He'd Rather Be Dead

by George Bellairs

  At first, her loss to me was mainly felt in loneliness, as when the familiar, almost unheard tick of a clock suddenly ceases, leaving a strange void and by the absence of its undertone alters all other sounds. She was dead and true realisation did not, at first, penetrate my understanding. Only weeks later, when I went again, alone, to the salt marshes, saw the bank on which we had so often sat eating our egg sandwiches and, finally and most poignant of all, found where she had lost it three months before, now tarnished and bedraggled, a little silver medallion on a blue ribbon which I had once bought her on her birthday (“St. Bartholomew protect you and keep you from Sickness,” it said) and the loss of which she did not discover until we reached home, did the full horror of the awful parting dawn on me. It fell like a hammer blow, sharp and overwhelming. I sank on the bank and wept, tearing the turf with my nails in impotent agony.

  Mr. Hardcastle took me to live with him and eventually made me his mechanic. It was due to him that I managed to scrape on the dental register without professional qualifications of the orthodox kind. He was, for as long as I knew him, my dear friend and benefactor. He died tragically before his time. His wife, whom he faithfully visited every Saturday for more than twenty years and whose long confinement cost him almost all he earned, persisted in regarding him as unfaithful to her, an unfounded obsession which, I gather, she contracted even when of sound mind. On one of these visits, having managed to conceal a table knife on her person, she plunged it in his chest with frenzied accusations, and killed him on the spot. Thus ended his long martyrdom, borne with fortitude. I inherited his practice and then occurred two incidents which set in motion the train of events which led to my undoing.

  I was only twenty when Hardcastle died. The suddenness of events threw everything awry. In fact, he had no known next-of-kin except his mad wife, and I had to administer his estate with a solicitor who had been his fellow-deacon at the chapel.

  There was little in the estate of my old friend except life policies which ensured the maintenance for the rest of her life of the wife who had killed him. By his will, he left his practice to me unconditionally. I was overwhelmed by this generous gift. It was the first piece of real luck I ever had.

  In the small deed-box he kept at the bank, Mr. Hardcastle had placed a sealed envelope addressed to me in my mother’s handwriting, to be opened when I reached the age of twenty-one. I did not violate its contents at once, for I had some months to go before reaching the specified age. But my curiosity grew day by day. I argued with myself against this impatience whilst constantly fingering the envelope like a drunkard who, having signed the pledge, wrestles with his conscience with a bottle full of whisky on the table before him.

  Finally, in a fit of impulsive resentment against my conflicting feelings which nagged me day and night like the exposed nerve of a rotten tooth, I broke the seal and read the contents of the packet.

  Would that I had, then and there, thrown it unread into the fire, for it laid the train which led to my present sorry plight.

  There were four sides of paper torn from the cheap, lined writing tablet, which my mother used to use because she could not write straight from one side to the other without the help of the ruling, and because she could never afford good notepaper. It pained me to imagine her setting it all down in her laboured hand, her head on one side, her pen scratching, her hand moving slowly with many dips in the penny bottle of ink I remembered so well from days gone.

  The letter began by saying that by the time I read it, my mother would be dead. It ended by giving me her love and blessing. In between occurred the following paragraph which struck me like a thunderbolt.

  “… I have done my best to conceal your origins because I was afraid that the knowledge of them would make you feel at a disadvantage with others who you had to fight against in the world. Now you are established in a good job, I feel it is only right to tell you that you are illegitimate. Your father is still alive when I write this, but I think it better not to tell you who he is, because that would do no good. You would perhaps hate him and seeing that once in my lifetime I refused to give you up to him when he would have taken you, there is no point in opening the question again. I had to leave the place where we had settled to stop him from finding us. He was not worthy of you and I was afraid if he took you, he would not bring you up to be the son I dreamed you would become and, thank God, you have become.

  “All I will say is that he deserted me before you were born and after that, although he approached me to make amends by offers of money and to adopt you, through a firm of solicitors (for he was married to somebody else by then), I refused. Do not blame me, my son. I felt then as I do now, that I could not touch his money and my pride rather preferred drudgery than his charity …”

  Enclosed in the envelope was my birth certificate and a bank draft for £500 dated seventeen years before! Covering the draft was a letter from a firm of solicitors saying they had been instructed by a client to forward the enclosed draft and should she care to allow the same client to adopt her son, the necessary arrangements could be made. I discovered, too, that after her so-called disgrace, my mother had changed her name from Wilson to Fenwick, which had been her mother’s maiden-name.

  The news paralysed me! Bastard, by-blow, I called myself, preferring to flagellate myself with unpleasant-sounding words used by the vulgar rather than the milder politenesses of ‘illegitimate’ or ‘natural’. Born on the wrong side of the blanket. I worked no more that day, but fled to the marshes, there to gnash my teeth and cry aloud at this further dirty trick of fate.

