Unexpected Guest Read Free Page A

complain?’ Starkwedder asked her.
    â€˜Oh, of course they did,’ Laura replied as she returned to sit on the sofa. ‘We’ve only lived here for a couple of years, you know. Before that, we lived on the east coast, in Norfolk. One or two household pets were victims of Richard’s there, and we had a lot of complaints. That’s really why we came to live here. It’s very isolated, this house. We’ve only got one neighbour for miles around. But there are plenty of squirrels and birds and stray cats.’
    She paused for a moment, and then continued. ‘The main trouble in Norfolk was really because a woman came to call at the house one day, collecting subscriptions for the village fête. Richard sent shots to the right and left of her as she was going away, walking down the drive. She bolted like a hare, he said. He roared with laughter when he told us about it. I remember him saying her fat backside was quivering like a jelly. But she went to the police about it, and there was a terrible row.’
    â€˜I can well imagine that,’ was Starkwedder’s dry comment.
    â€˜But Richard got away with it all right,’ Laura told him. ‘He had a permit for all his firearms, of course, and he assured the police that he only used them to shoot rabbits. He explained away poor Miss Butterfield by claiming that she was just a nervous old maid who imagined he was shooting at her, which he swore he would never have done. Richard was always plausible. He had no trouble making the police believe him.’
    Starkwedder got up from his footstool and went across to Richard Warwick’s body. ‘Your husband seems to have had a rather perverted sense of humour,’ he observed tartly. He looked down at the table beside the wheelchair. ‘I see what you mean,’ he continued. ‘So a gun by his side was a nightly routine. But surely he couldn’t have expected to shoot anything tonight. Not in this fog.’
    â€˜Oh, he always had a gun put there,’ replied Laura. ‘Every night. It was like a child’s toy. Sometimes he used to shoot into the wall, making patterns. Over there, if you look.’ She indicated the french windows. ‘Down there to the left, behind the curtain.’
    Starkwedder went across and lifted the curtain on the left-hand side, revealing a pattern of bullet holes in the panelling. ‘Good heavens, he’s picked out his own initials in the wall. “RW”, done in bullet holes.Remarkable.’ He replaced the curtain, and turned back to Laura. ‘I must admit that’s damned good shooting. Hm, yes. He must have been pretty frightening to live with.’
    â€˜He was,’ Laura replied emphatically. With almost hysterical vehemence, she rose from the sofa and approached her uninvited guest. ‘Must we go on talking and talking about all this?’ she asked in exasperation. ‘It’s only putting off what’s got to happen in the end. Can’t you realize that you’ve got to ring up the police? You’ve no option. Don’t you see it would be far kinder to just do it now? Or is it that you want me to do it? Is that it? All right, I will.’
    She moved quickly to the phone, but Starkwedder came up to her as she was lifting the receiver, and put his hand over hers. ‘We’ve got to talk first,’ he told her.
    â€˜We’ve been talking,’ said Laura. ‘And anyway, there’s nothing to talk about.’
    â€˜Yes, there is,’ he insisted. ‘I’m a fool, I dare say. But we’ve got to find some way out.’
    â€˜Some way out? For me?’ asked Laura. She sounded incredulous.
    â€˜Yes. For you.’ He took a few steps away from her, and then turned back to face her. ‘How much courage have you got?’ he asked. ‘Can you lie if necessary–and lie convincingly?’
    Laura stared at him. ‘You’re crazy,’ was all she