SAUCE FOR THE GOOSE, by Clyde Linsley

Arthur Gibbs, the celebrated world explorer, considered himself a cosmopolite, a student of the world, and as tolerant an individual as ever lived. So his decision to murder his next-door neighbor was clear evidence of the neighbor’s unpleasant nature.

In his varied career, Gibbs had lived on four continents, first as a foreign-service officer with the State Department, then as a highly paid consultant to several multinational corporations. He spoke five languages, four fluently, and held advanced degrees in political science and economics. He could converse easily on almost any subject.

William Lanier, by contrast, was a cretin, intellectually and morally, ignorant of the world around him and indifferent to the events that concerned the world. His interests seemed to be confined to a narrow range of subjects, of which professional sports—notably football—seemed to predominate. Gibbs was not quite sure what Lanier did for a living, but he was certain that his neighbor was a man of little or no value.

If he could have done so, Gibbs simply would have ignored the man, but in the high-rise apartment building where he lived, that was impossible. Lanier was always invading his space, usually at the most inopportune times. Whenever Gibbs invited guests to his apartment, his neighbor would always happen to be in the hall to greet them, busily engaged in some important but obscure activity and always (it seemed to Gibbs) fishing for an introduction or an invitation. It was distressing; the man was always on his best behavior, so guests would wonder why he was not invited. Weren’t they neighbors, after all? His friends, he felt, were beginning to wonder about his behavior. But it would be even worse if he included Lanier, so that his friends would learn the man’s true nature and associate him with his loutish neighbor.

Gibbs had considered his alternatives. He could move, of course, but it would be difficult—perhaps impossible—to find comparable lodgings in the crowded city. For the same reason, it would be difficult to make conditions so uncomfortable that Lanier would elect to move away.

Facing such dismal prospects, Gibbs decided to make one last attempt to accommodate his neighbor’s desire to be sociable in a way that would not destroy his own reputation. A half-hearted effort, to be sure, but as sincere as he could make it. Because the holiday season was approaching, he invited Lanier to a Christmas dinner.

Lanier quickly accepted the invitation. Gibbs determined to make the best impression possible, and he was certain that he could do so. He prided himself on his culinary skills. A Christmas goose, he decided, was the perfect offering—a traditional holiday feast, but one not normally offered in an era of “quick and easy.”

He took great care to purchase the perfect goose, neither too fat nor too lean, and he devoted hours to its preparation. While the bird roasted, he prepared an accompanying compote of apples and sage. The result, he concluded proudly, was superb. The best he had ever done.

The dinner, alas, was disastrous.

Lanier was late in arriving—two hours late. He apologized profusely, explaining that he had been engrossed in “the game.”

“Game?” Gibbs asked. “What game?”

“Why, the Redskins, of course,” Lanier said. “They’re playing the Cowboys this week, and—don’t tell me you haven’t been watching it.”

“I don’t have television,” Gibbs said. “Never saw the need.”

Lanier’s jaw dropped. “No TV? How do you keep up with things?”

“I get two daily newspapers,” Gibbs said. “Three, actually, if you include the Wall Street Journal, which I don’t because it’s such a specialized publication.”

Lanier stared at Gibbs in disbelief.

“And I have radio, of course,” Gibbs added.

“And you follow the news on the radio?”

“Well, no. Opera, mostly. There was a performance of Les Troyens just last night. Quite enjoyable.”

Lanier shook his head in disgust. “Whatever,” he said.

The evening went downhill from there. Conversation was virtually non-existent. Lanier ate almost nothing, saying that he disliked goose.

He did seem to enjoy the compote of apples and sage. In fact, he helped himself to several servings, which he consumed, although still silently, with obvious relish. And when the evening was over, he turned to Gibbs and shamefacedly asked if he could have the recipe.

Gibbs was taken aback. He would not have been surprised at a request for the goose recipe; he considered it one of his specialties. The apple compote, however, had been an afterthought, and he had not followed a recipe. It had been an experiment from start to finish, and he did not remember all that he had done to make it.

But an idea came to him suddenly. If he could duplicate the dish, or make something similar to it, and introduce one subtle and toxic addition, it would work out nicely, and remove the man from his life at the same time. As long as Lanier did not detect the differences between the original dish and its successor—and Gibbs was certain he would not—Lanier would go to his death unaware that he had been poisoned. It would be, in a sense, the perfect murder.

“I’m sorry,” he told Lanier, sounding as sincere as he could. “The recipe was given to me by an old friend, who asked that I never divulge the details to another soul.”

“Oh, well,” the crestfallen Lanier said. “In that case, I understand. I wouldn’t want you to betray a friendship.”

