don’t know. They never found her. They never found the car, either. But it’s a big world, and I hope that she’s alive out there somewhere. But remember this: I had no motive to kill Elizabeth. Sure, our relationship might have been volatile, but it was still a pretty good one. We weren’t married, so I didn’t stand to gain from her death; and if I’m the kind of violent man who’d kill her in a fit of passion, then how can you explain the fact that I’ve never been charged with any kind of crime, either before or since? I’m not asking you to believe me, Jane, but that’s the truth.’

  ‘So. What do you need a bodyguard for?’

  ‘To help keep away intrusive people.’ He shrugged. ‘That’s it. You know, it’s not easy being infamous, and that’s what I was … Now I’m just an anonymous man living an anonymous life away from any trouble. I just want to be like everyone else. So, look, if you want to leave, I’ll drop you back right now, but otherwise, I’ve prepared dinner for us. So if you’d like to stay, I’d love to have you.’

  ‘What are you going to do about the bodyguard?’ I ask. ‘I don’t like him being around.’

  ‘He’s got his own cabin below deck. We’ll have plenty of privacy. We’ll just eat, and see how the evening goes. Does that sound like a plan?’

  I look at him and I’m thinking he’s a good liar, but a liar nonetheless. All my instincts tell me this man spells danger, but I figure that just here, only a few hundred yards from shore, he’s not going to do anything stupid. In the end, he’s got too much to lose.

  I smile. ‘Okay. I’ll stay for dinner.’

  Him

  I’ve got to tell you, that was close. Jesus, of course I killed her. We had an argument, I hit her, and kept on going until she’d shut the fuck up. I’ll tell you something else too. It gave me a kick. You get some uppity bitch who wants to take your manhood away, you’ve got to stand up for yourself. A man who doesn’t stand up for himself is only half a man. My dad used to tell me that, when I was a kid. That bitch tried to take me down and I took her down instead. I didn’t panic, either. I stayed calm as ice. I had good contacts in those days. One of the major share-holders in my business knew people who could clean a crime scene and get rid of a body so it’s never seen again, so I called in a favour and he sorted it out for me. I talked to the cops, pretended she’d moved out, and it would have been fine except that one of the guys who moved the body ratted me out to the cops. It wasn’t enough to get me sent down, because in the end the jury believed me, but it was enough to end my life back home.

  But you know what? Right now, as I toast this gorgeous-looking milf with the pneumatic boobs, I’m loving life, and I wonder what pleasures await tonight.

  ‘So if I’m staying for dinner, who’s doing the cooking?’ she asks.

  I give her my best megawatt smile, the one that always works on chicks. Confident, yet self-deprecating. ‘Would you believe it? Me. I’m a pretty good cook, and I’ve done all the prep work, so we can eat whenever you want.’

  She smiles back, and it’s obvious she’s relaxed now. ‘And what’s on the menu?’

  ‘Well, we’re on a tropical island, so fish soup, then baked snapper fillets Mediterranean-style.’

  She tells me she’s not hungry yet, so we sit there chatting on deck and I’m on top form. I tell her amusing anecdotes about my past, smile a lot, fill her champagne glass, stay careful not to overfill mine because it’s important always to stay in control, and I can see she’s completely falling for the nice-guy schtick. To be honest with you, it’s not hard. You’ve just got to allow yourself to fall naturally into the role, and you’ve got them. Give them decent food and outrageously expensive champagne, show them the trappings of wealth, and bang, the flytrap closes.

  She finishes talking about whatever the hell she’s talking about – something about her oldest kid’s baby, and how strange it feels to be a grandmother – and I smile, look deep in her eyes and tell her that there’s no way she looks old enough to be a grandmother –because, let’s be fair, she doesn’t – and I suddenly realize within that moment that I’ve temporarily forgotten her name.

  She thanks me for the compliment and I go to fill up her glass again.

  This time, though, she stops me. ‘I’m not a particularly big drinker,’ she says. ‘I don’t want to get drunk before we eat.’

  ‘Ah, it’s a beautiful evening in a beautiful place. We should celebrate.’

  ‘Celebrate what?’

  ‘Being alive,’ I say and raise my glass.

  We clink glasses and that’s when I make my move. I lean towards her, slowly but not too slowly, my eyes fixed on hers, my hand gently touching her shoulder, and we kiss.

  She’s a good kisser and I can feel the inner wolf being aroused. I put my hand on the back of her neck and draw her into my kiss as my other hand touches her knee, then moves up her leg under the hem of the dress, caressing her thigh. And I’m wondering to myself: am I looking at a lover for the night? Or a victim?

  Her

  The champagne’s perfect, and Greg/Matt is great company. Handsome and charming, with a beautiful smile. But you know, the problem with men like him – men who have no real respect for women, or indeed any empathy for them – is they think they’ve got you. They don’t realize that other people can be just as intelligent and observant as they are, and see right through them.

  But I’ve got to admit, I’m having fun too. If you know what you’re getting, then you’re not going to be disappointed, so when he leans forward to kiss me, I kiss him right back, and I even let his hand drift up my thigh, although he has the good sense not to rush and instead lets his hand linger a few inches above the knee, his forefinger drawing delicate circles on my skin.

