The Benefits of Death

by Roderic Jeffries

  They were dark and dismal, and they depressed him as woods always did. He was startled by a rustling noise and when he turned sharply he saw a grey squirrel run, with undulating movement and raised tail, to a large oak tree behind which it disappeared. He was not of a sensitive nature, but it did seem to him that the echoes of death were still around.

  He turned right and came to the small pond and the ride where the dog’s head had been found. He continued to the spot where the small grave had been dug and the bullet, dog’s body, handbag, chemist’s bottle, revolver and suitcase had been recovered. On the opposite side was the patch of brambles in which the hairs had been, between the grave and the road. Suppose they had all been wrong? Signposts pointed in two ways.

  He returned to the ride and looked down it. It twisted round in a semicircle, so that from where he stood he could not see, to the north, the point at which it came out to the road. He turned and went southwards. The ride reached the narrowest part of the wood and then, as he entered Roman Woods, it continued parallel to the stream.

  The clay on his wellingtons grew heavier and heavier and he had to keep kicking great clods of it clear. The land on the right began to fall away to form a valley, the banks of which were thick with rhododendrons.

  He came to the first of the lakes, the smallest of the three. Several birds rose from the surface, with a loud slapping of wings on the water, and he identified them as some kind of duck.

  He studied the lake. Rhododendrons came down to the water and the edges were thick with reeds. The other two lakes were much the same, but larger, yet he decided to go forward to see them. Light rain began to fall and he hurriedly put on the plastic mackintosh.

  *

  On his arrival at the police station the following day, Murch went straight to Jaeger’s room. “What’s the use of searching the lakes again?” he snapped, as he strode through the doorway. He reached Jaeger’s desk and leaned on it. “We dragged ’em before. In any case, the bloody man’s been found not guilty.”

  “I want to find the body, sir,” replied Jaeger.

  “All very efficient. But wasn’t it you who assured everyone the body wasn’t in the woods? Wasn’t it?”

  “In a way, sir.”

  “And now you’re changing your tune when it doesn’t matter?”

  “I think it does, sir. Tidies things up.”

  “You can talk about tidy?”

  “As things were, sir, we were right until we believed that because the facts were fitting our theories so neatly, our theories had to be facts: that because the hair on the bramble was between the dead dog and the road, the body must have been dragged to the road. We forgot to discover what Leithan thought of Stymie.”

  “Who the hell’s that?”

  “The dead dog.”

  “Are you trying to tell me…”

  “If he was so fond of it that he could never have shot it, who did? If Mrs. Leithan’s body wasn’t dragged to the road where did it go?”

  Murch spoke loudly. “The woods have all been gone through. There’s nothing there.”

  “Don’t forget, sir, the dog was found pretty soon after we began in Frog Wood. But we still searched the rest of Frog Wood thoroughly, if dutifully because by now we thought we were wasting our time. Then we were told we had to check all two hundred acres of Roman Woods. Now, we knew we were wasting our time. When you know you won’t find anything, it doesn’t surprise you in the least when you don’t, but we even had the lakes dragged in order to stop the defence being able to get clever at the trial — of course, if you’re seriously expecting to find a body in a lake, you don’t admit a blank if dragging gives you no results. You move on to more efficient methods.”

  “Like an army of frog-men?”

  “The ride runs above each of the lakes and the banks are steep, and in some places they’re also relatively clear. A body would roll down into the water with some force — enough to get trapped so securely by the reeds that even if the drag came up to it, it would only pass over it.”

  “The keeper…”

  “I questioned him. He reckons he’s tramped most of the woods since November, but all he’s done at the lakes is to feed the duck.”

  “You know what you’re saying, don’t you?”

  “In what respect, sir?”

  “You’re saying the police made one bloody big mistake.”

  “Perhaps. But it wouldn’t be the first time, and it won’t be the last.”

  “D’you know what the A.C.C. is going to say if you’ve wasted the time of the frog-men?”

