Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine. Vol. 120, No. 3 & 4. Whole No. 733 & 734, September/October 2002

Seesaw by Eileen Dewhurst

A Liverpudlian who took a degree at Oxford and then worked as a journalist for a time, Eileen Dewhurst debuted as a novelist in the mid seventies. She is the author of nineteen books, the latest, No Love Lost, published by Severn House in April of this year. When she is not writing, Ms. Dewhurst says, she enjoys solving cryptic crossword puzzles and drawing and painting cats.

It’s Liverpool gentlemen, you know, dear, and Manchester men. That was the statement my silly, shallow aunt Marcia used to trot out at some stage of my every visit, always with the same pseudo-apologetic little giggle. My mother thought it had been a catchphrase circulating the snootier Liverpool suburbs at the end of the war, but by the time I was old enough to visit Aunt Marcia on my own it was anything but true: With the decline of the Atlantic shipping trade Liverpool had lost its cachet and no longer figured among the leading cities of Britain.

Manchester did, though, and still does. A thriving, lively city giving its name to the country’s second airport. My hometown. It was because I was a Manchester girl that Aunt Marcia brought out her catchphrase.

Whenever she did, her daughter Elaine would nod approvingly, enjoying an extra opportunity to feel superior to her Mancunian cousin. I hated those visits to Liverpool, but my mother always insisted I make them. Although we lived comfortably, she felt that her sister had made a better marriage than she had and wanted me to benefit from the influence of what she saw as a more elegant lifestyle.

It wasn’t that Aunt Marcia and Elaine were unkind to me, apart from that one little dig. It was just that their self-assurance made me feel even more awkward than I usually did

And I was awkward. I don’t deny it. Awkward and clumsy and very, very shy. The contrast between my cousin and myself was really painful. I can see us now, reflected side by side over the years in a succession of cinema, theatre, and restaurant cloakroom mirrors: Elaine’s hair falling wavy and graceful and never needing a comb; mine, as I tugged at it, sprouting in unbecoming tufts round a face with rosily shining nose and cheeks however hard I scrubbed them with powder. Elaine had a creamy matt complexion that never needed any powder at all...

I had one best friend at my grammar school, as shy and gauche as myself. Elaine belonged to a set of laughing, confident girls at the school where she boarded. Sometimes I coincided with one or more of them on my visits to Liverpool, and they seemed to point up my inadequacies simply by being there.

But that was then, and now — I shall never get over the surprise of it — now Elaine needs me. Needs me morning, noon, and night and waits anxiously on my coming...

Elaine’s youth continued on its gilded way. In her twenty-first year she made a very good marriage to a young man already coining it in the City, and went to live in his Chelsea flat. With the first baby on the way, she and Robin moved round the corner to the chic little house where Stephen was born. Two years after Stephen there came Carol. One of each. She even managed that.

I, meanwhile, trained as a nurse in Manchester, and had my fiancé walk out on me. He wasn’t much cop and I soon got over him, but I didn’t get over being celibate — I’ve a big libido and no sexual bravado, which is a difficult combination. But I threw myself into my work and discovered quite soon that I was an exceptionally good nurse. I worked my way to the top in hospitals, first in Manchester and later in London, and then decided to go freelance. I had excellent references and it was easy to get on the books of a prestigious agency. The work is very well paid.

And now when I look in the mirror (I’ve just done so) I see a fine figure of a woman, statuesque and high-busted, with well-defined features and cleverly cut red-brown hair that falls back into place even in a rain-lashed gale. Though I say it myself, I look good in uniform. (Some of my male agency clients have wanted me to pretend not to be a real nurse, but I’m only into the straight and they soon learn how a real nurse can make them regret such impertinence.) So, social confidence at last, as well.

Once I’d left school and could do as I pleased, I never visited Aunt Marcia again. Elaine and I, though — I can’t think why — continued to exchange Christmas cards. The year I went to London I sent mine early with a change-of-address slip, so that she could send hers to the right place. With it she enclosed a note in her turn, saying that now I was so close we really must meet. Neither of us did anything about it.

And then, ten years or so later, I heard from Robin. By letter, telling me Elaine had had a stroke so severe it had left her unable to move anything but her hands and her head. She could stutter out a few words, and write things down when she wanted to be fluent, and from her comments on books and radio and TV it was clear she could still take them in. But she could do nothing for herself, and although he saw to her needs when he was at home, on weekdays he was at work and there were, of course, other necessities requiring professional help. He knew I was now working as a freelance, and he wondered if there was any chance of my being willing to look after Elaine, taking my place in the family to which I belonged, at least for the time it took him to find the right long-term replacement for the string of unsatisfactory nurses he had been forced to dismiss.

I felt deep shock when I read Robin’s letter, remembering that beautiful, quicksilver girl, and I tried not to admit to the sense of satisfaction that came with it, a sort of The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away feeling that glowed through me as sensually as sexual release. (I always tried not to admit to my frustration at the absence of that.)