“But what I could do,” Gibbs continued, “is make another serving of my sauce just for you. That wouldn’t be breaking my promise to my friend.”

“You’d do that for me?” Lanier said.

“Of course,” Gibbs said. “I’d be happy to do so. It’ll take a few days, but…”

“I don’t care,” Lanier said hastily. “Take as long as you need. I’m going to enjoy that stuff.”

“I’m certain of that,” Gibbs said with a smile. He began immediately to put his plan in motion.

Gibbs had an ace in the hole: an acquaintance in one of the government intelligence agencies had told him of a special poison that was odorless and tasteless and would be almost undetectable unless one were looking for it specifically. He called it ricin.

“You have to be very careful when you make it,” the acquaintance had told him. “But ricin isn’t particularly difficult to make. You make it from castor beans, which you can probably get at a hardware store or a garden center, and you can find the recipe on the internet.”

A quick search yielded the information he sought, and Gibbs set to work immediately. The process took several days, and Gibbs had to be careful to avoid accidental exposure to the poison, which was quite virulent.

When the ricin was ready, Gibbs prepared the compote, mixed in the ricin—carefully avoiding spillage—and delivered the dish to Lanier, who received it gratefully.

“Great,” Lanier said. “Hey, I owe you. Is there anything I can do for you?”

Yes, there is, Gibbs thought but did not say. And you shall soon provide it.

“There’s really nothing I need,” he said, instead. “I was happy to be of assistance.”

How long would it take for the ricin to kill his neighbor? After carefully disposing of the potentially contaminated garments he’d worn and scrubbing his entire kitchen from ceiling to floor, several times, Gibbs sat down and consulted his notes. It might take a few weeks, or a few days, depending on how much of the compote Lanier consumed before it took effect. The first signs might be much like the symptoms of a cold or influenza. They would grow rapidly more severe until, one day, he would simply succumb.

But Lanier did not succumb. Days passed without incident. Gibbs had not expected Lanier to announce that he was dying, but his appearance and demeanor remained unchanged.

Gibbs found himself lying in his bed, wide awake, long hours into the night, listening for the siren of a fire-and-rescue truck, or the sound of heavy boots in the hallway as hastily summoned firemen and paramedics rushed up the stairs to Lanier’s apartment. Gibbs imagined the glee he would feel when he heard a medical professional declare his neighbor to be, officially, dead.

No such announcement was issued, and Lanier remained very much alive. Each morning, Gibbs would enter the hallway and find his neighbor also standing there. Each morning, Lanier would smile at Gibbs as if greeting a long-lost friend. He would make small talk in the elevator, as if nothing untoward had happened. Gibbs found himself wondering whether he had actually attempted to poison the man.

Perhaps he had dreamt it all? But a quick check of his storage unit revealed the tiny, tightly capped bottle of ricin he’d hidden there, still waiting for him to devise a safe method of disposal.

He could not imagine what had gone wrong with his plan. He knew only that the attempt to murder his neighbor had been unsuccessful. But he knew, also, that he would never have the courage for another attempt. If the deed itself was not sufficiently off-putting, the long ordeal of fruitless waiting was quite sufficient.

Gibbs made his peace with the situation. Perhaps it was time to begin the search for a new place to live—an apartment far away from his present lodgings. He made up his mind to begin the search the following day.

In the morning he made calls to several rental agents in town and made appointments to look at some apartments that had only recently become available. As he slipped into his overcoat, his doorbell rang.

“Good morning,” Lanier said.

“Mr. Lanier!”

“Oh, I think our friendship’s gone beyond Mr. Lanier and Mr. Gibbs. Don’t you think so, Arthur?”

“I suppose so,” Gibbs said. He waited for Lanier to state his business.

“May I come in?” Lanier said.

“I was just going out,” Gibbs said. “Is this something that could wait?”

Lanier frowned and shook his head. “Don’t think so,” he said. “I need your opinion on something important. Important and urgent.”

Puzzled, Gibbs moved aside so Lanier could enter. His neighbor went into the living room and quickly took a seat on the sofa. He opened the small paper bag he carried, removing a plastic container with a lid, which he placed on the table before him.

Gibbs waited impatiently for Lanier to continue, but his neighbor seemed to have lost his sense of urgency. He sat quietly, his eyes roaming around the room for what seemed an eternity. Gibbs was about to ask his business when Lanier finally spoke up.

“Nice place,” he said. “I really like what you’ve done with it. These newer buildings don’t have much character, but I like the way you’ve made this space your own.”

