Kiss and Kill

by Richard Deming

  It never would, of course. After the funeral everybody concerned would as usual be too sympathetic to show more than mild disappointment when I backed out of everything and left town to escape sorrowful memories.

  The rest of that day Helen, Dewey, Mavis and I all spent house hunting. Herman Gwynn got on the phone, and through his contacts with the Westfield Businessmen’s Club, of which he was a member, managed to locate two houses for us to look at. As nearly as he could discover, they were the only two in town for rent.

  The first one was one side of a duplex, and when we learned that it wasn’t going to be vacant until after the first of the year, we went away without even looking at it The second was a two-story furnished place on Portage Street, within easy walking distance of the store, and available immediately. It was only available until March, however, as the owners were wintering in Florida and wanted it vacated for their own use when they returned to town.

  The downstairs consisted of four rooms: living room, dining room, kitchen and a bedroom. Upstairs there were two bedrooms plus a wide hall. An open stairway led upstairs from the front room, and at its top only a balustrade guarded the front side of the upper hall. I examined the twelve-foot drop from the balustrade to the front-room floor thoughtfully as we went up the stairs.

  Catching me studying it, Mavis gave me a sardonic smile.

  Then Dewey did something helpful for a change. Resting his hand on the railing as he reached the top of the stairs, he said, “Hey, this thing’s kind of loose.”

  He shook it in demonstration, and sure enough it moved back and forth shakily.

  “I better have that fixed,” the agent said.

  I walked over to where the railing joined the wall, noting that the nails in the end posts had begun to work loose.

  “Don’t bother,” I said. “I can fix that myself easily.”

  I wouldn’t, of course. And I was reasonably certain Dewey would never think of it again, unless he happened to fall through it and spoil it for subsequent use. But it was convenient to have planted in the real estate agent’s mind that the thing was in a dangerous condition.

  We all agreed that the place was ideal for our purposes, and I paid the agent a month’s rent in advance. We moved from the hotel to the house that evening. Helen and I took one of the upstairs bedrooms, Mavis took the other, and we relegated Dewey to the one on the first floor.

  The next day was Thanksgiving, and we spent it at home except for a noon meal in a restaurant. We had to eat out because the women hadn’t had time to shop and the stores weren’t open on Thanksgiving Day.

  On Friday I began my study of the farm appliance business while the two women did the necessary shopping and organizing attendant to setting up housekeeping. I spent the entire day with Herman Gwynn and his two clerks, going over the books for several years past, making a detailed examination of the stock and listening to the three of them explain the details of the business.

  During the next few weeks our lives settled into pretty much of a pattern. I spent a good deal of time studying the business, meeting other local businessmen and generally getting acquainted with the community. One of the businessmen I particularly cultivated was an insurance agent named Richard Slack.

  I never mentioned the subject of insurance to him, however, leaving it to him to bring it up at the proper time, as I knew he would. But I did arrange for the proper time. I invited him to dinner.

  No insurance man ever deliberately sidesteps a possible sale. After dinner when we were all seated in the front room and I dropped the remark that I didn’t have any life insurance on myself, Slack went to work at once.

  “Now that you’re married, you certainly ought to have some protection for your wife, Mr. Howard,” he said. “Not that I’m trying to sell you a policy. I don’t believe in taking advantage of people’s hospitality to talk business. But as a matter of principle I’m naturally a strong believer in insurance.”

  Despite his avowed reluctance to take advantage of our hospitality, it didn’t take much urging for him to go out to his car and bring in his brief case. Within an hour of the time we had gotten up from dinner he had me signed up for a ten-thousand-dollar straight life policy.

  Then he suggested, “How about your wife, Mr. Howard. Has she any insurance?”

  Chuckling, I told him I wasn’t interested in betting on my wife’s death.

  “That’s not the way to look at insurance,” he said seriously. “It’s not a gamble. It’s an investment. She ought to have at least enough to cover funeral expenses.”

  He went to work on both me and Helen then, and ended up selling me a five-thousand-dollar policy on her life, to go in force in thirty days. After that he made a stab at selling policies to Mavis and Dewey without getting anywhere with either. Mavis told him she had a five-hundred-dollar policy to cover her funeral expenses and wasn’t interested in any more, and Dewey didn’t even seem to know what he was talking about. Finally he gave up on both of them.

  I was satisfied with the whole evening. When it came time for the insurance company to pay off, there wasn’t likely to be much suspicion when the agent recalled that he had considerable difficulty convincing me my wife should be insured as well as myself, and instead of insuring her for the largest amount I could get, he had trouble getting me up to a five-thousand-dollar policy.

  CHAPTER XVII

  WHILE I busied myself with studying the farm appliance business and getting acquainted with the community, Mavis spent enough time ostensibly looking for a job to create the impression that she really wanted one, though she would have been considerably put out if anyone had actually offered her a position. Dewey seemed content to loll around the house waiting for the expected opening at the store to develop.

  Helen threw herself wholeheartedly into housekeeping duties.

