Presumed Dead (18 page)

The house looked dark as they drew near,
but as they climbed up onto the patio and peered in through the glass doors,
they could see some light spilling down the stairs from the galleried landing
above. ‘Looks like he’s upstairs,’ Alice said.

She led them around to the kitchen door,
then retrieved the key from underneath a plant pot that was sitting on the
window ledge. Next to the back door, there was a second door leading into a
small outhouse that had originally been the outside toilet. Now it was used as
a vegetable store.

Alice handed her umbrella to Philippe, and
pointing to the outhouse door said, ‘You can shelter in there if you want, it
will be warmer, I won’t be long.’

‘No, I will wait next to the open door,’ he
said, ‘just in case you need me.’

She unlocked the kitchen door and went to
go through, but then stopped and rushed back to him. Standing on tiptoes, she
reached up and hugged him. ‘Wish me luck,’ she murmured.

He held her trembling body close for a few
seconds. ‘You have nothing to be afraid of, I will be just here,’ he whispered
in her ear. ‘Just remember everything we have talked about.’ She nodded, then
slowly released her grip. They stood looking into each other’s eyes for a few
moments. ‘Have you got your envelope?’ he asked.

She patted her jacket and felt the
statement they had written sitting in her inside breast pocket. ‘Got it right
here,’ she said.

‘Then go and give him hell,’ Philippe said.

A look of determination came over Alice’s
face. She turned and slipped through the back door.

The dull, watery light, filtering through
the windows into the house was enough to illuminate the ground floor to the
extent that Alice could see where she was going. As she made her way through
the kitchen and out into the hall, she could see the light from above was
coming from the master bedroom. There was also a strange, rhythmic, animal like
noise coming from that direction. Alice stood at the foot of the stairs and
listened. At first, she didn’t recognize what she was hearing, then with a
sudden shock of realization, she knew exactly what was going on.

He’s got a woman up there!
Alice’s inner voice shrieked incredulously. Only a few hours after
my funeral and he’s in bed with another woman! How much lower is he going to
sink? She slipped out of her shoes and started to make her way slowly up the
curved staircase, her mind whirling. I knew it… I knew it all along! I wonder
who she is? I wonder if I know her? This is going to be perfect, catching him
with another woman, in flagrante delicto, more ammunition for the divorce.

She reached the top of the stairs and
turned left towards the master bedroom, which was at the far end of the
galleried landing. The noises from the bedroom started growing louder and the
tempo quickened as she crept along with her back to the wall. Just as she got
to her own bedroom door, the noises from inside seemed to reach a crescendo,
and as she stuck her head around the door frame, the full, shocking reality of
the situation hit her like a hammer blow.

In a split second the scene was imprinted
on her mind like a flash photograph. The noose around Alex’s neck, tied on a
thick rope which passed through the iron ring on the ceiling where her delicate
fabrics used to hang. The handcuffs. The blond wig. The women’s underwear he
was wearing. The riding whip her husband was using. The way they were locked
together in a disgusting, degrading, outrageously unnatural act. And the smell…

Alice’s hand flew to her mouth as acid
spurted into the back of her throat. In an instant she’d turned and dashed down
the landing, through her son’s bedroom and into his bathroom. Sinking to her
knees in front of the toilet she whipped the lid up and sent her lunch
splattering against the porcelain, coughing and gagging as the acid seared the
back of her throat.

Slowly the spasms in her stomach subsided
and she sank back on her haunches, wiping her mouth on a piece of toilet paper.
Her face was flushed and burning and she could feel the sweat on her forehead
standing out in beads. She closed her eyes and slumped sideways against the
wall, covering her face with her hands and started to cry uncontrollably.

After a while, the tears stopped but she
stayed huddled there, shocked and numb, until a distant humming noise broke
through into her consciousness, making her mind start to work again, pulling
her slowly out of her dark emotional vacuum. She couldn’t place it at first,
then suddenly realized it was the sound of the power-shower in her en-suite
bathroom making the water pipes vibrate. One of them must be taking a shower,
she thought, which must mean they’ve finished... thank God, I could never face
that sight again.

