When Last I Died

"I don't believe Tom fell out of that window, either the first or the second time, and I don't believe the haunted house had anything to do with his death," replied the widow. "But as for Bella Foxley—if I could blacken her name even now that she's dead, I'd do it. It was something she knew, and something Tom knew, too! That's why she killed him. It was the grated carrot, you know. That's what it was. Tom knew. Oh, how I wish we'd never gone! It was the telegram that decided us, although Tom knew better than to expect anything under the will. Poor Aunt Flora! She hadn't very many relations to go and see her! But we weren't well off, you know, and Tom said she might think we thought we'd got expectations, and he wouldn't go anywhere near. We had no expectations of any sort, and didn't want to have any, and he knew what people would think—especially Bella—if they got to hear.

"Well, Bella was there already. She had arrived the day before. She was quite nice, and she and I went up to see Aunt Flora, who looked very, very frail and very much older than when I had seen her last, for all she had dyed her poor old hair since we were there before, although I didn't like to tell Tom that, and he wouldn't go in to see her. He couldn't bear illness, poor man."

"When had he seen her last?" Mrs. Bradley enquired.

"When Tom and I were married. I was Tom's second wife, you see, and we had only been married four years. Aunt Flora did not come to the wedding, but we sent her a piece of the cake —Tom would have a cake and orange blossom and everything, for my sake, because he said I was only a girl, and that, after all, it was my first marriage, even if it was his second. He was full of little jokes like that about it. I never felt his first wife came between us at all, although I believe he had been quite fond of her. But, after all, she had been dead for nearly twenty years when he married me. He was nearly sixty, you see, and although people made some remarks about December and May, it really wasn't like that at all. Tom was really very young for his age—more like a man of forty-five, I always thought—and I've always been rather reserved and sort of old for mine, so it was a more suitable marriage than you would think, considering I was only twenty at the time. I am only thirty now, although people have taken me for thirty-five or six."

She did look that age, thought Mrs. Bradley, but the fact had no importance. It might be important to know that Tom was so much older than she had imagined, though, she decided. A man of sixty-four or five might tumble out of first-floor windows and hurt or even kill himself where a man much younger might sustain no lasting injury. Curious he had not hurt himself the first time, all the same, at any rate, not seriously."

"Had you met your husband's cousin before?" she enquired, as Muriel paused. The widow nodded.

"Oh, yes, several times. She and Tom got on quite well together. She put him in the way of renting these haunted houses from time to time. She had even come away with us for part of her summer holiday, I remember. We were very hard up that year, and she said that if we would let her join us she would pay half the expenses and we could pay the other half between us. It was quite a generous offer, because, although we had two bedrooms, the one sitting-room did just as well for three as it would for two, so we actually saved a little more than you would think, especially as the rooms came a little cheaper, taking the two bedrooms with one sitting-room, you know. It was then she gave us the first news about this last haunted house. Tom was pleased. We had a happy time. I liked Bella then, and Tom liked her right to the end."

"Even after he knew ...?"

"That she choked poor aunt? Well, perhaps not quite so much then, but, of course, he couldn't be sure."

"But I thought he was sure?"

"Well, you see, what really happened was this:"

"We are coming to it at last," thought Mrs. Bradley.

"You see, Aunt Flora was so much better that we thought we might all venture to go out for a little while in the afternoon. A sickroom can be very monotonous, and poor Aunt Flora's (I don't mean it was her fault, of course !) was really rather stuffy and smelly. Well, Tom said he wouldn't be a minute, and Bella seemed to be hanging about, almost as though she wanted me out of the way...."

"You thought of that later," thought Mrs. Bradley. She grinned, and the narrator looked disconcerted." Wanted you out of the way, yes?" said Mrs. Bradley, nodding.