Two Crime Novelettes: The Revenge of Darian Devlin and A Singular Murder
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Now came the worst bit; the sting in the tale, so to speak. You can imagine that I’d rehearsed each part of my plan a hundred times in my head, but it wasn’t until the day when the couple walked down the path that it had struck me that I could hardly leave the damn rope floating in the water. Now it was time to put into practice the only solution to that problem that I’d been able to come up with. I quickly took off my boots and stripped off all my clothes and, after taping the penknife not too tightly to my right thigh, I lowered myself into the water with the rope in my hand.
I’d always been a strong swimmer, but the temperature of that water was enough to knock the stuffing out of anybody, so I stood there up to my chest until I’d got used to it. I then paddled out, pulling myself along on the rope until I could no longer stay above water, took a deep breath, and hauled and kicked my way down towards the body. I think I was within a couple of feet of it when I ripped the penknife free and cut through the rope, before kicking for the surface with the loose rope still in my hand.
My teeth started to chatter as soon as I climbed out of the water and I dried myself off as quickly as I could, before dressing and heading for my car with the sackful of evidence. I wasted no time in getting away from that lodge, but there were still a couple of things to do before I could breathe easily. There’s a village about half way home from the lodge and I parked on the road near to a pub. There wasn’t a soul around so I took off my wet boots, changed my socks, slipped my shoes on, put the damp socks and the old rain jacket into the sack and set off back to town.
It might seem foolish that I brought the evidence of my evening’s work back home with me, but it was only in our town where I knew of a supermarket whose big waste bins were easy to get at. It wasn’t unusual for people to dump extra rubbish in them and when I’d pushed my sack down under a load of cardboard I finally felt that I was on the home straight. It was yet another risk, but traipsing round a strange town trying to find a suitable place to dump the sack wouldn’t have been very clever either and I couldn’t afford to waste any more time.
After combing the little hair that I had and checking my clothes, I entered my local pub just before last orders and ordered a pint and a whisky chaser. I chatted to a couple of the blokes at the bar and was pleased to hear no news of any missing persons. On my way home I went through the events of the evening in my mind and felt that it had all gone off as well as could be expected. After leaving my walking boots in the garage I went inside to greet Barbara in the knowledge that there was no longer any danger of her finding out about what I’d already decided would be my last ever fling.
I knew I’d hear news of Dennis’s disappearance sometime that week, but I wasn’t as worried as perhaps I ought to have been, especially after it had rained hard all day Monday. It was strange, but I felt so pleased to have finished with the whole episode that I gave little thought to the news that was bound to break sooner or later. There was nothing in Tuesday’s evening paper and I wondered just how few people Dennis had actually known. Linda was no longer in town and I’d never heard him speak about any other relatives.
In Friday’s paper there were two front page columns dedicated to Dennis’s disappearance and a small photograph that made him look even uglier than he really had been. It was thought that he had disappeared while running on the moors on the previous Sunday and the police were reported to have already searched the area with dogs. There was no mention of any relatives and I think that’s why there was no suggestion of any further searches, because it’s only when a missing person’s family start to make a bit of noise that the police get their finger out.
Two fat CID men called in at the factory on the following Tuesday and were pointed in my direction as I’d been his foreman. I told them that the managers, not me, had let him go a few months earlier and that he had taken it badly. I said that I’d been quite friendly with his cousin Linda – in case they found the photo, which I hoped he’d left among other ones – but hadn’t known Dennis very well at all. He was a peculiar bloke, I told them, but I knew he was an experienced runner and doubted very much that anything could have happened to him up on the moors.
“Perhaps he took off somewhere,” I said to the bored coppers.
“Yes,” said the fatter of the two brightly, “there was no sign of a passport in his house. It might be one for missing persons, Bill.”
“It might be, Tom,” Bill said, and I couldn’t have agreed more.
As far as I know, Dennis’s body is still at the bottom of that lodge, but it’ll just be a pile of bones by now. After that first week I only saw his name mentioned in the paper one more time, a few months later when someone remembered to mention that he was still missing. It just shows how insignificant people are, especially if they don’t have much family, so find yourself a good wife, have some kids, and don’t mess around with other women like I did. It just isn’t worth the hassle.