The Secret House of Death

by Ruth Rendell

  ‘Down here,’ Magdalene Heller said. It was a narrow street of tiny slum houses. Ahead he could see a tall chimney, a gasometer. ‘What’s the hurry?’

  ‘It’s not exactly a beauty spot, is it? Not the sort of place one wants to hang about in.’

  She sighed, then touched his hand lightly with one fingertip. ‘Would you stop a moment, David? I have to get cigarettes.’

  Why couldn’t she have bought them in London? Anyway, the three or four she had smoked had come from a nearly full pack. He could see a shop on the corner and he could see that it was closed.

  Reluctantly he pulled into the kerb. They were quite alone and unobserved. ‘I’m so lonely, David,’ she said. ‘Be nice to me.’ Her face was close to his and he could see every pore in that smooth fungoid skin, mushroom skin, rubbery as he could guess that too-perfect, pneumatic body to be. There was a highlight on her lips where she had licked them. ‘Oh, David,’ she whispered.

  It was like a dream, a nightmare. It couldn’t be happening. As if in a nightmare, for a moment he was stiff and powerless. She touched his cheek, stroking it, then curled her warm hands around his neck. He told himself that he had been wrong about her, that she was desperately lonely, devastated, longing for comfort, so he put his arms around her. The full wet lips he by-passed, pressing his cheek against hers.

  He stayed like that for perhaps thirty seconds, but when her mouth closed on his neck with sea-anemone suction, he took his arms from her shoulders.

  ‘Come on,’ he said. ‘People can see us.’ There was no one to see. ‘Let’s get you home, shall we?’ He had to prise her off him, a new and quelling experience. She was breathing heavily and her eyes were sullen. Her mouth drooped pathetically.

  ‘Come and have a meal with me,’ she said. Her voice had a dismayed whine in it. ‘Please do. I can cook for you. I’m a good cook, really I am. You mustn’t judge by what I was giving Bernard that night. He didn’t care what he ate.’

  ‘I can’t, Magdalene.’ He was too embarrassed to look at her.

  ‘But you’ve come all this way. I want to talk to you.’ Incredibly, the hand came back to his knee. ‘Don’t leave me all alone.’

  He didn’t know what to do. On the one hand, she was a widow, young, poor, her husband dead only days before. No decent man could abandon her. He had already abandoned the husband, and the husband had killed himself. But on the other hand, there was her outrageous behaviour, the clumsy seduction attempt. There was nothing cynical in concluding her offer of a meal was just eyewash. But was he justified in leaving her? He was a grown man, reasonably experienced; he could protect himself, and under the peculiar circumstances, do so with tact. Above all, he wondered why he need protect himself. Was she a nymphomaniac, or so unhinged by shock as to be on the edge of a mental breakdown? He wasn’t so vain as to suppose against all previous evidence to the contrary, that women were spontaneously and violently attracted to him. The wild notion that he might suddenly have developed an irresistible sex appeal crossed his mind to be immediately dismissed as fantastic.

  ‘I don’t know, Magdalene,’ he said doubtfully. They passed the prison or barrack wall and they passed the lighted cinema. There was a long bus queue at the stop by the park. David heard himself let out a small sound, a gasp, a stifled exclamation. His hands went damp and slithered on the wheel. Bernard Heller stood at the tail of the queue, reading his evening paper.

  Of course, it wasn’t Bernard. This man was even bigger and heavier, his face more ox-like, less intelligent than Bernard’s. If David hadn’t already been jumpy and bewildered he would have known at once it was the twin brother, Carl who had borrowed the slide pojector. But they were uncannily alike. The resemblance made David feel a bit sick.

  He pulled the car in alongside the queue and Carl Heller lumbered into the back. Magdalene had gone rather pale. She introduced them snappily, her accent more pronounced.

  ‘David’s going to have dinner with me, Carl.’ She added as if she had a part-share in the car and more than a part-share in David, ‘We’ll drop you off first.’

  ‘I can’t stay for dinner, Magdalene,’ David said firmly. The presence of Bernard’s twin both discomfited him and gave him strength. Here were capable hands in which he could safely leave the girl. ‘I’m afraid I don’t know where you live.’

