“Hurry, stupid, hurry!” Her throat ached, and her brain was bursting into flames. She would get him for this. If it was the last thing she ever did, she would get him.
And then he was standing over her.
“No, Charles, no! I’ll give you the divorce. I’d never hurt you, Charles. I’ve never hurt anyone. I’ve been a perfect wife. You know it. Put that pillow down, Charles. You idiot! You’ll never get away with...”
Murder off the Record
by John Sidney
“Good-by, my dear,” she said. There was nothing strange about that — except she was quite dead!
At twenty minutes past eleven that Wednesday morning William Saunders permitted himself to say aloud, “Everything comes in useful if you keep it sufficiently long enough.”
It was a frequent remark of Mr. Saunders and one that always irritated his wife but could not do so on this occasion. Three minutes earlier, Mr. Saunders, as he had planned for months, had killed Mrs. Saunders as she lay in bed.
Mr. Saunders had chosen a Wednesday because that was their servant’s day off. He had chosen this Wednesday because their old friend, Mr. Joseph Reynolds, of London, was staying at the Saunders’ Hampshire home and would, unwittingly, corroborate the alibi Mr. Saunders was at this moment preparing.
Mrs. Saunders never rose before noon, but lolled in bed, eating chocolates and listening to television. That practice, as much as her money, had made Mr. Saunders plan her murder.
Three minutes earlier Mr. Saunders had delivered a few neat precise blows with what he confidently anticipated would appear in the police reports as “a blunt instrument.”
In point of fact, it was a hammer and at the moment it was in Mr. Saunders’ shooting bag. During the next half hour, while out in his fields seeking hares with Mr. Reynolds, Mr. Saunders would drop the hammer in the river.
As he busied himself in his wife’s bedroom, making it appear that she had been struck down by a burglar, Mr. Saunders congratulated himself on keeping that early tape recording of his wife’s voice. They had made it together one night three years ago, when Mr. Saunders had first bought the tape recorder and when their relations had been rather better.
Mrs. Saunders had spoken a number of random phrases and sentences which Mr. Saunders had snipped out and joined together a few nights earlier and now proposed to put to good use.
Mr. Saunders rapidly tossed put the contents of wardrobes and drawers and filled his pockets with her jewelry — the pearl necklace, the diamond brooch, the three rings — one he took off her finger — and the bracelet of sapphires.
These, too, would go into the river in the next half hour. It was a pity, Mr. Saunders commented to himself, but he’d be a fool not to play safe.
Mr. Saunders, fifty-five, dapper, with a neat mustache, stood still and checked his work, including the still figure on the bed whose money he would now inherit, satisfied himself that he bore no blood stains, and then turned on the recording machine.
It would play silently for five minutes — time enough, as Mr. Saunders had planned, for him to call Reynolds from his room, where he was writing letters.
Mr. Saunders went downstairs slowly with Mr. Reynolds, unobtrusively stealing glances at his watch. He was a few seconds ahead of time.
“I have timed it as neatly as a well-planned military operation,” Mr. Saunders told himself. “Everything is possible if it is tackled in the right way. Perhaps, if I had had better luck during the war and fewer fools over me, I might have emerged as one of the great leaders.”
Mr. Saunders sternly called himself back to business. It was twenty-nine minutes and forty seconds past eleven.
“Take it slowly to her door and pause for eight seconds,” Mr. Saunders told himself. “Wait. Wait. Wait. Now it is time.”
Mr. Saunders spoke, “Good-by, Lucy. We’re off now.”
Here it came. “Good-by, William. Have a good time.”
“Yes, we will,” said Mr. Saunders.
“I’ll stay in bed and listen to the radio while you’re away.”
It had been a joke with them then, three years ago. Mr. Saunders had laughed on the tape.
Remembering now, Mr. Saunders laughed before saying: “All right, dear.”
Joseph Reynolds called out his farewell, “Good-by, Mrs. Saunders.”
Mr. Saunders allowed himself to congratulate himself on what happened next. Music swelled up in Mrs. Saunders’ bedroom.
“She’s turned the radio on. I don’t think she heard you,” said Mr. Saunders. “Let’s go.”
As he and Reynolds gathered up their shot guns in the hall and went outside, they could still hear the music distantly.
“Lucy is keen on the Light Program,” offered Mr. Saunders. “Listens to it by the hour.” And told himself, “That was a masterly touch — to link up that old tape recording of a B.B.C. light music broadcast. But there’s a use for everything if you keep it long enough. Joe Reynolds has no ear, I know, and will recall only that there was music.”
In the next twenty minutes, as he had planned, Mr. Saunders separated himself from his guest. There was no one to see as he tossed the hammer and the jewelry into the river.
Mr. Saunders shot well. He bagged three hares, all of them difficult. At twelve-thirty they returned to the house for lunch. In the drive Mr. Saunders made an excuse to hurry ahead, called out to his wife, ran up the stairs, switched off the tape machine, carried it to his bedroom and hid it in a cupboard, doubled back to the bedroom and switched on his bedside radio.
“Funny!” thought Mr. Saunders. “It’s dead. But it’s no matter.”
Then he pretended to call out in well-pretended horror and his guest came racing up. After that there was the doctor and the policeman. While he told his story Mr. Saunders thought only lightly of the recording machine.
When things were settled down a little, there would be an opportunity to destroy that dangerous little roll of tape.
“I said good-by to my wife about half-past eleven,” Mr. Saunders was telling the village constable. “She answered me and said something about us having a good time.”
Mr. Saunders watched the thickset elderly constable writing slowly in his notebook.
That was a nice touch, thought Mr. Saunders, not to be too precise...
“She said she would listen to the radio,” said Mr. Saunders and waited for Mr. Reynolds.
“I can confirm this,” said Mr. Reynolds. “I heard her answer, ‘Good-by. I will listen to the radio.’ She turned it on because she didn’t hear me say ‘Good-by.’ The music came on quite loud though I can’t say what they were playing.”
The constable wet his pencil and then wrote.
“Something on the Light Program,” said Mr. Saunders.
“I have no ear for music,” said Mr. Reynolds. “I was trying to place what it was when we were in the hall.”
“In the hall — downstairs?” asked the constable, frowning. “You are sure of that, sir?”
“Positively,” said Mr. Reynolds, frowning.
Mr. Saunders was watching the constable’s face and he felt his own growing tighter.
The constable was pursing his lips.
“There was Mrs. Dale’s Diary up to 11:15 on the Light Program,” said the constable. “After that, no music. I had the set on at the station—”
“But I heard the music, constable,” said Reynolds. “It was just after half-past eleven. The music came up — I have no ear for tunes — but I’d swear to the time.”
“There was no music,” said the policeman. “There couldn’t have been—” The constable went on talking and his eyes bored suspiciously into Mr. Saunders. Mr. Saunders listened and knew he was undone.