The Sacrificial Man

by Ruth Dugdall

I wait for my lover to arrive. My hair is loose and I wear a long white dress. I could be going to a wedding, if it was not for the fact that upstairs, hidden under the pillow, is a knife. I don’t think I breathe until I hear the knocking on the door. Until I open it and feel Lee’s arms tight around me. Her grip allows me to fall, the pain in my chest rising in my throat. There’s no choice but to surrender, to let her love me. She guides me back into the house and closes the door.

  “I thought I might be too late. That you would be on the plane to Germany.”

  Lee’s lips are on my ear. “There was no plane, Alice, not tonight anyway. I was going to be in court tomorrow, in the viewing gallery. I didn’t want to tell you that I knew everything. It had to be your choice, and you wanted to keep it from me. I respected that.”

  “But you knew?”

  “I always knew. It’s why I came back.”

  Of course, of course she knew. She knows me. She knows the weight of my silence. Lee wipes the tears from my chin, my cheek. She takes her fingers and strokes my face as she’s done a million times, as if her only desire is to comfort me. She shows no surprise, only concern. No fear, only love.

  “Have you never stopped to ask yourself, Alice, why it all happened last year? You’re the same person you’ve been since you were a teenager – why then and not any other year?”

  “Because that was when I found Smith.”

  “But it was also when you started looking – when you needed to find something, someone. Because, after being together since we were five-years-old, I’d left. Don’t you see?”

  “What?”

  “It was me, Alice. Our love. That’s what kept you stable. Kept you safe. But last year I was posted to Germany. That’s when things went wrong.”

  I’m silent. Is it true? “I love you, Alice. I should never have left you. I won’t leave you again.”

  I’m crying again, collapsing into her, letting her hold me like a strengthening force. Is she right? Was Smith’s death not what I longed for, not the remembrance of love past, newly tasted. Lee will give me that. She gives me a sense of it already. It can only be her. I know she can make it right.

  When I’m finally still she asks, “What has happened, Alice? Why are you like this now? Is it because of the sentencing tomorrow?”

  Her arms are tight, holding me fast. Her mouth places kisses on my neck like pearls. I long to tell her everything but my mouth is a fortress, keeping it back. I can’t tell her that I’m diseased.

  “I know, Alice,” she whispers. “I know about David Jenkins. Alice, Alice, my sweet love… ” I struggle to turn from her, and she releases me slightly, but I’m still in her embrace, turned away. She rocks me. I give in to myself, let my weight be hers. I’m a child again and she is my parent. I close my eyes and allow it, feeling what it is to be loved. I must forget the disease in my brain, planted like a bad seed.

  I remember my mother. I think of her cool skin, her freshly painted pink toenails. Being alone with her that final time, my head on her chest. I want it back, so much, that love. I want her back…

  “Let’s go upstairs,” I say.

  Lee leads me to the bedroom.

  She undresses, watching me. I stand, in my white dress. I won’t be naked. When she is under the sheets she reaches for me, gently pulling me onto the soft mattress, next to her. I slide under the new sheets. Despite the warmth of her smile, I’m shaking. “Kiss me,” I say. “I want you to make love to me.”

  Lee strokes me, pushes her thigh between my legs. She closes her eyes and it is then that I remove the knife from the pillow. She looks at me and the blade flashes in her pupils.

  “Alice, please… put the knife down… ” The knife is still in my hand, but raised. The blade points to her heart. Now is the moment. “Alice, please… ”

  I’m Lot’s wife, immobile and poised, pale as salt.

  “It’s over, isn’t it, Lee?” The question comes from nowhere conscious, barely a movement, the sound of grains in an hourglass. “They’ll lock me away for life.”

  She watches the knife as its blade touches her skin, my pale hand gripped to the wooden handle. “Whatever happens Alice, we can sort this out. I’ll never go away again, but first I want you to give me the knife.”

  She moves slowly, as if managing a lion that has pinned her to the back of the cage. I could pounce at any moment, but our bodies are still close, alongside each other, her leg between mine. My heart palpitates and I’m sure she must see beads of sweat on my lip. Does she still find me beautiful?

  Slowly, so very slowly, Lee covers my hand with her own and we hold the knife together. She pulls the length of the blade forward so it punctures her breast. “Is this what you want, Alice? To kill me?”

  She coaxes my hand forward, the tip of the blade digging further into her flesh, towards her heart. A bead of blood blooms on the silver like a ruby, and Lee watches me, never breaking eye contact. “Alice, is this what you want?”

  Like cracks appearing in marble, my composure dissolves, my voice loud and stuttering. “He betrayed me! He lied! I thought it was what we wanted. What I thought was love was his desire to infect me. I’m sick, Lee, I think I’m dying. Smith murdered me.”

  I pull the handle hard so the knife is over my own heart. The tip is razor sharp and cuts as it falls, but I no longer wield it. Surrendered, I crumple into the mattress. Finally, I cry like a child.