  For, you must understand, I had begun to fancy myself socially! In later life, I grew accustomed to the bar-sinister and realised that many another under its shadow had found it no drawback to a useful, even famous life. At the time of the blow, however, when I needed all my powers, it seemed to brand me with the stigma of inferiority and obsessed me so much that had I borne the mark of it on my brow, I could not have suffered more. I had hoped for a socially good marriage and one day saw myself as the husband of one of the group of lovely girls which every Saturday afternoon titupped along on horseback past my surgery from the nearby riding-school. They were daughters of the well-to-do of the town and I had set myself the task of raising myself to their level.

  Now I felt flung down among the drabs and outcasts. Had Mr. Hardcastle been alive, I might have found comfort in his sympathy and restoring counsel. But he was dead and there was nobody to whom I could turn. I alternately reproached my mother for her stubborn pride, her humility, her lack of consideration for me, and cursed and called down vengeance on the head of the man who had caused all the misfortunes of my mother and myself. I alternated in an unhinged and maudlin sentimentality and uncontrolled rage. I even meditated putting an end to my existence by an overdose of my own laughing gas, but got drunk instead.

  At length, the mental ferment into which my mother’s letter had thrown me, died down, leaving a hard core of resolution. In spite of her silence and precautions, I determined to find my father and make him pay for his treachery and the life of agony he had inflicted on my mother and to which he had condemned me.

  Among my mother’s belongings was a faded photograph taken before my birth and presumably before she met her seducer. It bore the name of a photographer in Hull. I hastened to Yorkshire, neglecting my business and everything else under the lash of my resolve. The firm mentioned on the picture had become defunct years ago, they told me. I searched the out-of-date voters’ lists in the city library, for the name of my mother’s family. There were scores of voters bearing that surname. Without stopping even to eat, I tramped here and there seeking a clue. It rained hard as I rushed hither and thither and I must have been a sorry sight as I presented myself at various houses, where I was invariably received with great civility in spite of my disreputable appearance.

  Six names on my list had vanished altogether. The seventh hit the mark! In the house already occupied for twelve years by a family called Joyf
ull, if you please, the previous tenant had been one William Wilson, captain of a river barge.

  “You want to ask Mrs. Bates in th’end house,” said Mrs. Joyfull, an enormous, good-natured woman, who looked as though she would have great difficulty in getting through the doorway of the dwelling where I found her. “She’s lived in this street for fifty years and’ll keep-on doin’, too, till they carry ’er out feet-first or her house comes from together.”

  Mrs. Bates knew all about it. A little, wiry one of uncertain age, but very old and wearing a snow-white apron or “brat,” as she called it.

  “Yes, Will Wilson lived at Number 14 till he died. A sad man, he was, after he’d turned his daughter out of doors. A stern, unbendin’ sort, ’e was … And ’er, pore thing, left in the lurch by a man who was courtin’ her, and her own father quotin’ the Bible to prove how the way of transgressors was hard. So the girl went off somewhere and nobody never saw ’er agen. Old Wilson was sorry when it was too late …”

  “Who was the man?” I almost screamed, hardly able to contain myself.

  Mrs. Bates regarded me suspiciously and her mouth tightened.

  “What d’you want to know for?”

  “I’m a solicitor trying to trace Miss Wilson,” I improvised on the spot, rather cleverly I thought. “There’s money for her.”

  “What does it matter then who he was? He’ll want none o’ thy brass, I can tell you,” she replied. “He’s made his fortune, and no mistake. Guess that’s why he left ’er in the lurch when he found out she were in the fambly way, pore lass. Didn’t want no dockside girl for ’is wife … aimed higher nor that …”

  “His name …?” I asked chokingly, like poor Punchinello.

  I could have wrung her neck in my anguish, but whilst seething inwardly, I managed to be patient. I almost feared that the unkind fates might strike her dead or bear her off, like Elijah, in a heavenly chariot before her secret was out.

  “Ware, his name was. Gideon Ware. Now he’s Sir Gideon Ware and much good may it do him … Why! Whatever’s the matter, mister?”

  My search successful, my goaded body protested against the spirit which had driven it, without food or drink, through pouring rain, throughout the length and breadth of Hull and I fell fainting across the beautifully clean doorstep of old Mrs. Bates.

  CHAPTER TWENTY - THINGS PAST—II

  Never in my life have I sailed calm seas for long at once. It is as though my very presence is a challenge to the elements or fates, which, for some fortunate ones, leave the waters untroubled for great stretches of life. There has never been any respite for me. Perhaps that is why I contemplate the deeds I have done without a qualm.

  I had just nicely accustomed myself to being my own master and a professional man, and was beginning to aspire hopefully towards those higher social spheres in which I intended to move and from which I would choose my wife. Then the whole of my plans were thrown into a turmoil by Dulcie Cherry!

  Dulcie Cherry! The name is enough! Where she got it from heaven only knows. In moments of ironical humour I used to call her Dulcinea del Toboso to dazzle her with my learning. She retorted by somehow discovering the origin of the name and, apparently having read Sancho Panza’s description of the wench, took it as an amorous compliment and grew coy with me. How she would roll her eyes at me and simper! For she had fine eyes. In fact, she was too fine altogether for my liking. A lovely figure and lush bosom, the latter frequently displayed by gaping blouses or tight jumpers. Her face was pretty and shapely and her black hair crowned the lot very fittingly. A perfect Carmen! Except that she was stupid. I can’t bear stupid people. It spoils the loveliest women for me, just as other men might recoil from ill-kept finger-nails, thick ankles, dingy teeth, or a nervous tick. A very Venus herself is repulsive under such disadvantages. Murders have been committed for less.

