Antidote to Venom (23 page)

He was expecting to recoup himself from a legacy of some eight thousand pounds on the death of his aunt, who was then incurably ill. The aunt died and he then learned that her solicitor, Capper, had embezzled his whole inheritance and that he therefore would not get a penny. His debt and the threatened break-up of his illicit establishment made him desperate.

Faced with such a situation, George was doubtless tempted by Capper. He could recover his money by helping in a certain scheme. His part would be to steal and send to Capper a venomous snake. Possibly he had to “milk” the snake first and send on the venom separately. Possibly he had to drown the snake before sending it. But in some form or other he had to supply Capper with snake and venom. Capper would do the rest. Probably George hesitated before agreeing. French had no doubt he did agree in the end.

This view was supported by several other facts. First, Capper could not himself have obtained the snake, as on the night of its theft he was in London. Someone, therefore, stole it for him. Of those with the necessary knowledge, George was in by far the best position to do so. Further, careful inquiry had eliminated every other possible person.

If, thought French finally, a job has been done, and if the only person who could have done it has an overwhelming motive for doing it, the case is strong. But if, in addition, all the remaining facts in the affair harmonise with this explanation, and with it only, the conclusion becomes overwhelming. Cumulative evidence again!

Well pleased with the results of his cogitations, French drafted his conclusions in the form of a report and took it to the Chief Constable. Mr. Stone read it carefully, but without showing much surprise.

“This is very able, if I may say so, Chief Inspector,” he commented, laying down the sheets, “I congratulate you. I think there's no doubt you've reached the truth at last. What do you propose now?”

“I thought, sir, we had enough to justify an arrest?”

Stone nodded heavily. “I agree, and I suppose we needn't delay. What about at his house this evening?”

French sat forward. “I thought of that, sir, and normally I should entirely agree,” he said. “But in this case I advocate an unexpected arrest. We must prevent what happened in Capper's case. For all we know to the contrary, Surridge has one of those oval balls in his pocket. We must take him so suddenly that he can't use it.”

Stone sat silent for some moments. “I agree,” he said at last. “It wouldn't do to risk a second suicide. How do you propose to make the arrest?”

“He leaves his office every evening about half-past five. I suggest we should wait for him on the private path to his house and seize him as he is walking home. It'll be dark, but there's enough moon to see by.”

“Very well. To-night?”

“Yes, sir, if you can get the warrant.”

“Right. We'll let Rankin do the job, but I'd be glad if you'd be present.”

That evening three men slipped one by one through the gates of George's drive, and passing as much as possible behind shrubs, worked their respective ways round the house and along the private path leading to the Zoo office. There, behind bushes, they took up their positions.

“When I hear him coming I'll walk to meet him,” French explained. “I'll say, ‘Good evening, Mr. Surridge. Can I have a word with you?' Then you both close in and catch hold of his arms.”

“Suppose he has the ball in his hand?”

“He won't have; he won't be expecting anything, and we won't give him time to get it out of his pocket.”

They lapsed into silence, waiting. The night was raw and cold, and a faint breeze stirred uneasily among the trees. Otherwise it was still, save for an occasional hoot from a car. They were too far from the city to hear its roar. French found it hard entirely to control his excitement.

They waited till long after half-past five. But George didn't come.

Chapter XXIII

Venom: The Antidote

George's sense of approaching crisis continued to grow more and more intense during the day and night which followed his telephone conversation with Capper. The latter's phrases, “If they've got that, it looks like the end,” and “Look out for yourself and keep away from me,” rang continuously in his ears, with their heavy portent of disaster.

He would have given half his inheritance merely to know what was going on. He had the impression of being surrounded by inimical forces working secretly and relentlessly to destroy him, forces from which there was no escape, and against which he couldn't strike back. Sometimes the loneliness and the moral weight of his crime drove him nearly mad, at others his fear increased till it crowded every thought and feeling from his mind.

At lunch at the club on the second day a terrible blow fell. The police had discovered the truth and Capper—was dead.

If it hadn't been for the whisky he drank nearly neat, George felt he could never have got through lunch without giving himself away. As it was, he almost feared he had given himself away. He imagined a number of the men had looked at him strangely. They had said nothing: though of course they would say nothing. But when he had gone what would they say? What would they do?

That afternoon George could not force himself to attend to business. He wanted desperately to get away from the office, and the questioning stare of Miss Hepworth's shrewd eyes. He felt increasingly certain that it was his guilt that was his real trouble. It was his guilt that had cut him off from his friends, and made him feel this desperate loneliness. It was his guilt that had prevented him from taking refuge in suicide, and now he saw that it was his guilt that gave him his real fear of arrest and what might follow. If only he could be rid of this feeling of guilt; if only he could feel clean and honest with people he could face anything. Even that dreadful end which might be in front of him would be robbed of half its terrors.