  “I can guess, sir.”

  Murch muttered something, then turned and walked out of the room. Jaeger absentmindedly began to pack the bowl of his pipe with tobacco. He looked down at the paper-work on his desk and sighed. The telephone rang.

  “Watters, sir. She was there, hooked up so well the bloke said it was as if she’d been knitted into the reeds. Three feet below the surface of the biggest lake.”

  Chapter XIX

  Georgina Yerby was patently suspicious and resentful as she climbed out of the battered Austin Seven van and stared briefly at Lower Brakebourne Farm, which was looking beautiful and mellow against the stormy sky. She was dressed in her working tweeds: skirt and coat hung loosely against her angular figure. “I got your letter,” she said to Leithan, as he closed the van door after she had climbed out.

  He resisted the desire to point out that that was explicit in her presence. “I hope you’ll accept them.”

  She put on an old and dirty mackintosh and it was difficult to know whether it was by accident or design that she ignored his proffered help. “You didn’t mention a price?”

  “I don’t want any money for them, Georgina.”

  She tried not to show how relieved she was. “It’s… It’s very decent of you.”

  “I hope you’ll have plenty of success with them.”

  “They’re good foundation stock. I’ll cross the dog with my bitch on her next heat and the bitch puppies can be put to the secretary’s dog.”

  “Let’s collect them and then have a drink.”

  “Not for me, thanks. I’ve got to get back to organise everything.”

  They walked round behind the belt of ornamental trees. The kennel-maid had already boxed up Nemean and Lernaean and at a word from Leithan she left to take them to the van. “I’ll send you all their papers and things,” he said. “We mustn’t forget to notify the Kennel Club of the transfer.”

  “No.”

  They became silent. Each searched for something to say and failed. The kennel-maid returned and tried to persuade Ceryneian into the wire-fronted box. The bitch yowled and, with unusual dexterity, evaded capture until Leithan gave a hand. Erymanthian gave up without a struggle and seemed on the point of physical collapse.

  “Won’t you miss them?” asked Georgina Yerby.

  “Not in the least.”

  “I’m very grateful.”

  That conversation ceased. Leithan longed for the peace of her departure, and she wanted to escape from the sense of obligation.

  The kennel-maid collected Hippolyte and Cerberus, and Georgina Yerby and Leithan followed her to the van. A car came up the drive and, with a sense of anger, Leithan realised it was Jaeger’s.

  The noise from within the van became greater. The Cuencas had taken fright and were screaming for help and protection.

  “I’ll be off,” said Georgina Yerby. She had been wondering whether she ought to say something about Evadne, but her uncertainty was now at an end because it was time to go.

  “I hope you’ll make up a champion at Crufts.”

  “It would be rather fun.” She made a very great effort and said: “Pity Stymie won’t be there. Well, good-bye, Charles. I’ll let you know how they get on.” She climbed into the van and he slammed the door shut. The engine fired at the third pull of the starter. She drove off’ and the noise of the dogs died away.

  Jaeger left his car. “‘Morning, Mr. Leithan. I
s that the end of the dogs?”

  “Yes.”

  “Can we go inside, sir? I’ve some news for you.”

  “What kind of news?”

  Jaeger took the initiative and walked round to the front door. They went into the house and from the sitting-room came the shrill hum of a vacuum cleaner. “We’d better use the study,” said Leithan.

  When they were in the study, Jaeger said: “I’m sorry to tell you, sir, we’ve found the body of your wife.”

  Leithan’s mind tried to panic, but he forced himself to think coherently. He knew he was being closely watched, but could do nothing to stop his hands trembling. “Where was she?”

  “In the third lake in Roman Woods.”

  Leithan sat down and fumbled in his coat pocket for his cigarette-case. He remembered how Pamela had told him he would only be able to fulfil his promise as a writer if he paddled in the dung of life. Was this sufficiently dungy?

