The Night She Died

by Dorothy Simpson

  ‘Yes, unfortunate, that – that we can’t be more definite. Mind, she wouldn’t have lingered long. A few minutes, no more.’

  Enough to clear Holmes, Thanet thought. ‘But why the doubt?’ he asked. ‘I thought it was always possible to tell, after a post mortem.’

  ‘Not necessarily. How the victim died, yes, but not how long it took. Let me explain. In this particular case the point of the knife pierced the pericardium – in layman’s terms, the coating of the heart. Now if such a puncture is of sufficient dimensions, death is instantaneous. If, however, it is very small, only slight bleeding may occur at first. But the pressure of each successive pulsation of the heart increases the size of the wound until, bingo, suddenly the pericardium ruptures and there is a massive haemorrhage and death occurs. The point is that when this happens the pericardium tears and so in a post mortem it is impossible to tell whether or not the wound was sufficiently lethal to cause death at the moment of penetration, or whether its size was increased after a delay of some minutes.’

  ‘I see.’ Thanet thought for a while, absorbing the implications of this information. ‘Some minutes, you say. The time could vary?’

  ‘Oh yes. Depending on the size of the initial puncture and also on what the victim was doing. If he was lying down, the heart would not be labouring as much as if he were standing up, or doing something even more energetic.’

  ‘Like struggling?’

  ‘Yes, like struggling. So, yes, as you imply, in this case death would have been accelerated.’

  ‘So it is still just possible that her husband could have done it?’

  ‘Frankly, I doubt it, in view of various other factors – none of which, I freely admit, enters my province. And I certainly don’t think you could ever take it to court unless you had some other pretty conclusive evidence. A good defence Counsel would make mincemeat of you on the medical evidence.’

  ‘Quite,’ Thanet said gloomily.

  ‘Ah well, time I was on my way. Cheer up, Luke. At the moment you look as though you ought to be parading up the High Street with a sandwich board proclaiming The End Of The World Is Nigh.’

  Thanet gave a shame-faced grin as he said, ‘Thanks for the explanation, anyway,’ and saw Mallard to the door.

  Returning to his desk he skimmed quickly through the messages which he had pushed aside to ring the Marriage Guidance Council. The two witnesses who had seen the tall dark man walking in the direction of Gladstone Road had had nothing to add to their statements. Both said that their estimate of the time could have been out by a few minutes either way.

  Bentley had been unable to get a detailed itinerary of Horrocks’s sales trip either from the man’s wife or from his firm; the former didn’t know it, the latter said that they left such details entirely to their representatives. The best they could do was to provide a list of the towns which Horrocks would be visiting during the time he was away.

  Negatives, negatives, negatives. There was nothing constructive, at the moment, that he could do. Thanet glanced at his watch. Six-fifteen. Lineham should soon be reporting on his visit to Parrish’s mistress. But apart from that … to hell with it, thought Thanet. What was the point in hanging about here beating his brains out for nothing? If he was needed, they knew where to find him. He’d just wait for Lineham’s call, then he’d go home. He knew from past experience that this was probably the most constructive move he could make at the moment. Let things simmer for a while, try to put the case out of his mind, come back to it fresh tomorrow.

  Lineham rang a few minutes later. Phyllis Penge had confirmed Parrish’s account of their meeting in every detail.

  ‘What’s she like?’ Thanet asked.

  ‘Younger than I’d expected. Lush, sexy type.’

  ‘Was she telling the truth, that’s the point?’ Thanet was aware of a feeling of unease, but couldn’t put his finger on its source.

  ‘Oh yes, I’m sure of that. She’s not very bright. I don’t think she could have been convincing enough if she’d been lying.’

  ‘Good,’ Thanet said, thinking that the news was anything but. ‘Well, you get off home now, Mike. Get a good night’s sleep. We could both do with it.’

  He replaced the receiver thoughtfully. What was it, just now …? But it was no use, it wouldn’t come and he felt more depressed than ever. Parrish was out, then. Now what?

  Home, he reminded himself.

  It was healing to unlock his front door and hear the normality of splashing and squeals of delight from upstairs.

  ‘Is that you, darling?’ Joan appeared at the top of the stairs, face flushed from bending over the bath.

  ‘Daddy!’ Bridget appeared beside Joan, dressed only in pants and socks. She flew down the stairs to hurl herself at him.

  Thanet grinned up at Joan. ‘This one hasn’t had her tub yet, I gather?’

  ‘No. I’m just finishing Ben.’

  ‘I’ll do Sprig, then. Come on, young lady.’ Thanet stooped to pick her up, just remembering his back in time. Better not risk it. He took her hand instead.

  After supper Thanet helped Joan to wash up, then left her to make coffee while he selected a record. Bach’s double violin concerto, he decided. It had a quality of certainty, of sureness and order which he needed tonight. When Joan came in she settled herself on the carpet at his feet, leaning back against his knees. Thanet stroked her hair, reminding himself thankfully that even if his work was going badly he always had this to come home to. He had a sudden, disconcerting picture of Holmes sunk in his armchair with the overflowing ashtray at his side, his house empty and silent, his much-loved wife dead and even his memories of her tainted by discord. By comparison he, Thanet, was rich beyond telling.