  Magdalene said something that sounded like Copenhagen Street and she had begun on a spate of directions when David felt a heavy hand, grotesquely like the comedy scene hand of the law, lower itself on to his shoulder and rest there.

  ‘She’s in no fit state for company tonight, Mr Chadwick.’ The voice was more guttural than Bernard’s. There was more in that sentence than a polite way of telling someone he wasn’t wanted. David heard in it self-appointed ownership, pride, sorrow and—yes, perhaps jealousy. ‘I’ll look after her,’ Carl said. ‘That’s what my poor brother would have wanted. She’s had a bad day, but she’s got me.’

  David thought he had never heard anyone speak so ponderously, so slowly. The English was correct and idiomatic, yet it sounded like a still difficult foreign tongue. You would grow so bored, exasperated even, if you had to listen to this man talking for long.

  Magdalene had given up. She said no more until they reached Hengist House. Whatever she had been trying on, she had given it up.

  ‘Thanks for the lift.’

  ‘I’m glad I saw you,’ David said untruthfully. Carl’s face was Bernard’s, unbearably pathetic, dull with grief, and David heard himself say in a useless echo of his words to the dead man, ‘Look, if there’s anything I can do . . .’

  ‘No one can do anything.’ The same answer, the same tone. Then Carl said, ‘Time will do it.’

  Magdalene lagged back. ‘Good night, then,’ David said. He watched Carl take her arm, propelling her, while she tugged a little and looked back, like a child whose father has come to fetch it home from a dangerous game with the boy next door.

  8

  Julian and Susan had tried to be very civilised and enlightened. They had to meet for Julian to see his son. It had seemed wiser to try to maintain an unemotional friendship and Susan had known this would be difficult. How difficult, how nearly impossible, she hadn’t envisaged. When life went smoothly, she preferred not to be reminded of Julian’s existence and his telephone calls—incongruously more frequent at such times—were an uncomfortable disruption of peace. But when she was unhappy or nervous she expected him to know it and to a certain degree be a husband to her again, as if he were in fact a husband separated from his wife for perhaps business reasons, who had to live far away.

  She knew this was an impossible hope, totally unreasonable. Nothing on earth would have made her disclose this feeling to anyone else. Julian had his own life to lead.

  But was it so unreasonable to expect at this time some sign of concern from him? Louise’s death had been in all the newspapers; tonight both evening papers featured the inquest. Julian was an avid reader of newspapers and the fact that the two Evenings had been delivered to her house, were now spread on the table before her, was a hangover from her marriage to Julian who expected his wife to be well-informed.

  That he still hadn’t phoned showed a careless disregard for her that changed her loneliness from a gathering depression to a panicky terror that no one in the world cared whether she lived or died. To spend the evening and night alone here suddenly seemed a worse ordeal to pass through than any she had encountered since her divorce. For the first time she resented Paul. But for him, she could have gone out tonight, gone to the pictures, rooted out a friend from the past. Here in this house there was nothing else to think about but Louise and the only conversation possible an interchange between herself and her alter ego. The sentences almost spoke themselves aloud, the answerless questions. Could she have helped? Could she have changed the course of things? How was she going to stand days, weeks, months of this house? Above all, how to cope with Paul?

  He had gone on and on that evening about Louise and t
he man. Because someone had told him Louise had loved this man, he found curious childish parallels between her case and that of his parents. Susan too had found parallels and she couldn’t answer him. She reproached herself for her inadequacy but she was glad when at last he fell silent and slid the beloved cars out of their boxes, playing with absorption until bedtime.

  So it was unforgivable to feel this mounting anger when she went to her desk and saw how he had left it, a multistoried car park with miniscule bonnet and fender protruding from every slot and cranny. Black tyre marks were scored across each of the top three sheets of her typescript. Unforgivable to be angry, cruel perhaps not to control that anger.

  But the words were out when she was halfway up the stairs, before she could stop herself and count to ten through set teeth.

  ‘How many times have I told you to leave my things alone? You’re never to do it again, never! If you do, I won’t let you wear your watch for a whole week.’

