“What I said after the death of Robin Boyton was essentially true. He had devised this extraordinary idea that we had concealed my father’s time of death by freezing his body. I doubt that this was his idea. This, too, came from Rhoda Gradwyn and they planned to pursue it together. That’s why, after more than thirty years, she decided to have the scar removed and chose to have the operation here. That’s why Robin was here both on her first visit and when she came for the operation. The plan was, of course, ridiculous, but there were facts which might make it believable. That’s why I went to Toronto to see Grace Holmes, who was with my father when he died. And I had a second reason for the visit: to pay her a lump sum in lieu of the pension I felt she deserved. I didn’t tell my brother what Gradwyn and Robin were planning. I had sufficient evidence to charge them both with blackmail, if that’s what they intended. But I decided to play along until Robin was thoroughly implicated and then enjoy the pleasure of disabusing him and taking my revenge.

“I asked him to meet me in the old pantry. The lid of the freezer was shut. I asked what sort of arrangement he proposed, and he said that he had a moral right to a third of the estate. If that were paid over, there would be no future demand. I pointed out that he could hardly divulge that I’d falsified the date of death without himself being accused of blackmail. He admitted that we were in each other’s power. I offered one-quarter of the estate, with five thousand as a start. I said it was in cash in the freezer. I needed his fingerprints on the lid, and I knew that he was too greedy to resist. He might have doubted but he had to look. We moved over to the freezer, and when he lifted the lid I suddenly grasped him by the legs and toppled him in. I’m a swimmer, with strong shoulders and arms, and he wasn’t a heavy man. I closed the lid and fastened the clasp. I felt an extraordinary exhaustion and was breathing hard, but I couldn’t have been tired. It was as easy as toppling a child. I could hear the sounds from inside the freezer, shouts, banging, muffled pleading. I stood there for a few minutes leaning on the freezer, listening to his cries. Then I went next door and made a pot of tea. The sounds grew fainter, and when they stopped I went into the pantry to let him out. He was dead. I meant only to terrify him, but I think now, trying to be totally honest—and which of us can ever be that?—that I was glad to find that he was dead.