  Dulcie—I shudder as I write the name—Dulcie was the daughter of the woman who “obliged” by cleaning my quarters and answering the door-bell. Mrs. Cherry herself was a large, flat-faced, shuffling woman, who had quarters in the basement. Her underground habits gave her features an etiolated look from want of fresh air and light. Her complexion, pitted by some past disease, was powdered to hide the scars and reminded one of the cratered surface of the moon. Her one ambition was to see her lovely daughter settled for life and she was prepared to go to any lengths to achieve it. As it was bound to do, her glassy eye soon fell on me.

  I began to find Dulcie about the house more, ostensibly relieving her dropsical mother. The girl worked in a local shop, and as soon as her day’s work was done, appeared at the surgery, quite without my consent. She made a dead-set at me right away. Her cheeks grew flushed in my presence, her eyes sparkled, her lips became moist and inviting, and her hips undulated voluptuously as she came and went before my eyes. I was the chosen victim and her’s was the ritual dance.

  How it might have ended I don’t know, for in spite of her silly style, her tactics were such as caused the blood to beat in my ears out of sheer desire. I could never have loved her. The competition of the riding-school was still too great, but her flesh drew me like a magnet and the one false step between me and destruction might easily have been taken had not Mrs. Cherry, in her anxiety, sprung the trap too soon.

  She had latterly resorted to mothering me in a most revolting fashion. She gave me advice about my health, fussily attended to my comforts, told me how the shop-keepers cheated me, and spoke her mind concerning my physical and moral welfare. I wanted a nice little wife, she said. Not content with that, she followed-up with a bolder card, like a fanatical whist player, who, intent on sweeping the board, plays aces and kings with reckless abandon, forgetting that the trumps of her adversaries are not exhausted.

  “My Dulcie’s fond of you,” she said confidentially one day, in a burst of effrontery inspired by the gin bottle, to which she resorted in times of emergency. And with that, she almost took me by the throat and wrung a proposal from me on the spot.

  The pupils of the riding-school cantered by as she spoke, and I recoiled speechless, my thoughts in confusion.

  She must have sensed my repulsion and all my objections in a brief intuitive flash for, from being a wheedling, fawning match-maker she suddenly turned into a tiger, defending this time, instead of peddling, her young.

  “And why not?” she yelled. “My girl’s as good as you any day. And better. Come to that, I wouldn’t allow her to marry a common shrimp like you. Son of a charwoman and no better than she should be …”

  She got no farther. I had her by the throat, choking the life out of her. A red mist engulfed me. I thought only of the insult to my mother.

  Mrs. Cherry’s windpipe was too lost in fat to be closed. She contrived to yell the house down in spite of my efforts. Two waiting patients rushed in and tore us asunder.

  It ended in being what looked like a first-class local scandal. And then a strange thing happened. Instead of making a full-dress court affair of it, the police acted as intermediaries between the parties and hushed up the whole business. I gracelessly begged the pardon of Mrs. Cherry, paid-up the suggested damages for injuries to throat, nerves and pride, and then packed-up and left the accursed place for good. Who would patronise a dentist who’d just missed an indictment for attempted murder? Besides, whenever the girls from the riding-school met me after that, they stared, put their heads together, whispered and laughed.

  “There’s that appohling dentist,” I overheard one of them say. “Traved to strengle his miftruss.”

  “Appohling! Ameyzing! Fezzinating! Fentestic! Gawstly! Too, too praceless!” replied her equestrian friends in the language they assumed was cultured, and which at length revolted me so much that I was glad to leave them behind for good.

  But here I go, singing my swan-song, polishing my periods, airing my new gift of words, as though I had all the time of eternity at my disposal.

  Let me now say a word about the strange attitude of the police. The man in charge of the ca
se was one Sergeant Boumphrey. For some reason—later to become clear—he adopted the role of mediator and settled the matter out of court.

  I left Follington with little money with which to bless myself, thanks to the abominable Cherries who seemed to know just how much I could afford to pay and wrung it all from me. The practice was worth nothing, for was I not a quack?

  There was only one place for me to choose. Westcombe. Sir Gideon Ware, the one who had wronged my mother and imposed on me a life of miserable bastardy, was there. I could not have gone elsewhere, for that evil man drew me as a magnet attracts steel. I would keep him under my eye. The town was growing as a resort and perhaps I could build-up a practice in it from scratch. Besides, I’d make Ware pay.

  Time presses. I must abandon style and summarise a bit.

  I made a good start in Westcombe and soon had enough patients to earn a living. Meanwhile, Sergeant Boumphrey, my benefactor at Follington, turned up here as Chief Constable. Obviously, he had blackmailed Ware into getting him the appointment and, probably, my history was involved in it. I never got to the bottom of it, for I never cultivated Boumphrey’s acquaintance. A pompous upstart! But one more reason for caution.