This would show the bastard, Susan thought, giving the middle three rungs of the ladder a final, thorough rub with the butter wrapper and easing her way back down to ground level. The middle six rungs were nice and slippery - not so high that he’d fall off and die, but not so low that he wouldn’t be nursing a few hefty bruises for a spell.

Weeks he’d been over at Carol and Barney’s house; fixing drain pipes and filling in gaps, painting window sills and pulling up weeds. And he’d seemed very pleasant at first. Susan had even considered getting him round to give her flue a good seeing to - it had been years since anyone had paid it any attention, but seeing the handyman at work across the road had got her thinking about getting her fire going again and that he’d be just the man to do it.

Of course, that was before. Since he’d started work on the roof, Susan had gotten to understand what he was really like, what he got up to when he thought no-one else was watching.

She’d spotted him, the first time, when she got out of the shower. She had been standing there sodden, dripping and in nothing but a towel when a flickering light had caught her attention. Peering outside, Susan had been shocked to see the handyman standing on Carol and Barney’s roof holding binoculars up to his face and staring directly at her!

Red faced Susan had pulled the curtains sharply closed, losing her towel in the process, and no doubt giving the lecherous degenerate a good eyeful. After that she had been careful to make sure her curtains were always firmly closed when there was even the remotest possibility she might be less than fully clothed.

It hadn’t stopped him trying though. Susan had seen him up there with his binoculars three times since then. She had even overheard him talking to Barney, quite brazenly, about all the tits he’d managed to see from their roof. Susan had been disgusted to hear that it wasn’t just her he had been spying on and her heart bled for those poor unsuspecting young women being perved on in their own homes

She hadn’t had the heart to tell Carol that her husband was in league with a sexual deviant.

So Susan had decided to take matters into her own hands. She carefully hid the incriminating butter wrapper in someone else’s bin and settled back to watch her handiwork in action from behind the hedge.

He walked cheerfully past Susan, whistling something upbeat and tuneless and carrying a sandwich and a couple of plums for his lunch. He was even wearing the binoculars around his neck for all to see. Shameless, thought Susan.

But it wasn’t until he had taken three steps up the ladder that Susan noticed the book tucked into his back pocket British Garden Birds…

Horror dawned. Susan opened her mouth to shout a warning, but she was too late. She heard a shout, a crash, and the sound of two fresh plums splattering on Carole and Barney’s driveway.