  “We had to conduct a post-mortem, of course.”

  “Yes,” said Leithan. His fingers dug into the palms of his hands.

  “Mrs. Leithan died from a coronary thrombosis.”

  “A…a what?”

  “Coronary thrombosis, sir, following an acute attack of angina.”

  Leithan said hoarsely: “I must have a drink.” He went into the sitting-room, where Mrs. Andrews was startled by his expression, and he returned with a bottle of whisky, a soda siphon, and two glasses on a tray. He poured out two drinks without bothering to ask if the other wanted one.

  “I’m afraid the story isn’t a pleasant one,” said Jaeger.

  Leithan drank quickly. Suddenly, he remembered to hand the second glass across.

  “Much of it, anyway, must be guesswork. Your wife hated Mrs. Breslow and obviously tried every possible way to break up the relationship. When she failed, she determined to make you suffer for it and the most obvious way to do that was to divorce you and so cut you out of the trust fund. Without money, she was certain you would be lost.

  “She went to the solicitors in Tenterden to discover how to gain a divorce and learned she would have to prove adultery. Her first way to try to do this was to have you watched by a private detective when she was not at home. However, you’d been too cautious and his reports didn’t provide the evidence she needed.

  “When it seemed it was going to be denied her, that divorce became more important to her than anything else in the world: even more important than making her Cuenca the first champion in England.

  “She was certain that if she disappeared you would become careless about your relationship with Mrs. Breslow: further, if her disappearance looked like death, your carelessness would be such that you would afford her the evidence of adultery she so desperately needed. So she decided to vanish on the way to a meeting everyone would swear blind she’d attend while an ounce of breath remained in her body.

  “She made you drive her to the station on the eighteenth, but wouldn’t let you see her on to the platform. After you’d gone, she put her plan into operation — and how she must have blessed the fog!

  “This is where we come to the guesswork. Mrs. Leithan was making for Margate or Ramsgate, where even in November there would be enough people to render her anonymous. Anonymous, that was, if she didn’t have the dog with her, because that was sufficiently unusual to identify her immediately. She must have drugged it before she left home with some fit and hysteria pills or something like that, and when you’d dropped her at the station the dog was sufficiently dopey to be put into the suitcase without causing trouble. We know the case was only a quarter full of clothes so that there was plenty of room and also that there were a number of dog hairs on the pyjamas. I suppose I’d better admit that I merely thought that proved she took the dog to bed with her.

  “She walked into the town and caught a Canterbury bus. She left this at Frog Wood and went into the wood along the main ride. Soon, she turned off to find a spot in which to kill the dog.

  “At first, it may seem strange she did kill it, but I’m sure it isn’t if you stop to realise that that animal had come to mean to her far more than just a dog. It was hers, but it gave all its affections to you and that infuriated her: you had stolen it, just as you had stolen the marriage. She knew, therefore, that if she killed it, she would be destroying something you loved and that would give her a revenge she so desperately desired. To date, all the victories had been yours: now, you could be made to suffer a defeat that would hurt. Finally, when the dog was dead, she could no longer own the first Cuenca Champion and, in her mind, it would have been you and no one else who deprived her of this chance. She could hate you for ever for denying her her ambition.

  “She had brought along your revolver and some ammunition. She dug a shallow grave, rested the doped dog by this grave, took aim, and fired. Her first shot missed, because her mental state bordered on temporary madness and in any case she knew nothing about revolvers. She went much closer and fired again and this time was successful.

  “She must have been a sad and ghastly sight, revolver in one hand, the dog a bloody mess at her feet. Everything she had fought for had now been destroyed. Her passion became so great that she suffered an acute attack of angina. The pain gripped her and all her thoughts were now turned to the relief that she must gain from her tablets. She collapsed to the ground and had to crawl across to where she’d left the handbag. In this struggle, she went through a patch of bramble and her hair was caught up on the thorns and some of it was torn out of her scalp. Eventually, she got the bottle from her handbag and she either took a tablet and replaced the screw top or else she did not even have the strength to open the bottle.