Abruptly the sound stopped. Things started
to fall into place in Alice’s mind. Lots of little things. Remarks and looks
that had passed between Ross and Alex that she hadn’t understood. The way they
were often away from home at the same time. The way Alex had just appeared overnight
as their secretary. Of course, she would have been suspicious if her husband
had suddenly introduced a woman into the household. But Alex, gentle, friendly,
effeminate little Alex? She’d accepted him without question.

And what a fool they’d made of her!
Carrying on right under her nose! She couldn’t believe she’d been so blind… but
then, what wife would suspect her husband of that? Then she remembered the
summer holidays. Charles and his teenage friends, the way Ross had been all
over the boys in the swimming pool, the wrestling matches, the presents, the
outings, the treats. That made her feel sick again, sick to her stomach. She
was suddenly seized by an iron resolve to give them both exactly what they
deserved.

She stood up weakly, and going to the sink,
splashed cold water on her face, rinsed her mouth and tried to gargle some of
the acid out of the back of her throat. She dried her face on the towel then
stood looking at herself in the mirror. The woman that stared back was cold,
hard and determined. ‘You know what you have to do,’ she said aloud. ‘You’re
already dead and gone, remember? You can be back in France by midnight and no
one will ever know.’

With eyes glazed like a sleepwalker, she
marched out onto the landing, down the stairs, and into her husband’s oak
paneled study. Behind the door, she slid one of the panels aside which
automatically caused a small strip-light to come on, illuminating a gray, steel
cabinet about four feet high by two feet wide with a heavy handle and
combination lock dial on the front. She spun the dial then selected four
numbers, reversing the direction of rotation between each, before grasping the
handle and swinging the heavy door of the gun-safe open.

Just as she was reaching for one of the
Purdey shotguns, she heard her husband’s voice and footsteps on the polished
wood of the upstairs landing. He was saying goodbye and something about tidying
up. She quickly grabbed two shells from a box in the bottom of the safe, and
breaking the Purdey, expertly slipped them into the breech. She snapped the gun
shut, slipped the safety catch off, then stepped back into the shadows of the
study behind the large antique desk, from where she had a clear line of fire
from the bottom of the stairs to the front door. She hefted the big gun up to
her shoulder assuming the stance her father had taught her, and with her finger
resting lightly on one of the triggers, waited for her husband to come into
view.

With a final remark and jaunty wave towards
the bedroom, Ross trotted lightly down the stairs and into Alice’s line of
vision. She followed his head with the shotgun sight as he slipped into his
coat and collected his keys and briefcase from the hall table. Her finger
slowly tightened on the trigger until suddenly her inner voice started
shrieking at her to stop.

You can’t do it! What about Charles? Do you
want him to lose both parents in one week? What about Philippe? Do you think
he’ll want you after you’ve killed a man in cold blood? Don’t be stupid! Put
the gun down!

Snapping out of the daze that had gripped
her since she’d been upstairs, Alice abruptly released the pressure on the
trigger and let the barrels of the gun droop towards the floor as her husband
stepped out through the front door.

She stood there in shocked silence for a few
seconds as she listened to his car door slam, then the sound of the engine and
the swish of the gravel as he accelerated away.
I can’t believe what you
nearly did!
the voice scolded. Slowly, with badly shaking hands, she slid
the safety catch back on and laid the gun across the desk as she sank into the
padded swivel chair and buried her face in her hands.

You nearly did it that time! You nearly
blew your whole life! Before she’d come here, before she’d seen them together
like that, all she’d wanted was to divorce him and see him go bankrupt. But now
that wasn’t enough. She wanted revenge. Slowly dropping her hands and opening
her eyes, she looked down onto the desk, with its familiar arrangement of
writing paper, envelopes and a pot of pens. Then her gaze strayed out into the
hall to the stairs and her eyes narrowed as she had a new idea.