  Paul gave a heart-breaking wail. He made a grab for the watch, pulling it from its velvet-lined case, and cradling it against his face. Desperately near tears herself, Susan fell on her knees beside him and took him in her arms.

  ‘Stop crying. You mustn’t cry.’

  ‘I’ll never do it again, only you’re not to take my watch.’ How quickly a child’s tears evaporated! They left no trace, no ugly swollen redness. Louise’s weeping had left her face furrowed, old, distraught.

  Paul watched her with a child’s sharp intuition. ‘I can’t go to sleep, Mummy,’ he said. ‘I don’t like this house any more.’ His voice was small and muffled against her shoulder. ‘Will they catch the man and put him in prison?’

  ‘He’s dead too, darling.’

  ‘Are you sure? Roger’s mother said he’d gone away, but she said Mrs North had gone away too. Suppose he isn’t dead and he comes back here?’

  Susan left the light on in his bedroom and the light on on the landing. When she got downstairs again she lit the twentieth cigarette of the day, but the smoke seemed to choke her, starting a long spasm of coughing. It left her shivering with cold. She ground out the cigarette, turned up the central heating and, going to the phone, dialled Julian’s number.

  Tonight, when nothing went right and all things seemed antagonistic, it would have to be Elizabeth who answered.

  ‘Hallo, Elizabeth. Susan.’

  ‘Susan . . .’ The echoed name hung in the air. As always, Elizabeth’s gruff schoolgirlish voice held a note of doubt. The impression was that she knew quite ten Susans, all of whom were likely to telephone her and announce themselves without surname or other qualification.

  ‘Susan Townsend.’ It was grotesque, almost past bearing. ‘May I have a word with Julian?’

  ‘Sure, if you want. He’s just finishing his mousse.’ How those two harped on food! They had plenty in common; one day, no doubt, they would share obesity. ‘Good thing you rang now. We’re just off for our weekend with Mummy.’

  ‘Have a good time.’

  ‘We always have a great time with Mummy. I do think all this killing in Matchdown Park is the end, and you up to your neck in it. But I expect you kept cool. You always do, don’t you? I’ll just fetch Julian.’

  He sounded as if his mouth was full.

  ‘How are you, Julian?’

  ‘I am well.’

  Susan wondered if her sigh of exasperation was audible at the other end. ‘Julian, I expect you’ve read about all this business out here. What I want to ask you is, d’you mind if we sell this house? I want to move as soon as possible. I can’t remember the way our joint property is tied up but I know it’s complicated and we both have to agree.’

  ‘You must do exactly as you like, my dear.’ Had he brought the mousse with him? It sounded as if he was eating while he talked. ‘You’re absolutely free. I shan’t interfere at all. Only don’t think of taking less than ten thousand and wherever you choose to make your new home, see it’s within distance of a decent school for my son and a good prep school when the time comes.’ He swallowed and said breezily, ‘Just put it in some agent’s hands and let him do the lot. And if I meet anyone pining to vegetate in salubrious Matchdown Park I’ll send him along. Tell me, were we ever on more than nodding terms with these Norths?’

  ‘You weren’t on more than nodding terms with anyone. Sneering terms might be more accurate.’

  For a moment she thought he was offended. Then he said, ‘You know, Susan, you’ve got a lot more waspish since we parted. It’s rather becoming, almost makes me . . . well, no I won’t say that. Rather a sexy-looking fellow, this North, as I recall, and a quasi-professional job, surely?’

  ‘He’s a quantity surveyor.’

  ‘Whatever that may be. I suppose you and he are living in each other’s pockets now, popping in and out of each other’s houses. No wonder you want to move.’

  ‘I don’t imagine I shall ever speak to him again,’ said Susan. Julian muttered something about finishing dinner, packing, setting off for Lady Maskell’s. She said good-bye quickly because she knew she was going to cry. The tears rolled down her cheeks and she didn’t bother to wipe them away. Every time Julian talked to her she hoped for kindness and consideration, forgetting for the moment that this was how he had always spoken to other people, waspishly, lightly, frivolously. She was the other people now and the tender kindness was Elizabeth’s.

