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The end of another average university Monday. Roland stood at the lectern and watched the students file from the room. One or two of the bolder ones ventured a, "Goodnight, professor," as they passed, Roland merely nodded in return.
He'd worked here for fifteen years, the last four as chair of haematology. Each autumn it was the same. A new set of fresh faced medical students. Unworn by the pressure of exams, yet to know the terror of life or death emergency room decisions made on the basis of too few hours sleep and too much caffeine.
When the last pairs of Levi's and Nike's had trailed out into the corridor, Roland gathered his notes, switched out the lights bank by flickering bank, and headed slowly down to the underground car park. It had been a warm day and the coming night would be moist and uncomfortable.
"G'night, professor." The elderly janitor was mopping the floor at the base of the stairwell, he had a voice that you could use to cut glass, the edge honed by a forty a day cigarette habit from the age of fifteen.
"G'night, Al." Roland pushed open the door and walked towards his blood red station wagon, the letters R.L. in bright yellow paint on the wall above his bay, his steps echoing on the concrete.
The drive home was as uneventful as always. A CD of smooth jazz eased his passage through the slow circulation of traffic. He mentally ran through Tuesday's lecture schedule in his head.
He let himself in the house and was greeted by a thin grey haze and the insistent beeping of the smoke detector. Sally, his faithful bloodhound looked at him with sad eyes that said, ‘she's done it again, boss.'
Roland went through to the kitchen. Margaret was slumped at the table, an empty glass in her hand, the smell of cheap whisky on her breath. Smoke seeped from the oven, Roland switched it off, opened the window, turned on the extractor. He cautiously cracked open the oven door and stood back as a cloud of thicker smoke coiled out, the cremated remains of a piece of lamb lurked in the gloom.
He slipped out to the local deli for a smoked salmon bagel, then locked himself in his study to continue work on his book. The book that would be the definitive work of its type. The book that would be his pension, his boat, his retirement home in Florida. He heard Margaret stumbling around downstairs, in search of another bottle. His mind turned to the plan congealing in his subconscious.
The following day he slipped out of the faculty at mid-day and went shopping. Two bottles of Scotch, Margaret's preferred brand, bought in two separate stores. The first place was quiet, Roland engaged the clerk in conversation, paid by credit card, made sure he was remembered. The second store was busy, Roland paid cash, he hardly rated a second glance from the harassed assistant.
Back at the university he returned to his office and locked the door.
***
For the last hour of Thursday afternoon Roland had discussed red cell deficiency with a particularly dull tutorial group. God help me in my old age if any of this lot get to be doctors, he thought.
He spent a few minutes chatting to Al on the way to the car park, although they had nothing in common. Their conversations followed a set routine, Al would run over last night's game in gory detail and Roland would make polite noises at appropriate moments.
The station wagon was comfortable and familiar, Roland drove to the exit barrier then eased out into the clotted rush hour traffic. He slipped Holst's Planets into the CD player and skipped tracks to ‘Jupiter - The Bringer of Jollity'.
The house was quiet as he unlocked the door. Sally greeted him with a whine and loped off towards the lounge, Roland followed.
Margaret lay on the sofa, bloodshot eyes staring, a two thirds empty Scotch bottle on the floor beside her. He felt her neck for a pulse, there was none.
With a thin smile Roland took the bottle and emptied its remaining contents down the kitchen sink. Retrieving the second bottle from its hiding place in the garage he broke the seal and emptied two thirds of its contents down the sink too, watching the brown fluid slowly gurgle away.
Returning to the lounge he wrapped Margaret's unresisting fingers around the new bottle and placed it on the floor beside her.
Then he took Sally for a brisk walk, casually tossing the empty Scotch bottle in an overgrown culvert at a quiet spot, away from the suburb's main arteries.
Back home he called the authorities. "I've just got home to find my wife dead." He even managed a convincing catch to his voice. "Professor Roland Life, one-one-seven Reynard Avenue."
For the next few hours all was activity: police, coroner's officers, questions, paperwork. When the officials were gone and the house was transfused with quiet again, Roland returned to his study, and his manuscript.
Turning up the front of the document on the computer screen he added a dedication, ‘To my late wife, Margaret.'
Whom I did not kill, he thought. She was killing herself anyhow, he'd merely hurried things along. A little ethanol in her Scotch to speed the process.
Then he thought about the most important thing in his life, his book, he couldn't have allowed Margaret to get in the way of that. An alcoholic wife lurking in the background of his success could have been a disaster. A dead alcoholic wife though, that was manageable.
He leaned back in his chair and smiled, Roland's book would be the foremost work on its subject, it would be mentioned in the same breath as other standard medical texts: Gray's Anatomy, Clunie's Surgery, Life's Blood.
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