  Lee holds me, still with the knife in her grip. Kisses me. I won’t hurt anymore. She whispers, intimate words. This was the moment I sought all along. The gift of love. She loves me, even now. Even knowing I have killed a man. Even knowing I may be diseased. Unconditional, immovable love. I don’t need her death to make love immortal: she won’t abandon me.

  She will never leave.

  Forty-three

  It is morning. Alice was to be sentenced today.

  She lies on the floor, her pale skin almost translucent in the weak February sun, as her lover paints the last of her fingernails a pretty shade of pink.

  Lee takes the cardigan from the chest of drawers. Hand knitted, lilac wool, with a precious pearl button. The blood from the wound on Alice’s breast is dried, clotted dark. Lee touches it, feeling the bump of fresh scar tissue.

  “Are you cold, my darling?” she asks, taking the cardigan and wrapping it around Alice’s shoulder. “You’re with your Mummy now. You won’t be cold anymore.”

  Lee strokes her beloved’s arm, kisses her, knowing that this time, this final time, there will be no bad dreams, no nightmares, to disturb Alice’s sleep.

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  If you enjoyed The Sacrificial Man, don’t miss the brilliant debut novel by Ruth Dugdall, The Woman Before Me.

  The Woman Before Me

  BEFORE

  1

  Creeping across the threshold, I listen to the silence of the sleeping house. These middle hours, between three and four in the morning when deepest sleep can be reached, make the kitchen seem larger and emptier than in daylight. Different. Although the difference is me. This time I’m saying goodbye.

  The fragrance of Emma is everywhere, the delicate tang of her green apple perfume. That small wooden box, holding an assortment of tea bags, on the shelf – I’ll never again see her bend over it, her hair falling like a veil, sweeping it away as she dithers over her selection. And Luke. She told me I’ll never see him again.

  There’s a large picture on the wall, a print of the Eiffel Tower, a place she visited on her first honeymoon. On the work surface are unwashed plates, remains of their last meal encrusted on the cutlery. I thought she was so neat, but then I never really knew her. Not like you did.

  Through the kitchen into the large dining room, I move slowly. I don’t want to miss a thing. I want to capture the memory of it. That is where we’ve sat, Emma and I, cradling hot cups of tea. I notice the red paint on the walls, the white pine of the win
dow seat. On the table is a packet of Silk Cut cigarettes, a box of matches. She’s supposed to have given up, but today has been a hard day.

  I see myself, reflected in a small mirror above the seat. I’m shocked by what my face reveals: there are flushed, red patches on my cheeks and forehead, my eyes are black. Curious, I look closer and see my pupils are fully dilated. I look excited, aroused even.

  Momentarily, my heart palpitates; my hands are clammy with sweat. This must be the nervous thrill that burglars feel. But I won’t steal anything. Emma was the thief, not me. I’ve only ever taken one thing from this house: the back door key. Secretly copied, and then returned to its hook.

  I climb quietly up the stairs, avoiding places I know would groan under my weight. Night-lights illuminate the hall, making me blink. Emma’s door is ajar and I can see into the bedroom. Her curtains are open and the moon is full.

  Emma sleeps facing the window, the duvet pulled high on her face. Next to her is the bulk of a man, hidden under the bedding. Dominic. Entering their bedroom, I creep up to her foetal shape, studying her perfect ear, her cheek, her blonde hair turned ashen in the half-light, and wonder if I could touch her without her waking. Only inches separate me from her sleeping body.

  She turns and my muscles tense. Then I realise that she’s moving to the rhythm of troubled dreams. She now lies half facing me and I can see the crease on her brow, the tightness of her mouth. Have I caused that, or are you to blame?

  Leaving Emma I walk further along the hall to the nursery, snaking behind the half-closed door. Inside the small room is the beautiful baby boy, asleep in his cot. Luke is surrendered on his back, hands fisted against the blanket, face peacefully fallen, soft skin and round fat cheeks. Usually I just watch him sleep, but tonight that isn’t enough.

  He’s familiar with my touch and smell. He stirs when I lift him and I think I hear a voice in the next room. I pause but hear nothing. His weight is natural to me, I cradle him expertly, one arm along his body, my hand on his thigh. Luke is so peaceful in my arms, head nestled to my chest.

  I love him, love him fiercely.

  I hear something in the next room; I freeze, waiting, and the noise becomes louder. Low whispers and then moaning. The repetitive sound of the bed banging against the wall. Careful not to wake Luke, I place him back in his cot and make my way from his room, passing the bedroom where Emma’s moans are getting louder, “Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.”

  2

  I’m still asleep when I hear loud knocking at the front door. I think it’s you, hope it is, but it’s the police. They’ve come for me. We know you were in the house, they say. There was a fire, they say. Then they tell me that Luke is dead and the air goes from my lungs. They want me to help them with their enquiries and I say I will.