  ‘I’m going to need to go to the bathroom before we go any further,’ I tell him, thinking it’s quite hard to drag myself away from his touch. I haven’t been with a man for several months now – not since some cock of a guy I met on Tinder, who seemed to think sex with a woman was a race against time – and I miss the touch of a man. I get the feeling that Greg/Matt knows what he’s doing between the sheets too.

  I walk across the deck as the light from a perfect half moon sparkles across the sea and a warm breeze envelops me. It really is a good night to be alive, I think. Following the directions I’ve been given, I go through the wheelhouse and down steps that take me through a spacious lounge area with two long sofas and a huge TV screen dominating one wall. The toilet is down a corridor on the right. Further along I can hear the TV blaring out of Frank the bodyguard’s room. It sounds like he’s watching porn.

  I lock the bathroom door behind me and stare at myself in the mirror. W
hen I was a young girl I used to imagine the life I’d be living when I was older. I’m forty-two now and, by this age, I was convinced I’d be happily married to a nice guy and with lovely children. Instead here I am on a horny stranger’s boat in the middle of the Caribbean, thousands of miles from home. For a moment I feel a pang of utter regret.

  Then I force the emotion aside, throw cold water on my face to wake myself up and prepare for what I have to do.

  Him

  Well, you already know I’ve killed once. And when you enjoy something, you want to do it again, right?

  But I’m no fool. I was lucky to get away with killing Elizabeth, and suspicion still hangs over my head about that one, hence the fact that I left the States. However, one of the great things about being free to roam wherever you want is that opportunities are always arising. Three years ago, I was in Bocas del Toro, a set of beautiful islands on the Caribbean coast of Panama – you ought to go there, it’s totally unspoiled – and I met this chick from Oregon who was backpacking through central America. She was twenty-nine years old and an absolute peach. I can’t remember her name, but I remember the body. I was in a beach bar, just like today, she came past, we chatted, I got her back to the boat, and that was it … I went to town on her. I can’t remember whether I planned to kill her or not but, either way, when we were in bed she started playing up – trying to get me to stop hurting her – and that just turned me on even more. By the time I’d finished, she was in such a bad way I had to finish her off.

  I offered Frank a ten-grand bonus to help me clean up the mess and we sailed away that night, chopped her up, then sent the bits of her overboard for the sharks to eat, leaving no one any the wiser. I did it again in San Andrés with a Colombian girl over from the mainland, who was working as a waitress. One look at my yacht and she was hooked. She ended up as shark-feed too, while Frank got another ten grand richer. But, like I say, I’m careful. I only do it when I’m certain no one can pin me to the crimes.

  This time round, I’m not so sure. St Lucia’s less of an out-of-the-way place, and this chick – Jane, that’s her name – is staying at a well-known resort where she’s likely to be missed. She might even have told someone where she was going.

  But you see, that’s the beauty of being able to sail wherever I please. Nobody knows who I am. I can be gone just like that. So I guess what I’m saying is: I haven’t made my decision yet, and I know Frank won’t care either way, because he likes the money.

  So it’s 50–50. Does she live? Does she die?

  And do you know what? As I come down the steps into the lounge, I’m beginning to think she’s got to die. The thing is, she’s too pretty to let go, and there’s something about her I can’t trust. For a start, she knows who I am, and that’s bad. How do I know she won’t tell anyone, or even sell the story of how she slept with the infamous Greg Fairman, etc., etc.? That’s what women are like. The bitches can never keep their mouths shut. And that really pisses me off.

  I take out a large filleting knife from the drawer just beneath the row of used paperbacks, and immediately it’s as if all my pleasure receptors have flooded my body with euphoria. I can’t stop myself now. I’m going to have to have her.

  The door to the lounge opens on the other side of the room and she steps inside, looking for something in her handbag.

  She stops, senses me in the room and looks up. We face each other, and she sees the knife down by my side. The blade is very bright and very sharp, and her eyes widen.

  ‘How you doing?’ I say, unable to stop myself from grinning.

  ‘What’s going on?’ she says, unable to take her eyes off the knife. Her face shows concern, but not the outright fear I like to see.

  ‘We’re going to have a little party,’ I tell her, ‘and if you do what you’re told, I’ll drop you back on land later.’ I don’t give her time to take in what I’m saying. The way to establish control is not to give the other person time to think. So I lift the knife and stride towards her, my eyes boring into hers, my free hand reaching out to grab her arm.

  But she’s fast. Turning on her heel, she runs back down the corridor, slamming the door shut behind her. The problem for her, though, is there’s no escape that way. I locked the door at the other end of the corridor before she came on board, just in case of this eventuality, so she’s trapped. And Frank’s down there too, in his cabin. It’s time to get him to earn his money, so I shout his name at the top of my voice. ‘Frank, I need your help here. We’ve got a runner.’