  And yet she didn’t love him any more. It was the habit of being a wife, of coming first in a man’s scheme of things, that she missed. When you were married you couldn’t ever be quite alone. You might be on your own which was different. And whoever she begged to come to her now would look on her necessarily as a nuisance, a bore that separated them from the person they would prefer to be with.

  For all that, she considered phoning Doris or even Mrs Dring. Her pride prevented her as her fingers inched towards the receiver.

  Paul had fallen asleep. She covered him up, washed and redid her face. There was no point in it, but she sensed that if she were to go to bed now, at seven-thirty, it might become a precedent. You went to bed early because there was nothing to stay up for. You lay in bed late because getting up meant facing life.

  She was going to move. Cling on to that, she thought, cling on to that. Never again to see the cherry trees come into crêpe paper bloom, the elms swaying above the cemetery, the three dull red pinpoints burning by the roadworks trench. Never again to run to a window because a dog barked or watch Bob North’s headlights swing across the ceiling and the in a wobble of shadow against the wall.

  They were glazing through the room now. Susan pulled the curtains across. She opened a new packet of cigarettes and this time the smoke didn’t make her cough. Her throat felt dry and rough. That must be the intense heat. Why did she keep feeling alternately cold and hot? She went outside to adjust the heating once more, but stopped, jumping absurdly with shock, when the front door bell rang.

  Who would call on her at this hour? Not surely those friends of her marriage, Dian, Greg, Minta, their consciences alerted by the evening papers? The dog hadn’t barked. It must be Betty or Doris.

  The man on the doorstep cleared his throat as she put her hand to the latch. The sound, nervous, gruff, diffident, told her who it was before she opened the door. She felt an unpleasant thrill of trepidation that melted quickly into pure relief that anyone at all had come to call on her. Then, coughing again, as nervous as he, she let Bob North in.

  At once he made it clear that this wasn’t a mere doorstep call and Susan, who had told Julian she would probably never be on more than remote terms with her neighbour, was curiously glad when he walked straight into the living-room as if he were a friend and a regular visitor. Then she told herself with self-reproach, that Bob had far more cause to be lonely and unhappy than she.

  His face now bore no sign of the misery and bitterness to which he had given vent in court and although he again apologised for Susan’s involvement in his affairs, he said nothing of why he had come. Susa
n had already put her sympathy and her sorrow for him into awkward words and now she could find nothing to say. That he had come with definite purpose was made clear by his nervous manner and the narrow calculating look he gave her as they faced each other in the warm untidy room.

  ‘Were you busy? Am I interrupting something?’

  ‘Of course not.’ His loss made him different from other men, a pariah, someone you had to treat warily, yet appear to be no different. She wanted to behave both as if the tragedy had never happened and at the same time as if he were deserving of the most solicitous consideration. An odd reflection came to her, that it was impossible to feel much pity for anyone as good-looking as Bob. His appearance called for envy from men and a peculiarly humiliating admiration from women. If the tragedy hadn’t happened and he had called like this, she would have felt ill-at-ease alone with him.

  ‘Won’t you sit down?’ she said stiffly. ‘Can I get you a drink?’

  ‘That’s very sweet of you.’ He took the bottle and the glasses from her. ‘Let me.’ She watched him pour gin into a glass and fill it high with bitter lemon. ‘What can I get you? No, don’t shake your head . . .’ He gave a very faint crooked grin, the first smile she had seen on his face since Louise’s death. ‘This is going to be a long session, Susan, if you’ll bear with me.’

  ‘Of course,’ she murmured. This, then, was the purpose of his visit, to talk to one near enough to listen, far enough to discard when the unburdening was complete. Louise had tried to do the same, Louise had died first. Somewhere in all this there was a curious irony. Bob’s dark blue eyes were on her, fixed, cool, yet doubtful as if he had still a choice to make and wondered whether he was choosing wisely.

  She moved away from him to sit down and the sofa suddenly seemed peculiarly soft and yielding. A moment ago she had been glad to see Bob; now she felt only deeply tired. Bob walked the length of the room, turned sharply and, taking a roll of paper from his pocket, dropped it on the coffee table between them. He had an actor’s grace, an actor’s way of moving because he had studied and learnt those movements. Susan thought this with slight surprise and then she wondered if his gestures looked calculated because he was keeping them under a painful control.