Chapter 3 Explanations & Tribulations
Eric asked Barbara whether they should tell the Winona and Bill and Pat and Peter the real reason why the party was cancelled last week.
‘I don’t know, Eric. We never informed the police either, I wanted you to – why didn’t you?’
‘I was in two minds – I was concerned over your state of mind at the time – all those questions they would be firing at you and having to go down the Police Station, listening to recordings etc, etc and leaving the house empty would have been another issue.’
‘Why would that have been an issue?’
‘Supposing it had been an opportunist trying to get us out of the house, he or they would have the run of the property and the police wouldn’t have put a constable to guard outside as they might not think it important enough as a crime as it appeared to be only a supposition on our part and as there is no evidence, it might have been a bit difficult to explain without us getting ourselves tied up in knots.’
‘Well – in that scenario, I suppose we did the right thing! I’m just thinking that this is a lot more serious than we think it is.’
Eric remarked ‘We wouldn’t have known, unless something else had happened that day or the day after, and on that basis I thought it seemed to be nothing more than a prank, unless of course something happens within the next week.’
‘Why should you think that something may happen next week?’
‘Well, it stands to reason that if someone starts something they must have an end product in mind – there’s no point in starting something and then not finishing it – if you see what I mean.’
‘Vaguely, I think.’ said Barbara
‘Well! Shall I try and explain again?’
‘No dear – I think I have the gist of what you were trying to convey to me – I’m just a bit slow to comprehend today.’
‘About this evening’ Eric said, ‘Shall we tell them about what has happened and why we cancelled the dinner party?’
‘I think we had better.’
‘I’ve only known them since I married you.’
‘I was at school with Winona, and we both attended Exeter University studying to become Secretaries and I vaguely remember Bill who was doing an Electrical and Telephone Course. He hoped to be employed by British Telecom.’
‘Ahh!’ said Eric.
‘What does Ahh! stand for?’
‘The telephone, the telephone!’
‘I know about the telephone, you don’t have to repeat it twice.’
Eric said the telephone again and this time pointed to it to make Barbara understand the significance between the telephone and Bill Monkton!’
‘Oh! You’ve got to be joking! I can’t see Winona going out with a prankster. She wouldn’t stand for it in the first place and she certainly wouldn’t have married him. No Eric – I think you’re wrong in your assumption.’
‘What about Pat & Peter, they were friends of Winona and Bill first before they met us.’
‘That’s Bill’s mate, Peter! They were friends in their youth, apparently living next door to each other – so I think everything will be okay in that quarter – we can safely tell them all about the frightening experience we had last week.’
Barbara said that she could not visualise Eric as Inspector Todd of Scotland Yard. She also said again that it would have been wise to notify the police at the time, but Eric stated that there was another reason why he had decided not to.
Barbara said, ‘What was that?’
‘There was no proof that we had received any threats, because if you remember it was a live performance, there was no tape in the machine or any recording device visible. So, somewhere in this house of ours there must be something that we do not recognise as being a recording machine or loud speaker.’
Eric went to the telephone and pressed a button and a lid sprang open. ‘There’s nothing in there. In fact it looks like a dish to hold paperclips in.’
‘That’s what it is! A dish to hold paperclips in. Don’t you remember I bought another telephone/fax/monitor machine and this one has the facility of digital recording.’
‘I can’t keep up with you, Barbara. When did you buy that?’
‘A few weeks ago, I told you I was going to buy one and I remember you telling me not to pay a lot of money for it.’
‘How much was it then?’
‘I can’t remember off-hand, I suppose about the usual price for one of those machines’
‘You must have a receipt somewhere.’
‘Does it matter!’
‘Suppose not. Where are the instructions?’
‘Still in the box, I think. I haven’t had a chance to look at it, but now you’ve mentioned it I’ll go and find it, I think it might be in one of the drawers in the kitchen, where we keep all the other documents.’
Barbara went to the drawer which housed all the instructions and leafing through the wads of papers she found what she was looking for and replaced all the other sheets and stuffed them back with great effort and just managed to shut the drawer and return to where Eric was standing, who was bent over the machine.
She handed the booklet to Eric.
‘Digital! Hmm! Let me see! Hmm! Ah! On page 21 how to use the digital recording! Hmm! Well that seems simple enough if you’re Chinese!’
Barbara said, ‘Are you looking on the right page, the English version?’
‘I am looking at the English section, but I think it must have been written by the Chinese!’