Picking the gun up, she walked out into the
hall, up the stairs and straight into the master bedroom. The room was empty,
but she could hear the sound of the power-shower operating in the en-suite and
saw the door was slightly ajar. Pushing it fully open with the barrels of the
gun, she glanced in and saw Alex standing in the cubicle with his back towards
her, letting the steaming torrent of water wash over the red weals on his back
and buttocks.

Revolted, she stepped over to the dressing
table and sat on the stool with the gun across her knees, facing the bathroom
door, waiting for him to come out. When she heard the shower stop and the
cubicle door click open, she swung the gun around and rested it across her
forearm so that it was pointing at the door, then double-checked the safety
catch was on. A few seconds later, Alex came wondering out of the bathroom door
with a small towel wrapped around his waist, rubbing his face dry with another.

‘Hello Alex,’ she said in a cool, level
voice.

Because of the towel over his face he
hadn’t seen her, but as soon as he heard her voice he visibly jumped and
whipped the towel away from his eyes. ‘A… A… Alice,’ he stammered in shocked surprise,
staggering back a step. ‘How…how?’

Alice helped him out. ‘How am I here? How
did I survive? That’s easy,’ she said, her voice suddenly becoming hard, ‘when
you drop me, I bounce. Didn’t you know?’ She lifted the gun to her shoulder and
aimed directly at his head.

‘It wasn’t my idea, I swear it,’ he
jabbered, looking at the gun, ‘you’ve got to believe me… Ross made me help him…
I didn’t want anything to do with it...’ He fell to his knees and put his hands
up to his face crying, ‘Don’t shoot, please don’t shoot.’

Alice let the gun drop slightly, then said
disparagingly, ‘I’m not going to shoot you, you pathetic little man… provided
you do exactly what I tell you.’

‘I’ll do anything, anything you want,’ he
sobbed.

Laying the gun down on her knees, Alice
reached into her inside pocket and pulled out the brown envelope containing the
statement she and Philippe had made. ‘You see this?’ she asked, removing the
document from the envelope and unfolding it. ‘This is a sworn statement I made
to a lawyer in France that tells exactly how you and Ross tried to kill me.’
Alex went to move forward so she quickly dropped the statement onto the
dressing table and hoisted the gun again. He sank back onto his knees.

‘Now what I want you to do,’ she said,
pointing the gun directly at him, ‘is to write your version of the story down
for me and sign it. After that, we’re going to call the police and have them
come over.’

Realizing that he probably wasn’t in
imminent danger of being shot, Alex started to become belligerent. ‘And what if
I don’t want to?’ he asked. ‘What will you do about it?’

‘I’ll blow your head off,’ she said quite
simply. ‘Then I’ll find Ross and do exactly the same to him. Remember, I’m
officially dead. You cremated my body this afternoon. No one would ever think
of blaming me.’

Alice’s cool manner and obvious
determination convinced him that she meant exactly what she said. Resigned, he
said, ‘All right, I’ll do it.’

‘Good,’ she said briskly. ‘Now you get
dressed, then we’ll go downstairs to the study.’

Alex stood up walked to one of the chairs
where his clothes were neatly folded in a pile. He was just about to reach for
them when Alice said, ‘Not them. I want you put on what you were wearing for my
husband.’

He looked around at her with a shocked
expression. ‘You saw?’ he asked incredulously.

‘Oh yes, I saw,’ she spat, with a look of
utter disgust. ‘Now do it!’

‘But why?’ he wailed.

‘Because you and Ross have humiliated me,’
she snapped. ‘Now it’s payback time. I want the nice policemen to see exactly
what you’re like.’

Slowly, Alex walked across to the bed, and
turning his back, dropped his towel and slipped the suspender belt up over his
hips. Next, he put on stockings followed by a short silk negligee, which barely
covered his backside. Turning to Alice, he asked sarcastically, ‘Happy now?’