“Thank you.” Gibbs waited, but Lanier seemed in no hurry to proceed to business. After a long moment, Gibbs felt the need to move the discussion forward.

“So what can I do for you, Mr.—”

“Jim, please,” Lanier said. “Or James, if you insist on being formal. I’d prefer Jim. Just Jim.”

“All right, Just Jim,” Gibbs said. “What can I do for you?”

“I was quite impressed with the sauce you whipped up for Christmas dinner,” Lanier said. “Since I’m having a few friends over for dinner next week, I decided to try making something like it. Have I managed to capture the flavor of yours?”

The “sauce,” Gibbs noted, was in a plastic container like those that eager salesmen hawked door-to-door. Gibbs would never have put anything in such a tacky, middlebrow container. Wrinkling his nose, he took the container from Lanier and removed the lid. He sniffed it judiciously.

“It certainly has the right aroma,” Gibbs said. “Of course, that’s not a definitive judgment. I’d have to taste it to be sure.”

“By all means,” Lanier said with enthusiasm. “Let me get you a spoon. I really want your opinion.”

He sprang from his seat and hurried to Gibbs’s kitchen, returning quickly with the utensil.

“Please,” he said as he handed Gibbs the spoon. “Let me have it straight. I can take it.”

Gibbs took the spoon and dipped into the compote. The flavor that greeted him was as familiar as an old friend. His face registered his recognition. He quickly dipped his spoon back in and savored another, larger portion.

“Does that smile mean that I have succeeded?” Lanier asked.

“You have, indeed.” Gibbs took another, larger spoonful. “If I didn’t know better, I’d guess that you had duplicated my achievement perfectly.”

“Well, not quite,” Lanier said.

“I beg your pardon?” Gibbs asked, after swallowing his third spoonful of the compote.

“I didn’t duplicate it,” Lanier said. “I merely transferred it from your container to one of mine. You’re correct that this is quite like your own creation. That’s because it is your creation.”

Gibbs’s spoon froze halfway to his mouth.

“But why—” he exclaimed.

“Why? Did you think your sudden gesture of friendship wouldn’t seem suspicious, after years of getting the cold shoulder? You were pathetically obvious. I racked my brain, trying to figure out what you were up to. And I realized you were faking it—you had some sort of dirty trick up your sleeve.”

“But surely you didn’t think I would try to harm you,” Gibbs said, realizing as the words left his mouth just how lame his protest sounded.

“Well, I didn’t know, did I? How could I know? But I thought it was possible. I needed to find out. And from the sick look on your face, I’m guessing my suspicions were on the money.”

“Oh, God,” Gibbs said.

“It’s no use blaming God,” Lanier said. “You can get an explanation from God face to face pretty soon. And I’m sure he’ll be interested in your explanation, as well.”

“And how will you explain yourself?” Gibbs said heatedly. “Do you think God will ignore murder?”

“I don’t think of it as me committing murder,” Lanier said. “I think of it as you committing suicide.”

After Lanier left, Gibbs thought about his dilemma. Perhaps he hadn’t added sufficient quantities of ricin to the compote. But he knew that he had done everything correctly.

He could go to the emergency room. But would they even know what ricin was? And it would likely be days or weeks, even, before he could find a specialized physician capable of applying an appropriate antidote, if one existed. Surely there was something—something exploratory or experimental perhaps—that could alter his fate and improve his prognosis.

But in order to seek a cure, he realized, he would be forced to explain his circumstances: how he had attempted to murder his neighbor, and how it had all gone wrong. Could he live with that knowledge? More to the point, could others—people he admired and respected—admire and respect him if they knew what he had done? Would he be able to face them if they knew?

On the other hand, if he died, there would be a funeral, and perhaps a memorial service, at which various people would deliver eulogies. That could only enhance his reputation. He could also specify in his will that Lanier be invited to speak on that occasion. Would Lanier be tempted to explain the circumstances of Gibbs’s death, including Gibbs’s failed homicide attempt? Perhaps, but Gibbs thought such an attempt would backfire.

What sort of man, after all, would speak ill of the deceased? And at the decedent’s own memorial?

He realized that he was developing a cough and a sore throat. He would probably feel even worse in the morning. Perhaps it would be best simply to let nature take its course and leave his reputation intact.

He would die, of course, but he would have protected his reputation, and a man’s reputation was—after all—his most valuable possession. He was surprised to find that the thought was rather comforting.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Clyde Linsley is a refugee from journalism who now writes historical fiction because he likes history. His most recent novels featured Yankee lawyer Josiah Beede. “Sauce for the Goose” is more contemporary, however. Linsley lives in the Virginia suburbs of Washington, D.C.