Cat in Hell's Chance

page 2

 

 

Before he could explain, she rushed down the stairs, not seeing the loose carpet which she had long asked Seth to repair. Her right foot caught in it sending her tumbling over and over until she lay silent at the bottom of the stairs. Seth put down the limp dripping bodies of the cats and went over to her.  

Her head lay at a strange angle to her body and there was no sign of  breathing  nor any pulse.  He rushed to the phone and asked for an ambulance. “There’s been a terrible accident!�?he said, then  gave details of where he lived and what had occurred.  The paramedics informed him that Betty was indeed dead but a doctor was on his way to confirm it. They told him that she had probably broken her neck in the fall.  Seth was in a confused and emotional state. Everything had happened so fast. Five dead cats and a dead wife in the middle of the same night!  It made no sense.  Yet, he was surprised at his own lack of remorse. The previous weeks and months of living with Betty had already destroyed  what little love he had for her. He now found himself filled with a kind of  relief,  for which he felt  a little ashamed.

The verdict at the inquest some weeks later was accidental death.  However, not everything was straightforward.  Betty’s fatal accident and her cat’s strange deaths triggered police enquiries. They checked Betty’s past and found that her  previous husband had died in unusual circumstances. The post-mortem examinations of the five dead cats revealed that they had all died from  strychnine poisoning. Further investigation revealed that traces of the same poison were found in the exhumed body of Betty’s former husband. It was clear that Seth would have been her next victim, had he eaten the curry she had so carefully prepared for him.  Fortunately for him,  his preference for mild not  hot spicy food and the subtleties of Asian cuisine were not part of  Betty’s  expertise.

 A chill wind blew through the cemetery, sending up leaves in little swirls of debris. Seth looked once again at the black stone cat and thought, “Yes! very suitable!�?nbsp; The colour and the material he’d chosen both represented her cold black-heartedness. The stone cat bought from a garden centre was a nice touch, he thought.  

He leaned forward and gave it a loving polish with the sleeve of his new camel hair coat.  He chuckled as he realised he could afford a few luxuries now. After all, the insurance payout which Betty had nagged him to take out was his by right. He'd earned it.  He pulled the coat tightly around him for protection from the wind and thought,  “I  ought to get away for a bit! Somewhere warm, like the West Indies!  Jamaica maybe?�?nbsp;

Seth whistled a tune as he walked away, before stopping to light up an expensive cigar which he removed just for a moment to take a nip of malt whisky from a silver hip-flask. “Yes! Jamaica might be really nice!�?he muttered as he watched children run along the cemetery path, giggling and playing. He turned and grinned as he heard one of them shout, “You can be the old ghost lady and we’ll  be the cats and chase you!�?

 

 

The End 

 

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