Unspoken: A story of secrets, love and revenge T. Belshaw (good books to read for beginners txt) 📖

with her warming hands. I put my hand on hers and with tears streaming down my face, told her I loved her more than anyone else on earth.

‘I’ll be sent to jail for this, but I don’t care, Amy. I couldn’t let him do that to you.’

Amy was crying herself. ‘The bastard got what was coming, Alice. He would have killed us you know? He couldn’t have risked us reporting him over this.’

I nodded. ‘I know. I was stupid to go anywhere near him. I should have stayed inside.’

Amy looked up at me. ‘He would have got in, Alice, he had that bloody axe. I saw him from upstairs. I couldn’t leave you alone with him.’

‘You got there just in time. I think he was about to beat me to death,’ I sobbed.

We were silent for a while. Then I got to my feet. ‘I supposed I’d better telephone the police.’

Amy stood up too. ‘No, you bloody well won’t,’ she said. ‘Let’s think about this first. There may be a way out of it.’

‘How? What can we do? I killed him. I nearly cut his bloody head off, Amy.’

‘He deserved it,’ Amy said with feeling. ‘Now, let me think for a minute.’

‘The police won’t believe any excuse I give them, Amy. They’ll think I did this in revenge for what happened in August. They won’t believe it was self-defence.’

‘Well then, we won’t tell them anything about it.’ Amy replied.

‘We’d never get away with it…would we?’

Amy had recovered her composure; there was no one better to have around in a crisis, even one as serious as this. It was amazing how she could think so clearly and precisely no matter how difficult the situation. I always envied her singlemindedness.

‘Think Miss Marple,’ said Amy. ‘If she can solve a crime when no one else can, she can make sure no one finds out about one, too.’

‘What do you suggest,’ I said, beginning to feel a little more hopeful. I didn’t regret what I had done to Frank, it was the only way I could stop him, but I didn’t want to go to jail for the rest of my life, or swing on a hangman’s noose either, if I could help it.

‘I haven’t got the whole answer yet but, let’s just consider the facts of the case.’ She held up her hand and began to count off valid points. ‘One, who knew he was here?’

I thought about the conversation we had in the yard, before it turned nasty. ‘No one. He sneaked into his mum’s house in the dark, and came out of it in the dark too.’

‘Two. Where does everyone think he is?’

‘In America, he was supposed to catch a ship, but he missed it. No one else around here knows that.’

Amy smiled. ‘Three. Did he go to his mother’s funeral?’

‘No. People will think if he couldn’t bother coming back for that, he’d probably never come back.’

‘Four. We’re on a farm. A farm is a big place. How do we get rid of a body and make sure it’s never found?’

‘We feed him to the pigs!’ I cried. ‘Pigs will eat anything.’

An hour later, dressed in my old overalls, we dragged Frank’s body around to the new pig pen.

‘Horace and Hector will make short work of him,’ I said. ‘The sows won’t get a look in.’

We had left a trail of blood in our wake, it glistened black under the sliver of a moon that peeked out from a gap in the snow-laden clouds.

We left Frank outside the pen while I got some whey treats from the store and tossed them into the holding pen. Horace and Hector, attracted no doubt by the metallic smell of Frank’s blood, came barging out of the sty. I opened the holding pen and after sniffing the air, curiously, they led their sows into the safe area. I pulled the locking lever to shut them in, and we got hold of Frank again, me at the bloody, neck end and Amy at his feet.

‘Will they eat his clothes, too?’ she asked.

‘I don’t know, they’ve eaten fox fur and chicken’s feathers before.’ I thought for a moment. ‘We’d better not risk it. Let’s strip him; I’ll burn the clothes on a bonfire.’

It took longer to strip him of his clothes than we thought it might. His boots came off easily, as did his trouser and pants. Amy pointed to his penis as she dragged them over his ankles.

‘Is that it? Is that his fearsome weapon? I’ve seen bigger baby carrots.’

His coat, jumper and shirt were the hardest items to remove. By the time he was naked, we were both sweating profusely. After a quick breather, we grabbed hold of him again, and half carried, half bounced him into the sleeping block. We laid him out in the furthest corner, then backed out of the sty.

I blew out my cheeks and pulled the lever, allowing the pigs back into their pen. Horace and Hector moved remarkably quickly for such giant beasts, and raced each other back to their sleeping quarters, their snouts twitching as they ran. The sows followed, eager to find out what had been left for them.

‘Enjoy your Christmas dinner,’ Amy said. Then, carrying Frank’s clothes, we walked back to the kitchen.

After a warming cup of tea, we went back out to the yard and hosed it down as best we could. We could hear the pigs snorting and snuffling as they tucked into their unexpected meal.

The snow began to fall in earnest again as we finished clearing the bloodied straw in the barn. I wasn’t too worried if we missed a bit of the blood in the yard, as I could always say I had done what my father had done all those years ago, shot a fox and dragged it over to the pigs by its brush. That would also go to explain any chomping and snorting coming from the sty when the early milking crew came in on Christmas Day. Whatever was