  I’m led down stairs and locked into a police cell, grey painted walls and a bench fixed to the wall. No fresh air. The door is unlocked and a man enters. He’s going bald and wears a short-sleeved shirt, his arms are sunburnt and peeling. “I’m Mike Hogg, duty solicitor.”

  He doesn’t sit or look directly at me, but scribbles on a jotter. He asks nothing that matters, just if I’m suicidal, if I’m hungry. I ask him if it’s true, if Luke is really dead. He says yes, but that we had better not talk about that.

  Next I’m taken by a uniformed police officer to an interview room. It is small and dim with high windows and a wooden desk, like you’d find in a school. Sat behind the desk a different police officer – in a suit, not a uniform – unwraps a black disc, slides it into the recorder. He chats to Mr Hogg, who sits next to me. They ask after each other’s wives. This must be normal for them, something they do everyday, so they don’t notice that I’m shaking. Mr Hogg tells the police officer about his holiday in Greece, how his son learned to swim in the sea.

  I feel closed in, lost. How can they chat about holidays when a baby has died? It takes all my energy to sit in the chair and not collapse. I’m tired and heavy and dull, as though my brain has been switched off. All I can think about is Luke.

  Finally, ready to begin, the police officer leans back. He takes a cigarette packet from his inside pocket, showing the gold box first to Mr Hogg, and then offers it to me. “It’s hard, this smoking ban. But you can take one for later, if you like?”

  “No, thank you.”

  “No? But then you don’t smoke B & H, do you Rose? Silk Cut is your brand, isn’t it?”

  Somewhere in the distance my brain registers what he’s implying.

  He presses the record button and a red light comes on. He speaks slowly and deliberately. “This is Sergeant West. Also in the room are…”

  “Mike Hogg. Duty Solicitor.”

  West points at me and I say, “Rose Wilks.”

  “I have read Miss Wilks her rights. This interview is commenced on Sunday 6th June at 11.26 am. Now, Miss Wilks. Can you tell me when you last visited the house of Emma and Dominic Hatcher?”

  “Yesterday.”

  “For the benefit of the tape, yesterday was Saturday June 5th. And what were you doing there?”

  “I was babysitting Luke.” His name catches in my throat. I grip the chair to keep my hands from shaking.

  “And what was your relationship with the Hatchers?”

  “We’re friends. Luke is – was – like a son. I babysat for him a lot. Emma is my friend.”

  “I see. And what time did you leave the Hatchers’ home on Saturday?”

  “When they got back from their trip to Southwold. They were back earlier than they said they would. It was about four in the afternoon.”

  “And did you return at any point that evening?” he asks.

  “No.”

  “No? Can you speak clearly for the benefit of the recording, please?”

  “No, I did not return that evening.”

  “You are absolutely certain about that? You didn’t go back into the house? You need to think about what you are saying; anything you fail to disclose now but tell us later will be used against you.”

  “I returned early this morning. Around three.”

  Sergeant West’s jaw loosens. He hadn’t expected me to admit this and I can see him smile beneath his lips.

  Mr Hogg shifts in his seat. “I want to stop this interview and speak to Rose alone, before the interview goes any further.”

  West shoots him a look of contempt, betraying their earlier friendly chat. But I don’t want to speak to Mr Hogg alone. I want to tell the truth. I’m intent on the recorder trapping my voice, trapping my words in that plastic casing forever.

  “I went back to see Luke at three this morning.”

  “Rose, I really think you should…” interrupts Mr Hogg.

  Sergeant West ignores him. “How did you get in?”

  I feel the warm metal on a necklace around my neck. My precious key.

  “The back door was unlocked. Emma is careless about things like that. ”

  “And did you go to Luke’s room?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you light a cigarette?”

  “No! I would never smoke around him.”

  “Did you drop a cigarette as you left, starting a fire in the house?”

  “No!”

  “I will ask you again; did you light a cigarette in the Hatcher’s home?”

  “No. I did not.”

  “A cigarette started that fire and you admit to being there, in the early hours of the morning.”

  “But Emma smokes! It would have been hers. She was awake when I left. She was having sex with her husband.”

  Sergeant West looks at me with undisguised contempt. “Mrs Hatcher was alone last night. Her husband was sleeping elsewhere. She was alone and asleep and you were in her home, holding their son who shortly after died in a fire. How can you explain that?”

  I close my eyes, hot tears behind my eyelids.

  “Rose Wilks, did you start a fire in Luke Hatcher’s bedroom?” Sergeant West says the words slowly, giving each one weight. Mr Hogg shifts b
eside me.

  I summon all my strength and lean forward, whispering into the speaker as if my words are only for its benefit. I speak low, my mouth touching the plastic. “No.” And then I can’t stop myself, because I’m tired and Luke is dead and I can’t bear any of it. “No, no, no, no, no.”