  “The worst of the pain passed. Mentally confused, terribly frightened by what had almost been a fatal attack, she slowly struggled to her feet. Gone was all thought of what she had intended to do: in her mind there was only room for her need of medical attention. She stumbled back to the ride and turned on to it — and in her terrible confusion went the wrong way. She entered Roman Woods.

  “She met no road, no passers-by, no one to help her — only more and more wood. Perhaps she believed her mind was playing her false and she panicked, tried to move more quickly. She came to the third lake and began to climb the ride, which is quite steep, when nature cried enough. She suffered a coronary thrombosis, died instantly, fell sideways, and rolled down the bank into the water where she was caught up in the long reeds.” Jaeger finished his drink. He watched Leithan pour himself a second one.

  Leithan used a handkerchief to mop his face. “Are you sure?” he muttered.

  “She did not die from angina.”

  “But…but you said she might not have managed to unscrew the cap of the bottle which had her pills in it.”

  “One of the popular medical misconceptions is that if an angina patient fails to take a tablet right away, he’ll fall down dead. It can happen, but it’s not likely.”

  Leithan stubbed out his cigarette and immediately lit another. He finished his drink.

  “The fact that Mrs. Leithan didn’t draw a large sum of money just before she disappeared is obviously because she expected to stay in a hotel. At the end of her stay, she would pay by cheque because as soon as you’d become careless enough to provide the evidence of adultery, she was returning to life.”

  Leithan twisted his empty glass round in his hands. He looked up. “Will Mrs. Breslow be charged with perjury?”

  “I’d like to meet the jury who’d convict a woman of perjury when it was her lies that saved an innocent man from being wrongly convicted of murder.”

  “Thank God,” whispered Leithan softly.

  Jaeger stood up. “I must be off.”

  “Have another drink? Stay to lunch?” Leithan spoke so excitedly that the words jumbled into each other.

  “I’d like to, but I can’t right now.”

  “Some other time, then?”

  “It’s a date, sir.” Jaeger took two paces towards the door, then he stopped. “A
ll the personal things belonging to Mrs. Leithan that the police have been holding are outside in my car. Would you like them?”

  “I…I think so, please.” Leithan followed the other out of the house and stood by the car as the detective reached inside and brought out the revolver, handbag, suitcase, and leather collar. “I hope these won’t hold too painful memories.” As Jaeger spoke, he was looking at the dog collar. “By the way, Mr. Leithan, I’d throw that bottle of tablets away, if I were you — it’s never safe to keep old medicine about the place.”

  After Jaeger had driven away, Leithan turned and stared at the house. It, the hundred and eight acres, the cows, all were his. He walked across and felt the roughness of the old bricks.

  He returned to the study and poured himself out a third whisky. How could he celebrate? The answer came to him immediately. Continue with the ordinary routine of life because that was the greatest gift to a man who had so nearly lost it.

  He placed the revolver, dog collar, handbag, and suitcase, on the desk. He was glad Stymie had died quickly.

  He opened the handbag. He smelled the scent she had always used and just for a moment he hesitated. Then he reached inside and brought out the chemist’s bottle. Quickly, he undid the screw cap and rolled the tablets on to the blotting-paper.

  *

  At first he could not see it. Then he picked it out. The tablet that was slightly different in colour and shape.

  *

  What did a man do when he was forced to choose between two courses and dared take neither?

  From the beginning, it had been obvious that Evadne’s death was the only solution. His mind, trained to construct a whole story from a single idea, had whirled into a series of fantasies. Shooting, stabbing, hanging, poisoning… He had always understood his own character and had therefore known he would never dare to poison her — but what about the tablets she took to counter an attack of angina? Suppose one of those was not what it should have been? A negative would kill and because it was negative there could be no possibility of a positive suspicion.