They say revenge is a dish best served cold.

I disagree.

I say it’s best served steaming hot with a bottle of Tabasco tossed in.

And so it was, mild mannered man that I am, I sought to destroy Maurice Trout.

Why?

Simple.

He moved into our small town of Verity and within weeks offended the locals.

Worse than that, some of the elderly citizens began receiving hate mail.

‘You filthy old slut, why don’t you put your dentures in when you give your decaying husband a blow job?’, one read.

The others were too obscene to mention and I am a polite man.

Without the basic rules of behaviour the world would fall apart.

Maurice Trout was a conceited individual who walked with a waddle and spoke in a high-pitched voice.
He bought a lovely old barn which he proceeded to renovate. That consisted in destroying most of it and replacing it with modern additions.

A Jacuzzi bubbled ferociously at the end of the small garden and on summer nights he could be heard lying in it entertaining hookers.

Obscenities shattered the peace of Verity and condoms were found on neighbours’ lawns.
I saw him once in the post office.

He pushed his way to the head of the queue which consisted of old women drawing their pensions.
He waved a parcel at Daphne.

‘Shift your arse, I’ve got important business here’, he said.

Daphne, who had been there as long as anyone could remember, said ‘there is a queue and I suggest you get in it.’

‘This is a joke’, he said, and marched out.

Hilary, one of the most active members of our town, stopped him outside and said ‘Mr Trout, there is no call for such rudeness, we have welcomed you here and all you do is abuse us.’

He lit a cigarette, blew smoke into her face and said ‘fuck you’ before driving off in his Bentley.

He had money.

Endless supplies of it.

He continued to develop his barn until the garden was overrun with outbuildings.

And he enjoyed inflicting noise on everyone around.

He would play loud music, ignoring any complaints made. Women were seen running naked through the streets in the small hours.

He thought he could buy anyone he wanted.

Meanwhile the hate mail continued.

That was before my niece arrived. And he did the thing that made me resolve to teach him a lesson.
Rachel hadn’t had it easy. Brought up by her mother on her own when her father ran off, she had to endure my sister’s bouts of depression and neglect.

She did all this with grace and good will and I took an active part in her well being, helping her through school.

From time to time she would come to stay with me.

A few weeks before she left to go to university she paid me a visit.

And ran into Maurice Trout. That fish I wanted to hook and pound on a sharp rock until it stopped moving.
On her first evening I took Rachel to supper at the local pub.

It was obvious she was attracting the attentions of any young man she came across.

She was very beautiful and without any form of arrogance that often accompanies good looks in the young.
We were having supper when Trout walked in.

He turned instantly, fixed his stare on her and sat some feet away drinking a gin and tonic.

After a few beers I went to the toilet and when I returned I found him talking to Rachel.

She was giggling, falling for whatever line he was spinning her.

‘This man is poison’, I said.

Rachel blushed.

‘Do you mind?’, Trout said, ‘we’re having a conversation here.’

‘I do. I have no intention of subjecting my niece to you.’

‘Niece? Where does she get her looks from?’

Rachel tittered and I could see that if I dug my heels in I would risk alienating her.

Besides I had no say in her affairs.

‘Rachel, I’m going home, are you coming?’, I said.

‘Maurice has offered to buy me a drink.’

‘Very well.’

The pub was about to shut and I thought by backing off she would save face and I could tell her who he was when she returned.

Except she didn’t.

At two o’clock I went looking for her.

I walked through the empty streets and eventually heard sobbing from the woods at the edge of our town.
Rachel was curled up into a ball and hiding in the undergrowth.

Her dress was ripped, her face was bleeding and all she kept saying was ‘he raped me’.

I took her to the hospital where they said she was in trauma and tended to her wounds.

Back at home we waited for the police to arrive.

There followed the painful process of police interviews which resulted in Trout laughing the matter off with the alibi that he had been several miles away with a lady friend at the time of the assault.

His lady friend supported his lies.

And I decided to kill him.

Oh yes, revenge is a dish best served hot and I was ready for him.

There was only one thing on my mind.

Hooking Trout.

I left Rachel to rest at the house and bought an old car from a second hand dealer some miles from Verity. I left the car parked in some woods and the next day I sat at the end of the town and saw Trout drive past.
I followed. He stopped near some offices.

As he went off to his appointment I walked to his car and slashed one of his tyres.

I sat on a bench until he returned.

There was no one about and Trout stood there fuming.

That was when I approached.

I was wearing an old mac, a hat, some dark glasses. I hadn’t shaved since the attack.  I always appear in public clean-shaven and well-dressed and it fooled him. Arrogance is its own enemy and he would never have suspected I was capable of what I was about to do.

‘Can I help?’, I said, in rustic dialect.

‘Some bastard’s slashed my tyre. I’m in a hurry, isn’t there a bloody garage round here?’

‘I’m a mechanic, I’ll do it.’

‘Be my guest.’

He opened the boot and as he reached for the spare tyre I hit him over the head with the crow bar I had inside my coat.

He fell straight into his own boot.

I shut him in and drove the few miles to my disused workshop.

I had a hobby.

Taxidermy.

My workshop housed a cellar no one knew about.

I still had many of my preparing fluids there and had been pondering what to do with it.

Trout began to stir as I dragged him into the darkness.

I switched on the single bulb which hung from the ceiling and looked at him.

‘You really are less than human’, I said.

‘Who are you? What do you want?’

He looked around at the stuffed heads and animal fur and I saw fear race through him.

‘You do not abuse people and get away with it.’

‘You!’

I hit him.

I punched him in the face and he spat blood. Then I knocked him out with the crow bar and dragged him down into the cellar.

The rats down there are like an army.

I removed the bottle of honey from my pocket and poured it all over him.

And how Trout screamed when he came to in the dark with their plump bodies scuttling across his skin.
I left him there.

As I locked the door it sounded as though he had broken his vocal chords.

I returned to Rachel.

I paid for counselling and sent her off to university where she made a slow recovery from her ordeal. A week later I returned to the workshop.

Trout was no more than bones.

A satisfying sight.

I’d considered stuffing him but there was nothing left to stuff once the rats had eaten him.

Besides, who would want to look at someone as hideous as him?

I drove back to Verity feeling content.

Trout’s barn was sold to some nice people, people who fit in.

Life is good again in our town.

BIO:
Richard Godwin is the author of crime novels Mr. Glamour and Apostle Rising and is a widely published crime and horror writer. Mr. Glamour is his second novel and was published in paperback in April 2012. It is available online at Amazonhttp://www.amazon.com/Mr-Glamour-Richard-Godwin/dp/0956711332 and at all good retailers. Mr.Glamour is Hannibal Lecter in Gucci. The novel is about a glamorous world obsessed with designer labels with a predator in its midst and has received great reviews.  Apostle Rising, in which a serial killer crucifies politicians, is available here http://www.amazon.com/Apostle-Rising-Richard-Godwin/dp/0956711308 You can find out more about him at richardgodwin.net