At first I thought that uncomfortable mixed reaction was all Robin’s letter had given me, but as I turned it over in my mind during the following few days I discovered that his proposition appealed to me. As he himself had pointed out, I could take the job on a temporary basis, and if it didn’t work out I could leave. I had a nice little flat by then in Maida Vale, but if the job suited me I could let it. By the end of the week it seemed absurd not to give the idea a try, and I replied — also by letter — that I would be pleased to talk it over.

This time Robin telephoned me, incoherent with gratitude.

I was shocked all over again when I saw Elaine, my imagination not having prepared me for the transformation of that lovely, lively girl into the gaunt creature slumped in a chair, hair lank and straight, face and figure inert but for the pleading eyes and fluttering hands. By poignant contrast, these seemed even more beautiful than I had remembered them, and for a few moments the sense of satisfaction deserted me and there were tears in my eyes. Robin saw them and fervently renewed his pleas, adding that he was, of course, offering full board and an excellent salary.

I accepted. And saw something in Elaine’s huge eyes that I couldn’t interpret, but which might have been fear. I tried not to feel gratified.

I’ve been here now for two years, and I still don’t know how she feels about having me permanently around. I think often about the contrast between past and present — I’m doing it now — but does she? If she does, it will be far less pleasant for her than it is for me. Whatever, I have no intention of leaving. I had enough of crises, panics, and difficult colleagues in my hospital jobs for one lifetime, and I’m enjoying the peace and security here, and the being absolutely in charge.

At first I was wary of the son and the daughter, but I soon realized this was unnecessary. Stephen and Carol simply do not want to know. Stephen has his own place and is already following in his father’s Midas footsteps; he finds it difficult now to be with the mother he used to treat like a fun elder sister, and is only too ready to accept my conscience-soothing reassurance that she understands and would hate him to be distressed. Carol is recently married and has settled in Edinburgh. Enough said.

So life is good, and can, I think, only get better.

I had a sad duty, though, this morning: I had to tell Elaine that her husband has cleared out. Bag and baggage. That he’s taken everything he owns from the bedroom they used to share (Elaine, now, is confined to the best and largest of the downstairs rooms), and hasn’t left a forwarding address.

I was afraid that the shock might carry her off — although it occurred to me at the same time that as she has so little quality of life that could really be for the best. The only clues I have to her state of mind are her hands and her eyes and they went into overdrive, her eyes widening and swivelling and her poor hands beating at the air. If I don’t want to feel uncomfortably sorry for Elaine I have to look away from her hands. But this morning, after delivering such devastating news, I took a deep breath, seized one of them in both of mine, and started to stroke it.

I was surprised at the force with which she pulled it away, but I could sense the anger she was unable to express, and I suppose it gave her strength. She shook her head from side to side and kept saying, “No,” over and over. Eventually she managed, “Not Robin.”

I didn’t try touching her again, but I drew up a chair and sat down beside her. “I think it would be a good idea,” I told her, “not to say anything to visitors. And it isn’t as though you have so many these days, is it, dear?” That was my long-delayed riposte to Liverpool gentlemen and Manchester men, and it cleared me of the last of my rancour. “He’s all right,” I went on. “Robin’s all right, dear. I rang the office and he was there, they put me on to him. We agreed to tell people, for the time being, that he’s having a bit of a break from the home scene. He said to tell you how sorry he is that he just can’t go on any longer, and that it would have been too painful to say goodbye. Stephen and Carol know his new address, he said, but they’ve promised to keep it secret. I suspect he may have had a bit of a brainstorm, and needs absolute peace and quiet. At home, I mean — we both know how restful he finds the office. Perhaps he’ll come back, dear, when he’s over it. But I don’t think we should get too excited. Better a pleasant surprise than a disappointment.”

I got up then, rather quickly, because she had made a strange sound that I can only describe as a growl. The next minute, though, she was crying, and I handed her my clean handkerchief. “Not to worry, dear,” I said as she wiped her eyes. “You’ll be all right, I’ll see to everything. In fact, I think we’ll do very well on our own.”

I don’t understand. Robin would never leave me. Robin! The mere idea is absurd. Robin loves me so much he suffers as cruelly as I do whenever we’re apart. And Muriel has told me he may have left me forever! My beloved, my devoted Robin! His presence is all that has sustained me through this terrible nightmare, kept me warm inside this cage which was once my body. Muriel’s words have turned that warmth to ice.

And fear. I am terrified. I am writing the word down now on my pad. Terrified. Terrified. Terrified.

Terrified of Muriel. When she told me Robin had left me she stood too close, as she so often does, invading my small private space. Does it give her a sense of power over me? She knows I can do nothing about it, that I can’t move away from her. And she has a lot of old scores to settle.

I’m terrified of a world without Robin. Robin would never choose to leave me, so I know he can have had no choice. And the only reason he would have no choice is if he was dead.

So he must be dead.

And Muriel must have killed him.

I don’t know why Muriel would have wanted to kill Robin, he gave her this job she loves and he never interferes with how she does it. Perhaps it’s just that she hates men, I can imagine that. Or because she’s mad. I can imagine that, too. That’s why she terrifies me.

