The next bit was easy. He simply poured petrol into the little wax reservoir that he had created and replaced the lid he had cut off, so that its trailing white wick was immersed in the fluid. He then used the warmth of his fingers to seal the wax and hide the mark of his cut. He would rather have used a flame, but prudence warned him against the unnecessary risk. Anyway, Dan wasn’t going to look at the candle closely. The first thing he’d do when he and Shelley entered the gloom would be to find his lighter and put it to the candle wick.
And then—boom. Conflagration. Greg Lincoln almost hugged himself at his own cleverness.
He was about to leave the shed when he was stopped by the sound of approaching voices.
“Where’s Greg?” asked Dan’s voice, deep and throaty.
“He’s gone. He said he had some golf thing.”
“At this time in the morning?”
“I don’t know. I never ask what he’s doing.”
“No, you let him ride roughshod over you.”
“Dan...” There was a note of pained pleading in Shelley’s voice.
“Well, the way he treats you ... it makes me mad.”
“He’s my husband, Dan.”
“Useless kind of husband. He doesn’t care about you at all. The only person he thinks about is himself.”
“That’s not true. Yesterday he bought me a hundred pounds’ worth of gardening tokens, and he really sounded interested in the garden.”
Greg was touched by his wife’s tribute to his solicitude. But he remained aware that he was in a rather awkward situation—geographically, at least.
“Oh, yes?” asked Dan cynically. “He doesn’t care about you. I’m the only one who cares about you. I’m the only one who loves you, Shelley.”
Hm, thought Greg, there’s a turnup for the book. And he waited with interest to hear what would come next.
“I know you do, Dan. But—”
“And you love me too. Go on, you’ve told me you do.”
“I may have said things like that in the past, Dan...” Shelley wasn’t finding what she was saying easy. “But the fact is that Greg is my husband. I’m a Catholic, and I believe that marriage is for life.”
“Even a rotten marriage that makes you unhappy?”
“Maybe it’s only a rotten marriage because I haven’t worked hard enough to make it a better one. And the fact is that Greg is my husband and we have both sworn to stay together until death do us part.”
Oh, thought Greg, what a splendidly loyal little woman I married. Pity I’ve got to murder her.
“And if death did you part?”
“What do you mean, Dan?”
“If Greg died, would you marry me?”
There was a long silence, then Shelley’s voice said quietly, “Yes, Dan. I can give you that satisfaction at least. If Greg were to die, I would marry you.”
Oh well, there’s a nice warm thought for them to end their lives with, thought Greg.
“Thank you for saying that,” murmured Dan, his voice thick with emotion. Then Greg heard him approaching the shed, even putting his hand on the open door. “So I can’t tempt you in?” asked the gardener. “Just for a quick cuddle?”
“No,” said Shelley firmly. “It wouldn’t be fair to Greg.”
Her husband was divided between respect for his wife’s loyalty and annoyance at the realization that, if she wouldn’t go into the shed, he was going to have to find another way of murdering her.
“All right. If that’s what you feel...” And, as a petulant punctuation to his words, Dan slammed the shed door shut.
Things happened very quickly then. Just at the moment Greg heard the clunk of the wooden door latch finding its slot and locking him in, he was aware of a sudden roar of combustion behind him. He turned back to the inferno that had once been a sofa-bed, and saw flames licking along the floor towards him from every direction.
Greg Lincoln had been a very good planner, after all. His twenty-minute twine fuse hadn’t really gone out. Burning more slowly because of the damp, its spark had still crept inexorably towards the knothole and the pool of petrol inside the shed.
Realising that that’s what must have happened was the last thought of Greg Lincoln’s unlamented life.
And his last sight, through the flames and the cracking windows of the garden shed, was his wife Shelley, held in the protective arms of the gardener Dan. Which was where she would stay for the remainder of her very happy life.