  We discovered that Westfield was a charming village. There were many lovely old homes, and most streets were lined with ancient elms. At the moment these were bare, but it wasn’t hard to visualize that when the winter passed, the streets would be beautiful green-roofed arcades. While it was an old town, there seemed to be some money in it, for most of the large old frame buildings were well kept up.

  Mixed with the old-fashioned element which made the town so comfortable was a good deal of modernism, too. The stores of the shopping center were as streamlined as any in large cities, there was an excellent first-run movie theater, and even one or two glittering cocktail lounges. The net effect was of a wealth of tradition, which still reached over into modern times to give the town its pleasant flavor, without the natives allowing it to sap their vitality. For despite its quietly homey atmosphere, I sensed a good deal of vitality and forward thinking among Westfield’s businessmen.

  It wasn’t hard to fall in love with the town.

  My relationship with Helen developed very pleasantly, too. She was an excellent housewife. As we grew to know each other better she developed into a more and more vivacious companion, and she seemed to be pouring out to me all the passionate love which had been bottled up within her for thirty-two years.

  Sometimes, in my enjoyment of our day-to-day life, I would forget the eventual plans Mavis and I had for Helen and Dewey to the extent that I would find myself seriously looking forward to the moment when we would take over the Farmer’s Appliance Store and become permanent members of the community. Then it was like a dash of cold water in the face when I jerked myself back to reality.

  As Christmas neared, Mavis began to grow a little impatient as to when I intended to act. One afternoon while Helen was shopping and Dewey, for a change, was out of the house too, we nearly had a fight.

  “Hasn’t the insurance been in force long enough?” Mavis demanded.

  “Only three weeks,” I said. “We’ll wait until after the first of the year.”

  “You mean you expect to spend Christmas as that woman’s husband?”

  “I certainly don’t expect to spend it in mourning,” I snapped at her. “What�
�s the matter with you?”

  “Nothing with me,” she said. “I’m beginning to wonder what’s the matter with you.”

  I discovered what was the matter with me Christmas Eve. We had a tree with the usual exchange of presents, and Helen acted as delighted as a child. She had given me a new robe and slippers. My gift to her, which made Mavis stare at me balefully, was a tiny gold wrist-watch for which I had paid the unnecessary price of seventy-five dollars.

  I had given Mavis a scarf and a pair of gloves.

  In bed that night Helen was still showering me with excited thanks for the watch. And as she whispered into my ear, I suddenly realized something I must have known subconsciously for some time.

  I was in love with Helen.

  As I lay there with Helen in my arms, thinking about my new discovery, I realized not only that I was in love with her, but that it was the first time in my life I had ever been really in love. Whatever it was I had felt for Mavis, it had no comparison to this overwhelming desire to protect and live the rest of my life with the soft creature lying next to me.

  All at once, I knew with great certainty that all Mavis’s and my plans were off. I intended to take over Gwynn’s store, I intended to make it pay, and I intended to live in this town with Helen as my wife permanently.

  The decision involved considerable alternate planning. I knew it was no use trying to explain it to Mavis, for she would never accept a simple ultimatum to get out of my life and stay out. I remembered a scene a year or two back when Mavis had suspected I was carrying on a flirtation with a blonde during one of our periodic vacations. It was one of the few times I ever saw her really angry, and the only time she ever dared talk to me in the tone she used that night.

  She had said, “I’ve let you push me around since the day we met, Sam. I’ve done everything you told me. I’ve let you make a killer out of me. I’ve watched you live with other women, burning with jealousy, even though I knew they meant nothing to you. I would have let you push me into bed with other men, if you’d wanted to run that kind of a racket. There isn’t anything in the world I wouldn’t do for you. Except one thing. Give you up.” Then she had screamed in complete rage, “That blonde’s no mark. You stay away from her!”

  No, Mavis wouldn’t accept my change of plans. I knew that even suggesting it would bring on a tornado which would make her rage over my mild flirtation with the blonde seem like a gentle spring breeze. In all probability she would create a scene which would end with both of us on trial for our lives in a half-dozen different states.

  There was really only one solution, I realized.

  I was going to have to kill Mavis.

  I reached the decision quite calmly. Five years earlier, just the thought of killing Mavis would have appalled me. But I had gotten a lot of practice in murder since then. It had become such a part of my life that it was the logical solution to any problem.

  I started my campaign a few days later by telling Mavis in private that I was beginning to miss her so much, I wanted to arrange for us to get away for a few days.

  “I don’t want to pull this thing until a couple of weeks after New Year’s,” I said. “When people have had a chance to get over the holidays. Before that we couldn’t get a judge to act on unfreezing the bank accounts, and we’d just have to sit and sweat it out anyway. But I’m going crazy for you. I can’t wait three more weeks.”

  Mavis was so overjoyed at the suggestion that it didn’t even occur to her this was the first time I had ever violated my strict rule of never dropping our brother-sister relationship, even temporarily, when we were on a job.

  “How will we work it?” she asked breathlessly.

  “Buffalo’s only sixty miles from here. Suppose that right after New Year’s you announce you have a job offer in Buffalo and have to go up there to check it. Ill offer to drive you up. We’ll leave on Wednesday the sixth and stay over until Friday night.”

  “Suppose Helen wants to go along?”