When Robin offered me a mobile phone I wish I’d accepted it. But I didn’t want to hear people hanging up on my stutter. I can ask Muriel to get me one, of course, and she’ll tell me she’ll look into it. And nothing will happen. A mobile phone is the last thing she will want me to have now.

I can talk to a visitor, or Mrs. Mop when she cleans my room, beg them to ring the office. But they’ll feel they have to speak to Muriel first, and she’ll tell them Robin has just gone away for a well-earned break, touching her forehead and looking significant. And then they’ll think I’m the mad one and they’ll do nothing.

Oh, Robin my darling, where are you? Are you lying at the bottom of the cellar steps, staring sightlessly at your wine bins? Or has she stuffed you pro tem behind the sacks in the toolshed? Knowing Muriel as I now do, I expect she has already neatly and safely disposed of you.

I cannot bear it. I must — I must! — be released from this cage so that we can be reunited. If I beg Muriel, surely she will oblige? Having killed once, she will have few qualms about killing again. My death, anyway, may already be on her agenda. Which would mean that for once we both want the same thing. I hate my cousin the murderess with a deadly hatred, but my release is in her gift, and hers alone. Next time she comes in to me I will petition her.

“Such an idea!” The nurse bridled indignantly, crumpling the offending piece of paper into a ball and shying it successfully at the waste-paper basket. “Asking me to kill you! Saying I’ll find it easy because I’ve done it before! I’ve never heard such wicked nonsense, Elaine!” Even when she wasn’t angry, Muriel tended to speak in short staccato sentences ending with oral exclamation marks. “And accusing me of killing your husband! I told you, Robin has had enough and just felt he must get away. So if you die it won’t bring him back to you. And if he’s left you in this life, he’s hardly likely to want to see you in another!” Looking into Elaine’s eyes, Muriel saw the pain in them and felt a sudden unfamiliar stab of remorse at having spoken so bluntly. But she had to put the poor woman off such a morbid idea. “Well, perhaps I’m wrong,” she conceded. “Perhaps you’ll be young and strong again in heaven, and then you will come back together.” She had been talking half facetiously, but for a moment Elaine’s eyes had glowed, and her hands had fallen peacefully together in her lap. Muriel felt another unfamiliar sensation — awareness of another person’s feelings — and found herself glad that the look of pain had gone; it had made her feel quite uncomfortable.

But when she got up to the big bedroom, her indignation was back in place. Robin was on the two-seater sofa, reading the paper, and she banged down heavily beside him.

“She’s just accused me of murdering you, sweetie,” she told him. “She probably thinks I’ve dumped you in the cellar.” She suddenly saw the funny side of it and burst out laughing. Muriel’s laughter was a back-of-the-gods affair, and Robin clamped his hand across her mouth.

“It’s all right,” she said, wiping her eyes. “She’s under the spare room.”

“We can’t take any risks.”

“You worry too much.”

“I do worry. Why does she think you killed me?”

“As if you didn’t know!” Playfully she pinched his cheek. “She can’t believe you’d ever choose to leave her.”

She saw him wince, and heard his faint moan.

“Hey! None of that now!”

“No, no,” he assured her, taking hold of her chubby red hand. He would have to forget about Elaine’s hands. And her eyes... “It was just... I’m all right. I couldn’t have taken another moment.” Because he had reached a point where he could no longer bear to look at the remains of his wife. And had been missing for too long a faithful time what Muriel had recently begun to give him...

“That’s not all,” she was telling him. “She begged me to kill her, too, so that you could be reunited. Said I would know what to use, that I would have access, and that it would be easy for me because I’d done it before. The cheek of it, sweetie!”

“She has to think you killed me,” he said, trying not to shudder as the pang went through him. “I should have realized she was bound to. It’s the only way she can explain my disappearance. As it is, she must be desperately unhappy.”

“Yes...” Muriel bounced to her feet, her face flaming.

“What is it?”

“There aren’t many situations,” she answered, slowly sitting down again, “where it’s in one’s gift to please all parties.”

“I don’t—”

“She wants to die. We’d be happier without her.”

“For God’s sake, Muriel—”

“So far as she’s concerned, I’m guilty of murder already. And if she ever finds out about you and me — and she will find out, one way or another, eventually — it’ll be worse for her than death.”

“Yes...”

“It’ll be a kindness,” Muriel said decisively. “Nobody should live the way she has to. And she’s asked me, Robin, it’s what she wants. She’s right about one thing, too, sweetie. I may not have done it before, but I do know what to use and how to get hold of it. There’ll be no danger. The doctor said she could go any time.”

“Oh my God, yes.” He could not escape her logic.

“I said this setup would work, and it’s working. Trust me again now.”

“I will, my Venus.” He would never love her, but he adored her self-confidence.

“So why not go down for a bottle of champagne, and we can toast our humanitarian enterprise?”

“But isn’t that a bit—”

“It’s what we all want, my darling. You, me, and Elaine. That’s all you have to think of.”

After a kiss that augured well for the later part of the evening, Robin went out onto the landing and tiptoed down the stairs. As he crept past his wife’s room he heard weeping, and it was a compassionate and a righteous man who opened his cellar door.