Tainted

The tempo of their coupling increased with Billy's confidence. "Amy," he sighed again.

"Love me," the girl insisted. "Not like Patrick. Don't use me like that. Be nice to me. Love me ..."

The couple slid from the chair to the carpet. Billy began to thrust in earnest. His body slapped against Amy's taut flesh as paunchy middle-age pounded against firm youth and beauty.

"Oh no," Billy hissed. "I'm ... Not inside you ..."

"Do it," the girl demanded through clenched jaw. "Just do it, it'll take me with you ... Please ..."

His semen squirted into the girl. Billy groaned and juddered as the stuff pumped from his cock. Amy cried with delight as her own climax broke, her arms and legs wrapped tightly around her new lover.

"What have we done?" Billy said, anguish twisting his face. "I shouldn't have done it. Not into you. Oh God, what if ...?"

"Don't worry," Amy smoothed Billy's recently cropped hair as he lay heavily on top of her. She felt him shrivel and his semen dribble out of her body. "I'm close to my curse anyway; I won't be pregnant."

"But ... You can't be sure," Billy protested.

"Dinae worry. It'll be alright," Amy insisted.

She didn't foresee what was going to happen, neither of them did, but with the passing of Christmas, as the snow fell, their time together would be ended.

From a letter dated 13th January1979:

... I killed her out of love. She asked me to. And because I loved her I couldn't refuse, no matter how much I wanted to. It was simple, in the end, not that I'm saying it was easy, of course it wasn't easy, but putting the pillow over her face and pressing down, leaning over her ...

The life passed out of her without me knowing exactly when she died. The moments after were quite simply terrible. The enormity of what I'd done struck me a few minutes after I'd lifted the pillow off her face. I'd killed her. She was dead. There was no coming back from it.

I want you to know I did it out of love. You said the same yourself, when you thought you'd killed your father. You said to me that it was because you thought he was going to hurt your mother that you hit him; you carried that burden around with you for four weeks, the guilt of having committed patricide, and you justified it by saying you did it out of love for your mother. That's why I killed mine; I smothered my mother because she couldn't take the illness any more. She wanted to die. And I killed her because I loved her.

The doctor knew what I'd done, the pathologist, I'm sure of it. Perhaps she understood and chose to support that terrible act. If she did she can justify it in her own way, that isn't my concern but, and I can't help but think that if she had known what I'd done and divulged her suspicions to the police, well then, perhaps Sylvia would still be alive. If I'd been tried and convicted for the murder of my mother I'd never have met Sylvia. That disastrous attempt at seduction would never have taken place, we wouldn't have argued, I wouldn't have run after her and the struggle would never have happened.

I just wanted Sylvia to see that it wasn't her fault, my impotence wasn't anything to do with how desirable she was or wasn't, but she was a mad one anyway, paranoid and alcoholic, which is why she'd agreed to come back to the house in the first place. She was just looking for comfort and love in the bleak winter of what had become her life. I'd been in the pub for the same reason I was on the station the night I met you, Amy. I was looking for company.

Sylvia screamed and struggled and tore herself from my grip. The banister gave way as she smacked against it ...

So I'd killed her too. But it was an accident.

The third death, I said I killed a third. It was necessity, or at least I thought it necessary at the time. If I'd had any guts I would've reported Sylvia's accident and ridden the tempest that followed. But of course I didn't. I've always been a physical coward, and physical cowardice really, I think, stems from a lack of moral courage, and so Sylvia went out on the moors ... And so did her friend, I never did now her name, the woman who came looking for Sylvia the next day.

She turned up at half-ten, already half-cut, and yapping on about Sylvia. The persistent bitch wouldn't leave it alone, wouldn't leave and kept on and on and on ...

Then she threatened the police. I don't think she meant to go the police, she was just trying to get some money out of me for booze or whatever she wanted -- but it was something I didn't need to hear and I panicked. I scrabbled around in desperation, found the claw hammer and ...

Well, figure it out yourself.

That's it, Amy. You know the worst. Judge me as you see fit, but I hope you do understand. You were never in danger; please don't imagine I would ever have hurt you.

How did I get your address? It's simple. Before you left, when I knew you were going home, I looked through your things and found the diary -- which I didn't read, I just noted the address in it.

Part of me wishes you'd never made that phone call on Boxing Day. If you hadn't ... well, you'd perhaps still be with me, in the house, making love ... But another part of me is glad that your dad's alive and that you can go home. He must have a hard skull! Lucky for you both.

Christmas Day, nothing special in itself but with you there, Amy, for a time I was able to push the guilt away and forget my mother and Sylvia and the other poor woman ... I knew it wouldn't last, but for that day ...

I made a will, the house is yours. The solicitor will be in touch. Sell it and use the money to enjoy your life. Waste it, spend it wisely, give it away ... It's yours.

The cat will look after herself. I doubt I was the only soft touch to feed her; she'll be OK.

Goodbye, Amy. Thank you for the time you shared with me.

William Montrose Appleby.

*

The rolling spine of England, the Pennines, lay under a blanket of pure, dazzling blue-white, a world unblemished, cold and pristine

An untainted soul.

Billy opened the car door, the old Allegro had taken him as far as it could. The A64 out of York had been clear. The A1 to Scotch Corner and the snow barred any further progress. Not that it mattered to him, isolation suited his purpose. He set off walking, ninety degrees south from the A66 towards Sleightholme, a town he would never reach, offering his stained soul to the waist deep drifts.