Switchback Stories by Iain Edward Henn Read Free Book Online Page B

the place but the profits were only ever modest, at most.
    It was quite some time since I’d first thought of the plan. Initially, it seemed repulsive to me, like a naughty daydream that you never tell anyone about. Over the years it began to sit more comfortably with me. Eventually, it seemed like a perfectly reasonable way to be rid of such a pathetic, domineering, money spending creature.
    Whenever we move to a new home, Ruth likes me to create wallpaper for the main bedroom and living area. Something unique.
    Something for her to boast about.
    This is one of my specialties in the décor business. I design and manufacture wallpaper in my studio workshop in Sydney. I have a four colour screen printing press and the necessary inks and dyes.
    The night before Ruth’s trip I was working late at the workshop. The front doorbell chimed and I ushered Alicia in.
    ‘Hi. Unexpected visit,’ she said.
    ‘Expected or not, you’re always welcome.’ I took her in my arms and the soft, smooth touch of her skin against mine felt good.
    God knows I’m not a promiscuous man. Hardly the type.
    But at least once in his life every man acts on impulse and does something totally out of character. For me that out-of-character moment was an affair. It had begun two months previously when Alicia and I were alone in my workshop for the first time. I’d reached over and kissed her on the lips.
    I don’t know what I’d expected. To my surprise, she responded, and we spent the first of many long, lovely nights together.
    ‘You’re just in time to see my masterpiece.’ I showed her the ocean inspired design of the new wallpaper.
    ‘Explain how this works again.’ She frowned. ‘I’m still not sure I understand.’
    ‘I’ve used an arsenical dye in the manufacture of the wallpaper,’ I explained. ‘The use of such dyes in the paper is prohibited but that’s a little known fact. And would never be suspected. Once I’ve pasted the paper onto the bedroom walls I’ll apply a specially prepared paper remover. The chemicals in this paper stripper will cause the paste under the paper to evaporate quickly. This, in turn, will release small amounts of hydrogen gas into the air.’
    I used my hands to illustrate the process of fermentation. ‘The hydrogen gas is harmless by itself. But combined with the arsenic in the paper it creates a lethal gas called arsine.’
    ‘And this process will take about twenty-four hours?’
    ‘That’s right. When Ruth breathes in the arsine gas it will cause nausea, cramps, dizziness. She’ll be dead within hours. The arsine gas disperses rapidly, leaving no trace, and I can quickly replace the wallpaper before the police are called in.’
    Alicia shuddered. ‘And my job is to make sure she gets home late at night from our trip. That way she’ll go straight to bed.
    I nodded. ‘She’ll no longer be with us by the following morning. The first day of our new life together.’
    • • •
    I was proud of my plan. It had the same meticulous detail and creativity as my interior home designs. I’d won awards for those.
    I first heard about the deadly wallpaper, the most unlikely of killers, during my college days twenty years before.
    I studied for my diploma at the Australian College of Interior Design in Sydney. I first heard the story when one of my lecturers told the class how arsenical dyes came to be banned from use in wallpaper manufacture in the previous century.
    Edward Sampson was one of those quaint Englishmen, slightly built, stooped, bearded, who got completely carried away when talking on a subject that fascinated him. The normally reserved lecturer became somewhat theatrical. He was the kind of odd character you never forget.
    The story of the arsenical dye had stuck in my subconscious ever since.
    Sampson had explained how, over a hundred years ago, a mystery illness spread in a small village in the English countryside. Over a period of many months, members of a number of families died.