‘Give it to me! You men are hopeless when it comes to practical things.’
‘Over to you, darling Barbara, if you can make sense out of that, I’ll eat my hat!’
Barbara read the instruction leaflet.
‘You are right, for a change!’
She threw the booklet at Eric and went back to the kitchen and resumed preparing the evening meal. Eric walked back to the sofa, and sat down and started reading the booklet.
Eric said, ‘I think I have the answer. You have to set the machine up with the date and time plus a lot of other trivialities and then finish by recording your own message and then the digital recording starts all by itself when you’re out, as long as you set it in the first instance.’
He went to the phone and started pressing buttons and after a few words finally completed the job.
‘It’s all done, we are ready for lift off, Houston!’
‘Don’t be silly, dear.’
‘Shall we try it?’
‘Yes! Lets do it!’
Eric pushed a button and the telephone announced that the answer phone has been activated.
‘That’s clever!’
They both stood still and watched it for a brief moment. Barbara went back to the oven and Eric sat down on the sofa.
Eric said, ‘Perhaps we ought to turn it off, in case one of our guests rings us for any reason.’
‘I suppose so,’ Barbara said.
Eric went to the phone, but it rang before he could press any of the buttons and a voice spoke loud and clear.
The voice said ‘So you think you’ve both been very clever, we will see about that!’
Before Eric could make any reply, the phone clicked and went off.
Barbara looked scared and had to sit on the sofa.
She said, ’He’s got to be in this house, how could he possibly know what we have been doing!’
* * *
Later on they both regained their composure, but were still wondering about the situation they found themselves in, Eric suddenly said ‘I’ll look in the loft, that’s the obvious place, I’ve never checked there very thoroughly before, there must be something I’ve overlooked!’
He went to the stairs and listened. The silence was deafening. Then he bounded up the stairs as quietly as possible and pressed the button, the trap door slid open and the steps lowered to the ground. He climbed the ladder very slowly. His head was parallel with the edge of the trapdoor and the light came on, he moved further up and peered along the roof space. There was no- one there, he even shouted out,
‘IS THERE ANYBODY UP HERE?’
Eric thought what a silly thing to say – no-one was going to answer that question even if they were there – they’d wait to see if he would come and then look round for something to clobber him with and make off somehow.
‘There’s no one up here!’ Eric said rather faintly.
Barbara decided to follow Eric to the next floor – not wanting to stay in the kitchen on her own.
She said, ‘Go all the way up, somebody could be hiding behind the chimney or anywhere up there!’
‘That’s what I’m afraid of – oh well!’
Eric disappeared and the silence was too much for Barbara to bear.
‘ERIC! ERIC!’
‘WHAT DO YOU WANT?’
‘Anybody there?’
Eric said, ‘I don’t know! I hadn’t got very far, when you called me back!’ Barbara remarked ‘Sorry! Carry on.’
He crawled some little way and then stood up. There was no-one there, but he did find sweet wrappings and one of the large window latches was undone. He looked out of the window, then he pushed it open further, but there was no one in sight. He locked the window and made his way back to the trapdoor and swung his legs down onto the steps and climbed down. The light went out as he took his foot off the last rung. He pressed the button and steps rose and the trapdoor slid shut. He looked at Barbara and handed her the sweet wrappings and they both walked silently down the stairs into the kitchen and Barbara placed the wrappings onto the work surface in the kitchen.
Eric said, ‘I found these on the floor and also one of our windows was open, it might have been Bill when he was last up there, we will have to ask him when he comes this evening.’
Barbara said, ‘Oh! I do hope so! But I have a horrible feeling that it maybe our unwanted guest!’
A cold shiver ran down her back.
Eric said, ‘Gosh, I never checked the spare bedroom!
‘Too late now, darling!’
‘I don’t suppose it matters, I didn’t hear anything. There’s no clear access in or out, unless he climbed up and over the roof, using a ladder.’
‘Oh stop it Eric! It give’s me the creeps just thinking about it!
‘Sorry darling. You know – about these sweet wrappers, I don’t think Bill eats sweets, he likes his drink of whisky and I didn’t see any bottle tops up there!’ Barbara was beginning to feel rather queasy and said so.
‘I am feeling quite ill! Are you doing this on purpose?’
Eric said, ‘What?’
‘Keeping on and making it into a joke!’
‘This is no joke.’ said Eric ‘I can assure you – It’s no joke!’