  I open the door to the corridor, taking a fighting stance in case the bitch is planning an ambush, but she’s not there and the far end of the corridor is in darkness; I can’t see her anywhere. The only light’s coming from the crack in the door to Frank’s cabin, and I wonder if the bastard’s sitting there with his headphones on, watching TV. I can hear it blaring in there, playing porn by the sound of things. Jesus, you can’t get the help these days.

  I shove open Frank’s door and am just about to yell at him to come and give me a hand finding this bitch when the words stop in my throat. Frank’s lying on his double bed, head propped up on a couple of pillows, wearing the same clothes he was wearing earlier, but there’s a hole where one of his eyes used to be, a deep slash-mark on his throat, and the sheets around him are soaked in blood. At first I’m confused. Then I’m scared. Someone’s killed him. Someone on this boat. Someone who knows what they’re doing. Because it’s clear from how he’s lying that he didn’t even have time to react.

  I hear a noise behind me and bang, someone’s on me in the darkness, slamming me back against the wall, twisting my wrist so hard it forces me to drop the knife. A head slams into my face and I feel pain like I’ve never felt before shooting up from my nose. I’m wobbling on my feet like a punch-drunk boxer, completely overwhelmed by the suddenness of the attack, so shocked that it takes a second to register there’s a new pain in my groin, not as intense, but somehow I know it’s worse because I can feel wetness coming down my legs, and then I manage to stagger back into the light of the lounge.

  And that’s when I look down and see the knife handle sticking out of my crotch, and I just have time to feel truly sorry for myself that I’ve ended up like this, before mercifully I faint.

  Her

  I have to splash water on Greg’s face to wake him up. By this time I’ve removed the knife from what’s left of his ball sac and roughly bandaged it up, to stop him bleeding to death. He’s lying on his back between the two sofas, his right hand cuffed to the leg of the glass coffee table, and he looks up at me, blinking, his face understandably pale and splattered with blood where I bust his nose, and when he sees me holding the throwing knife by the tip of the blade, his eyes widen. He knows I killed Frank, he knows I mean business, and it scares the shit out of him.

  ‘Call me an ambulance,’ he demands, his voice weak. ‘I’m hurt. Badly. You need to get me help. You stabbed me.’

  ‘I was always going to stab you, Greg,’ I tell him. ‘It’s just I’d planned to do it at the dinner table. But you got a little impatient. But then that’s you all over, isn’t it? You just can’t control your impulses. That’s how we found you.’

  ‘Who’s we? Who are you?’

  It’s very rare I get to talk about my work, and he’s not going to be blurting it out to anyone else, so I tell him. About how I was hired by Elizabeth White’s older brother Robert, himself a wealthy entrepreneur, to avenge the death of his sister. Robert’s own investigators had tracked Greg down to this particular yacht in the Caribbean, and it was they too who’d connected him to the disappearance of American backpacker Shelley Romano in Panama, and then the following year to the disappearance of Colombian waitress Roberta Penĕz. From there it hadn’t been very hard for me to track the yacht’s movements and initiate a meeting between Greg and myself.

  I shrug. ‘And that leaves us here and now.’

  He still looks confused. ‘But why hire you?’

  ‘Because, like y
ou, I’m a killer, Greg. The difference is I’m a professional and you’re an amateur. That’s why I’m up here and you’re down there with a hole in your balls.’

  ‘I’ll double whatever they’re paying you, if you just get me help.’

  I shake my head. ‘It doesn’t work like that. Otherwise I’d be out of business.’

  If you’re a professional like me, you spot warning signs, and I spot one now. Greg is still talking to me, offering me the yacht, more money, the whole works, the strangled desperation of the condemned in his voice, but twice now he’s glanced behind me, the movement of his eyes barely perceptible. But sometimes that word – barely – is the difference between life and death.

  I swing round fast.

  A short Asian man in a black smock is standing there with a very sharp-looking cleaver raised above his head, ready to land a blow on the back of mine. For a single moment he freezes in shock, surprised by my speed. The throwing knife leaves my hand and hits him blade-first in the throat. He makes a strange gurgling noise and the cleaver wobbles in his hand, so I give him a quick kick between the legs and he crashes backwards through the door and lands on his back.

  Behind me I hear Greg wriggling round, but he’s not going anywhere. I retrieve my knife and turn back. ‘So who’s he?’ I ask.

  ‘The chef,’ he gasps.

  ‘Jesus. So you even lied about preparing dinner?’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he says, like it makes any difference.

  ‘Anyone else on board I should know about?’

  He shakes his head, and I shake mine too. ‘You really are a piece of crap,’ I tell him, raising the knife. ‘I usually don’t take pleasure in my work, but tonight I’m going to make an exception.’

  Two hours later, I can see the dark shadow of the island of Martinique in the distance, the lights of the villages on the southern coastline shimmering in the darkness. Greg lies dead on the lounge floor and the yacht’s wiped clean of my prints. However, I’m not one to take chances. I’ve been doing this a long time now – killing people for money – and the reason I’ve survived as long as I have is because I’m extremely cautious. Right now, aside from my clients, only one person knows what I do for a living.