Scold's Bridle

His eyes grew suddenly wet. 'I did,' he said gruffly. 'She was beautiful once, you know, quite beautiful.' He patted his wife's hand. 'We all were, a long, long time ago. Age has very few compensations, Sergeant, except perhaps the wisdom to recognize contentment.' He pondered for a moment. 'They do say slitting the wrists is a very peaceful way to die, although how anyone knows I can't imagine. Did she suffer, do you think?'

'I'm afraid I can't answer that, Mr. Orloff,' said Cooper honestly.

The damp eyes held his for a moment and he saw a deep and haggard sadness in them. They spoke of a love that Cooper somehow suspected Duncan had never shown or felt for his wife. He wanted to say something by way of consolation, but what could he say that wouldn't make matters worse? He doubted that Violet knew, and he wondered, not for the first time, why love was more often cruel than it was kind.

I watched Duncan clipping his hedge this afternoon and could barely remember the handsome man he was. If I had been a charitable woman, I would have married him forty years ago and saved him from himself and Violet. She has turned my Romeo into a sad-eyed Billy Bunter who blinks his passion quietly when no one's looking. Oh, that his too, too solid flesh should melt. At twenty, he had the body of Michelangelo's David, now he resembles an entire family group by Henry Moore.

Jack continues to delight me. What a tragedy I didn't meet him or someone like him when I was 'green in judgement.' I learnt only how to survive, when Jack would, I think, have taught me how to love. I asked him why he and Sarah have no children, and he answered: 'Because I've never had the urge to play God.' I told him there was nothing godlike about procreation-doglike perhaps-and it's a monumental conceit that allows him to dictate Sarah's suitability as a mother. 'The vicar would say you're playing the devil, Jack. The species won't survive unless people like you reproduce themselves.'

But he is not an amenable man. If he were, I would enjoy him less. 'You've played God for years, Mathilda. Has it given you any pleasure or made you more content?' No, and I can say that honestly. I shall die as naked as I was born.

*2*

A week later the receptionist buzzed through to Dr. Blakeney's office. 'There's a Detective Sergeant Cooper on the line. I've told him you have a patient with you but he's very insistent. Can you speak to him?' It was a Monday and Sarah was covering afternoon surgery in Fontwell.

She smiled apologetically at the pregnant mother, laid out like a sacrificial offering on her couch. She put her hand over the receiver. 'Do you mind if I take this call, Mrs. Graham? It's rather important. I'll be as quick as I can.'

'Get on with you. I'm enjoying the rest. You don't get many opportunities when it's your third.'

Sarah smiled at her. 'Put him through, Jane. Yes, Sergeant, what can I do for you?'

'We've had the results of Mrs. Gillespie's post mortem. I'd be interested in your reactions.'

'Go on.'

He shuffled some papers at the other end of the line. 'Direct cause of death: loss of blood. Traces of barbituates were discovered in her system, but not enough to prove fatal. Traces also discovered in the whisky glass, implying she dissolved the barbiturates before she drank them. Some alcohol absorbed. No bruising. Lacerations the tongue where the rusted bit of the scold's bridle caused the surface to bleed. Nothing under her fingernails. Slight nettle rash on her temples and cheeks, and minor chafing of the skin beneath the bridle's framework, both consistent with her donning the contraption herself and then arranging it with the nettles and daisies. No indications at all that she put up any sort of struggle. The scold's bridle was not attached to her head in any way and could have been removed, had she wished to do so. The wounds to the wrists correspond precisely with the Stanley knife blade discovered on the bathroom floor, the one on the left wrist made with a downward right-handed stroke, the one on the right with a downward left-handed stroke. The knife had been submerged in water, probably dropped after one of the incisions, but there was an index fingerprint, belonging to Mrs. Gillespie, one-point-three centimetres from the blade on the shaft. Conclusion: suicide.' He paused. 'Are you still there?' he demanded after a moment.

'Yes.'

'So what do you think?'

'That I was wrong last week.'

'But surely the barbiturates in the whisky glass trouble you?'

'Mathilda hated swallowing anything whole,' she said apologetically. 'She crushed or dissolved everything in liquid first. She had a morbid fear of choking.'

'But your immediate reaction when you saw her was that she was the last person you'd expect to kill herself. And now you've changed your mind.' It sounded like an accusation.

'What do you want me to say, Sergeant? My gut feeling remains the same.' Sarah glanced towards her patient who was becoming restless. 'I would not have expected her to take her own life, but gut feelings are a poor substitute for scientific evidence.'

'Not always.'

She waited, but he didn't go on. 'Was there anything else, Sergeant? I do have a patient with me.'

'No,' he said, sounding dispirited, 'nothing else. It was a courtesy call. You may be required to give evidence at the inquest, but it'll be a formality. We've asked for an adjournment while we check one or two small details but, at the moment, we aren't looking for anyone else in connection with Mrs. Gillespie's death.'

Sarah smiled encouragingly at Mrs. Graham. Be with you in a minute, she mouthed. 'But you think you should be.'

'I learnt my trade in a simpler world, Dr. Blakeney, where we paid attention to gut feelings. But in those days we called them hunches.' He gave a hollow laugh. 'Now, hunches are frowned on and forensic evidence is God. But forensic evidence is only as reliable as the man who interprets it and what I want to know is why there are no