  “I can handle Helen,” I said.

  On Monday, January fourth, Mavis began putting the plan in operation. At dinner she announced that she had spotted an ad for a stenographer in the Buffalo Courier Express, had phoned the prospective employer long distance, and had an appointment to see him Wednesday afternoon.

  “I think I’ll stay for a couple of days and see what Buffalo’s like while I’m up there,” she remarked.

  I made no comment at the time. I waited until the following evening at dinner.

  Then I said, “A number of Gwynn’s suppliers are in Buffalo. I’ve been thinking of running up to talk to them and get their slant on the store. Think 111 drive Mavis up and spend a couple of days there myself.”

  Helen voiced no objection whatever, nor did she invite herself along, apparently feeling that I’d be too busy with suppliers to bother with her. Mavis and I left early Wednesday morning.

  When we reached Buffalo, I drove straight to J. N. Adams’ instead of registering at a hotel. When I parked in front of the department store, Mavis looked at me puzzledly.

  “What are we going to do here?” she asked.

  “I’m going down the street and kill some time in the first tavern I see,” I said. “You’re going into J. N. Adams’ and get an outfit that makes you look like a woman instead of an old-maid school teacher.” I handed her five twenty-dollar bills. “Don’t go overboard, because you’re only buying these clothes to wear for a couple of days, but if we’re going to have a short second honeymoon, I want you to look the part.”

  I told her I’d give her an hour and meet her back at the car.

  Promptly at the end of an hour I found her waiting at the car with a happy expression on her face and two suit boxes under her am.

  “Spend it all?” I asked.

  “Hardly half of it,” she said. “But wait till you see what I got.”

  She was so eager to get back into something feminine, she insisted on going straight to a hotel before we even had lunch. I registered us at the Richford as Mr. and Mrs. Sam Parker of Brooklyn.

  As soon as the bellhop left us alone, Mavis disappeared into the bathroom with her two boxes. She was gone nearly twenty minutes, and when she came out agan she was a different woman.

  She wore a white quilted skirt of heavy satin, so tight across the hips that their firm roundness was brought out in sharp relief, and an ebony black blouse open at the throat, with the V dipping to the shadowed cleft between her breasts. She had loosened her hair from its old-maidish bun and had brushed it to fall loosely about her shoulders. Expertly-applied makeup completed her transformation.

  “You did all that on fifty bucks?” I asked admiringly.

  “Plus a clearance-sale coat for only nineteen dollars.”

  Going back into the bathroom, she returned wearing the new coat. It was of gray cloth and tailored as simply as the one she wore with her spinsterish suits. But instead of being severe, its lines somehow managed to create an effect of complete femininity.

  “Can you appear in public with me now without feeling ashamed?” she asked.

  “I’ll have to fight off the wolves,” I told her.

  CHAPTER XVIII

  We decided to keep to restaurants off the beaten track and to the lesser-known night clubs while we were in Buffalo in order to decrease the risk of unexpectedly running into someone who knew us in Westfield. In a city the size of Buffalo, there wasn’t much chance of this happening, but on the other hand, Westfield residents often drove the sixty miles to shop there. Mavis, herself, understood that it would be difficult to explain her changed appearance if we did run into anyone we knew, and made no objection to keeping our celebration rather furtive.

  That night when we went to bed, Mavis brought out another item she had purchased—a nightgown. Its purpose was obviously entirely decorative, for it was much too sheer to have any warmth to it.

  I didn’t go to sleep when Mavis did. I deliberately lay awake for another hour, then carefully eased out of bed. When I w
as sure my movement hadn’t awakened her, I quietly collected all of her new clothes in the dark and carried them into the bathroom. I eased the door shut behind me before turning on the bathroom light.

  With a razor blade I removed every label from her clothes, even the small tab sewed into the seam of her slip. Then I turned out the light again and quietly returned each item to where it had been.

  As I slipped back into bed, Mavis stirred and said sleepily, “What’s the matter, honey?”

  “Nothing,” I said, drawing her into my arms. “Just go back to sleep.”

  At dinner the next night, I suggested we do what many other honeymooners do and take a run up to Niagara Falls that evening.

  “At this time of year?” she asked. “Don’t the falls freeze in winter?”

  “Sure,” I said. “But they’re supposed to be even more beautiful frozen than running. It’s only twenty-two miles.”

  “Wouldn’t it be pretty late when we got there?”

  “At night’s when you’re supposed to see them,” I explained. “They play colored lights on them from the Canadian side.”

  “All right,” she said agreeably.

  I hadn’t made the suggestion until eight o’clock. By the time we finished dinner, got back to the hotel, packed and checked out, it was nine-thirty. I told Mavis we were checking out because we’d stay over in Niagara Falls that night.

  I took my time making the trip. It was a clear night, cold but without snow, and it was comfortable enough driving with the heater on. It was just ten-fifteen when we reached the city of Niagara Falls.

  “Will we spend the night over in Canada?” Mavis asked. “I understand the Canadian side is where most of the tourists go.”

  “If you’d like. I thought we’d stop long enough to take a look at the falls from this side, then go over the bridge and see how they look from Canada.”