A Murder Most Duck, Goose, Turkey, Including Pheasant
Created | Updated Mar 12, 2023
A Murder Most Duck, Goose, Turkey, Including Pheasant
Editor's Note: This is the Prof's take on this year's novella challenge. We think he's nailed it.
Apologies! It should have been 'a murder most fowl (foul)' but that's been used before1!
Right! So to start the details of the crime etc:
Damian Melrose Grassbinder was a noted and was well respected professor in his field of Neurobiology.
That was until his 'loving' wife ran off with his chauffeur.
This event turned a mild-mannered man into a 100% recluse, who cut off all outside contact with friends and academic colleagues.
The only person to have any sort of 'contact' with him was his housekeeper, who she received notes he left outside his living quarters.
She had an apartment section of the house to live in, separate, like an annex.
This lady was the housekeeper to the whole family over the years and was dedicated to the family and respected by all.
She had a monthly income and no rent or other payments to make because of the 'contract of employment', etc.
Therefore she never questioned her 'employer's' activities and lifestyle, and never queried Damian's eccentricities.
Rait2! That's sorted the basic structure of where this is going?
During in his 'solitude' Damian's mind became scrambled to the extreme and the only thoughts that entered and brewed in his head WAS revenge!
He became demented and lost all reality, started using all his knowledge, to research the occult and dark forces to allow him to inflict his revenge on her and that he could not be 'put' as a suspect etc. in whatever happened to his soon to be ex-wife's demise!
He researched everything occult!
Delving into the unknown realms of curses and incantations and beyond.
Finally! He thought he had 'The Perfect Crime' (well, all criminals etc. do don't they) and he now stood ready to implement it.
(A pause in time, as it's pointless writing that a few weeks has gone by.)
Anyway! Now a few weeks has gone by (deja vu?)
And his wife has been found dead, apparently stabbed in the heart?
And a police investigation is now being conducted.
The murder scene is being scanned with a fine-tooth comb as they say by a forensics team.
Police detectives are interviewing many people, as any or all could be a suspect in this crime.
Two detectives have come to Grassbinder's home to interview him and as they and his housekeeper knock at his living quarters door, there isn't any response coming from within.
The housekeeper says to them that he never leaves the rooms, but will not unlock the door for them as she doesn't have Grassbinder's permission to do so and never has.
So the detectives must go back to their H.Q. and seek about getting a Court Order to allow entry.
(A pause in time, as it's pointless writing that a few days has gone by.)
After about 3 days! (deja vu?) AGAIN?
They now have the permit and revisit Grassbinder's, but again after no response to their knocks, the housekeeper unlocks the door for them to enter.
A foul odour fills the area and as they enter one of the rooms, they see a man's body prone on the floor.
The housekeeper cries out MR GRASSBINDER!
Yep! You guessed it! He's dead!
While one detective phones this in, the other looks round the room for any clues etc and finds that ALL the windows are locked and apart from the main door to his accommodation, there's no other form of entry.
This is perturbing the detectives, as Grassbinder has a knife sticking in the centre of his back and from the angle, deduce that this ISN'T a suicide.
Ok! another (saves ink) (pause in time, as it's pointless writing blah blah blah hours/days.)
The forensics teams are totally stumped because they have been unable to find anything to give any sort of answer/s to how he was killed.
No one can even speculate, because of no clues or DNA samples on the knife, including that it wasn't wiped as many crooks etc do to remove fingerprints.
They can't even surmise if this was the knife used to kill his wife as the entry cut on her was wider than the knife stuck in.
Grassbinder.
After months of investigations, the Detectives on the case have come up with a theory, that they cannot possibly give to their superiors, because they would be a laughing stock in the department.
And THAT theory is: The only possible culprit to the murder of Grassbinder is his Shadow!
And how do you ask your superiors for a permit to exhume a body to question a shadow? Plus! HOW do you question a shadow?
Could THIS crime be 'The Perfect Crime' Grassbinder wanted and found?
Only for it to go beyond his control, something we'll never find the answer to……….
P.S. I've not said/wrote anything about the chauffeur!
Was he also killed? Had he been questioned as a suspect?
Tough!