How he got through the remainder of the day George did not know. Had it not been for a frequent recourse to the whisky bottle he felt he could not have done it. It was with a feeling of overwhelming thankfulness that at last bedtime came and he was able once more to be alone.

But his relief was short-lived. He could not sleep and solitude he found was no ease to his mind, but rather another kind of torment. Again he played with the idea of suicide. If he were only
sure
that suicide was the end.…

For nearly a fortnight George suffered intolerable misery and distress. Then one night, when he was at his very lowest, his thoughts went back to his childhood and his childhood's teaching. Some old words that he had then learnt recurred to him, about going to Someone and being given rest. And as these echoed in his mind he knew beyond doubt or question that he had been deceiving himself: that there
was
a God, that good and evil in his life
did
matter, and that if there was hope for him at all, it was through the Divine Man who had spoken these words.

Without any conscious intention, George suddenly found himself doing something he had not done for perhaps thirty years. He was praying.

But his prayer brought him little relief. Rather the reverse, for once again the hideous idea of confession had filled his mind. And now with a shock he saw that confession had become a possibility. The argument about incriminating Capper no longer held. Capper was dead, and nothing that he could say could injure him. Now George realised that confession was a vital issue and that at last he was face to face with his destiny.

Presently from sheer weariness he fell asleep, and when he woke he knew somehow that he had taken his decision. Cost what it might, he would confess and be done with the struggle.

Next morning he spent putting his affairs in order, and in the afternoon he went home to carry through what he knew would be the bitterest part of his whole action, the telling of his resolve to his wife.

It proved so at first. She was not helpful and he found it desperately hard to begin. And when at last, with a sort of freezing horror, she grasped his meaning, she railed on him. If he had no thought for himself, had he none for her? Did he want, because of some ease to his own mind, to ruin her life also? What sort of a future would she have if he persisted in this madness?

George, if the truth be told, had not realised fully what his action would mean to Clarissa. But he saw that, while she would have to pay for what he had done in any case, probably payment would be less in this way than in any other.

He felt that he should never see his wife again, and that he must therefore tell her everything. With hesitations and pauses he spoke of Nancy. He said that he had turned to Nancy because of the failure of their married life, and admitted to her that this failure had been his fault. He mentioned other things which he had done and which had come between them.

Clarissa, as soon as she realised his action was irrevocable, seemed turned to stone. She heard him in a freezing silence. Nor did she break that silence when, after asking her if she would not say good-bye to him, he turned and stumbled from the house.

When French and Rankin were waiting on the office pathway to take him, he was striding blindly into the city. He reached police headquarters, knocked at the charge-room door, pushed it open and disappeared within.

***

George lay on his bed with his eyes closed. His time was nearly over. Another week would see the end.

Events had moved quickly since that evening some two months earlier, when he had pushed open the charge-room door and told the sergeant behind the little desk that he had come to give himself up. He had been charged with the murder, brought before the magistrates, committed for trial, had waited for nearly six weeks for the assizes, had pleaded guilty, had been sentenced and—here he was, just waiting—waiting for this last week to pass. Everyone was extraordinarily kind. Popular sympathy was with him. An enormous petition for reprieve had been presented, but had been rejected by the Home Secretary on the grounds that if it were known that reprieve followed confession, every murderer who felt cornered would know how to escape.

George himself, though at times he grew a little sick as he looked forward, was more thankful than he could say for his decision. His prayer and confession had been the first steps to a vital contact with the Divine. Though his sorrow for what he had done remained, he now knew himself to be forgiven, cleaned from his load of guilt, and with a power and confidence to face the future to which he was moving, such as he had never before experienced.

How to make such restitution for the past as still remained possible had been his greatest problem. With regard to Nancy he could do little. His confession had at least shielded her from publicity—only the police knew of their association. He had written to her begging forgiveness for the way in which he had injured her, but he felt this was insufficient. He longed to restore her financial position, made precarious through his action.

The means came in a way he had least expected—through Clarissa's generosity in agreeing to allow Nancy a part of the Pentland legacy, which Capper's heir insisted on paying her.

Overwhelmingly thankful was George about Clarissa. A day or two earlier she had been to see him. Their previous interview had impressed her profoundly. It had started a train of thought which during these weeks of waiting had led her also to find a contact with the Divine, She had reviewed in a different way her own past life, and had realised that she also was not without responsibility for their unhappy relations. Disregarding the cost to herself, she had told him so. At that the barrier between them had broken down, and both had glimpsed what life on such a basis of honesty and love might have been, if only they had found it earlier.

But though he was going to pay for the results of that failure, a satisfaction and a peace he had never known before had grown up in his mind. In spite of what was coming, for the first time in his life he was really happy. Presently he slept, peacefully.

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