Innocence

'Innocent until proved guilty. That's the law. Not guilty because
you and your cronies thought you saw something. The law doesn't work
like that.' Harold spoke quite firmly. He was put out. How dare she
accuse him? She was standing in front of him wailing like a banshee.
Lucky there was no one to hear her. He was grateful that the little
brick house he lived in was in a forgotten corner near the canal,
surrounded by empty warehouses, their broken windows mocking the trendy
waterfront apartments across the rather murky water.

Lisa was small and slight, but she could certainly make some din. Her
big eyes and black curls tumbling round her shoulders made her look
like a toddler having a tantrum. She beat her little hands uselessly
against his bulk. Getting a little bit aggravated by now, Harold
decided to try to calm her. Normally he let her rant and rave until she
collapsed into his arms and they went straight to bed.

He put his giant hands on her shoulders and held her off so that she
couldn't reach him. Her face was tear-stained. The big eyes now looked
out of a black, green and tan streaked face where the make up had run.
She did not look attractive. What had he seen in her? Flattered by her
attention possibly. She was good to be seen with. He even enjoyed the
'Beauty and the Beast' jibes. He always replied,' She's not that bad
looking. . ' and got dutiful smans from his mates who respected his
massive size if not his sense of humour.

She was going on and on about him being with someone else. It wasn't
that he was worried about being seen with another woman. She was just
jealous after all. He should be flattered. But there was a problem with
her remembering that particular woman. She was still wriggling, trying
to get at him, so he moved his hands further along. They were large
enough, or she was slight enough for his grasp to reach her neck. He
held her a bit tighter. She stopped shouting at him. In fact, she
stopped breathing.

It was Julia he'd been seen with. They were coming out of the club.
Fairly early it was, only half past two. He'd just met her. She was a
slender blond with the idea that she was beautiful. '. . .like
Cleopatra' she said, admiring herself in every mirror they passed.
There was a problem with the hair colour, of course, but, hey, whatever
made her feel good about herself. . It wasn't till much later that he
realised she would like him to be some kind of servile manservant,
seeing to her every need. That irked him rather. He told her that he
was annoyed by that scenario and she laughed. He'd only slapped her
once, but it left her head at an odd angle on the pillow.

He'd buried her at the bottom of his garden where the weeds and nettles
grew near the canal bank. There was a large willow hiding him from the
posh flats across the water. He'd been careful, and when he'd finished,
he convinced himself that there was no sign that the earth had been
disturbed. Now he'd have to do it again. How could these little women
cause him so much aggravation? Everything was their fault. He was
entirely innocent. He went inside still grumbling about the unfairness
of it all.

He was getting ready to go to the club when he heard a police siren on
the street outside. Probably there had been more vandalism at the
warehouses. Homeless people used them and sometimes they went a bit too
far with their drunken brawls and the City folk in the flats opposite
called the police. Yes, that would be it.

He was surprised when there was a ring at his doorbell. Well, he hadn't
seen anything. He'd just go and tell them that and then he'd have to
hurry or he'd be late.

There were two policewomen on his doorstep, looking round in amazement
at the perfectly respectable small house in such an urban wasteland.
They were young and quite attractive and Hector found his attention
wandering so that he didn't quite catch what they'd said and had to ask
them to repeat it.

They were looking for a young blond woman who hadn't returned to her
husband and children after going out with some pals the evening before.
(Husband and children? Hector was surprised.) The woman had been to the
club that he 'frequented' (their word) and they wondered if Mr Oliver
(Harold) had seen her and noticed who she left with.

He said he hadn't seen anything (his usual response to police
questions), but if they came inside for a minute, he would see if he
could remember any detail that had temporarily slipped his mind. He
could certainly handle two of them and was actually getting quite
excited at the thought of the uniforms. He had always been a sucker for
uniforms.

Slightly later, they were buried in his own nettleplot graveyard and he
pondered the problem of the police car at his gate. Best run it into
the canal, he reasoned.

It didn't take him long to push it (to save drawing attention to what
he was about to do) to the place where only a thin fence separated the
road from the dark troubled waters of the canal. He'd found car keys in
the fairer girl's pocket, so got in and started up the engine. He would
drive in and then jump out as it was sinking, go back home to change,
go to the club as usual, and no one would be any the wiser.

His plan did not quite work. His tremendous weight caused the car to
sink too quickly for him to lever his bulk through the window he'd left
open for his escape. The last sounds he heard were police sirens in the
far distance and he was relieved that they were coming to rescue him.
Maybe they would give him a lift to the club. After all he was just an
innocent man caught up in problems that were not his fault. . . .