  ‘Do you think …?’ he said softly.

  Joan twisted her head to look up at him, smiling. ‘Just what I was thinking,’ she said.

  He stood up, put out a hand to help her to her feet and softly, so as not to wake the children, they went upstairs together.

  5

  Julie Holmes’s photograph appeared in the newspapers next morning and at once the usual flood of telephone calls began: she had been seen in places as far apart as Edinburgh and Penzance and engaged in every activity from roller-skating to prostitution. With their customary resignation Thanet and his team began checking the more likely sightings; one never knew when one might strike gold.

  Thanet began ringing Sturrenden Marriage Guidance Council at regular intervals, but it was not until nine-thirty that the Ansaphone service was replaced by the secretary’s voice and Thanet discovered that setting up an interview with Mrs Thorpe would not be as easy as he had expected.

  It wasn’t as though the secretary was rude or difficult, quite the contrary. She was polite, charming even, but adamant. She quite understood the circumstances, she said, and appreciated Thanet’s need to see Mrs Thorpe, but she couldn’t possibly release Mrs Thorpe’s telephone number or make an appointment for Thanet to see her without clearance from Rugby.

  ‘Rugby?’ queried Thanet.

  ‘Our headquarters.’

  ‘Couldn’t you get Mrs Thorpe to ring me, then?’

  ‘I’m sorry. But in circumstances like this there is a certain procedure we have to follow, to protect the confidentiality we promise our clients.’

  ‘But there’s no question of breaking confidentiality here. Mr Holmes has agreed to my talking to her.’

  ‘Yes, I do understand. But I have to check, nevertheless. I’m sorry, Inspector, but I’m only doing my job. I do realise the urgency of your problem, though, and I promise that I will ring Rugby straight away and let you know the moment I have a decision.’

  And with this Thanet had to be content. The girl, however, kept her word; at ten o’clock she rang back to say that Mrs Thorpe could see him at one, at the M.G.C. premises.

  ‘No earlier?’

  ‘I’m sorry. Mrs Thorpe is counselling this morning.’

  ‘Right. One o’clock, then. Thank you.’


  Frustratingly, it was just as he was leaving, at twenty to one, that the most interesting event of the morning occurred: a phone call from a man called Burt, landlord of the Dog and Whistle in Sturrenden, claiming that on the evening she died Julie Holmes had visited his pub with a man. They had, he said, been in several times before, and he was certain that it had been she.

  ‘You’re in luck, Mike. You can get a good pint at the Dog and Whistle. Get over there and we’ll meet back here afterwards. I’ve a feeling this interview with Mrs Thorpe might take some time.’

  As he drove through the lunch-hour traffic Thanet wondered if he was wasting his time. Wouldn’t it have been more sensible to go to the Dog and Whistle with Lineham? The landlord’s story certainly seemed the most promising lead they’d had so far. Having been so insistent over the need for the interview with Mrs Thorpe, however, he felt morally obliged to turn up. And, he had to admit it, he wanted to see her.

  Why?

  Well, partly because he genuinely felt that in a case like this, where there was a lack of material evidence, it was the job of the investigating officer to find out as much as he could about the character and life of the victim in the hope that his knowledge might lead him to the murderer, and also because, if he were honest with himself, Julie herself was beginning to intrigue him. He had now spoken to a number of people who had been close to her in her everyday life – her husband, her boss, the girls with whom she worked, and so far she still remained a shadowy figure to him, elusive. She must have trusted Mrs Thorpe, to have asked for an interview alone with her, and Thanet was hoping that she might have confided in her.

  Thanet wondered what the counsellor would be like. What sort of a person would want to hear about other people’s marriage problems? Thanet’s own work was often depressing enough, but the thought of sitting listening to accounts of other people’s misery day in, day out, made him shudder.

  In the event, Mrs Thorpe was a surprise. She was in her early thirties, small – not much more than five feet – and very slim. She had a mop of dark, curly hair, wore an enormous pair of tinted spectacles and was dressed in faded jeans and a loose overblouse in some soft, blue material.

  The counselling room, too, was a surprise. Thanet didn’t know quite what he had expected, but it certainly wasn’t this small, pleasant sitting-room furnished with comfortable armchairs.

  ‘Do sit down, Inspector,’ she said. Then she grinned. ‘I’m not what you expected,’ she said.

  ‘Is it so obvious?’

  ‘I’m used to it. I’m not quite sure what people expect when they come here, but I suspect it’s someone rather staid, elderly and drab.’ She shrugged. ‘Still, it doesn’t seem to matter what image they start off with. Once you’ve been with them a short while then you’re “My counsellor” and that’s it.’ She looked at him expectantly and said, ‘Now tell me how you think I can help you, Inspector. It was a dreadful shock to me, of course, to hear about Julie and anything I can do … I’m sorry there was some delay in fixing this appointment, but we simply have to watch this confidentiality thing. If we didn’t, people would never feel free to talk to us. D’you know, once a counsellor was called as a witness in a defended divorce case. