Before I knew what had happened, I’d gouged out her eyes with my trusted knife and stuffed the sockets with little bits of mangled fox. Whilst this superfluous act of gristly decoration might not have helped my case later on when explaining it to the doctors, the initial violence was clearly self-defense.
You’d be forgiven for wondering how she then became my wife.
Two years later, on a date exactly half way between the incident at the garage and my trial (which takes place tomorrow) I met Dorothy McLaswell-Gorbicz again, playing banjo with a travelling band of blind musicians. The other musicians were Cynthia Marigold on the kettle drum and vocals, Claude Hiboux on double bass and a Jamaican by the name of Errol “Dud” Trabbet on the melodion. Since she was now sightless, and I had had the sense to introduce myself by another name, I proceeded to woo her over a series of seafood dinners at a little place I know.
The sense of power I felt was both delicious and shameful, and I would have confessed all to her, but I simply couldn’t find the words. I’m shy.