14

At four o’clock, as Mr Jaraby was taking his first spoonful of raspberries and cream, Mrs Jaraby was offering sleeping pills to his cat. She had given Monmouth nothing to eat all day. Breaking the pills, four times the recommended adult dose, she mixed them into a plate of fish, knowing that they would be instantly and carelessly consumed. They were. Monmouth lay in a stupor on the kitchen floor, the empty eye-socket wide and sinister, flakes of fish lingering on his fur. Mrs Jaraby poked him with the end of a broom. She poked harder; she placed her foot on his tail and gradually brought the weight of her body to bear. The cat did not wake up. Mrs Jaraby fetched a sack.

Monmouth was heavy and unwieldy, and Mrs Jaraby had difficulty in getting him into the sack. She wore gloves, removing them only to tie the mouth of the sack with a piece of string. She dragged the burden upstairs, panting with every step. Once she thought she felt the animal move, and stood back in terror in case he should tear his way to liberty. She stood at the top of the stairs, looking down at the sack, which was about half-way up. There was no movement now; she hauled it up the remaining steps, across the landing, over the smooth surface of the bathroom floor. She paused then, looking from the sack to the bath three-quarters full of water. Straining herself, she raised the sack from the floor and toppled it as gently as she could over the side. She had to wedge it beneath the surface of the water with a chair.

At half-past five Mrs Jaraby returned to the bathroom, laid an old macintosh coat of her husband’s on the floor, removed the chair from the bath and bundled the sack over the edge. She folded the coat about it, tying it in place with string. She pulled it from the bathroom, allowing its own weight to carry it down the stairs. From the hall she dragged it through the kitchen into the backyard. She had removed the contents of a dustbin and placed the bin ready on its side. She shoved the sack in, levered the dustbin into an upright position again, covered the sack with tins, newspapers and potato peelings, and replaced the lid.

Mrs Jaraby let the water out of the bath, cleaned away the scum, and set the house to rights. She put a hat on, took some money from her purse and walked to the bus-stop. She could have sent the telegram over the telephone, but she preferred to see the message in writing. She wrote in her spidery handwriting with a difficult post office pen. The ink ran into the absorbent paper, but the girl behind the counter was able to read it; Mrs Jaraby made sure of that.

Your birds no longer threatened. Monmouth died today. Come as you wish. Love. Mother.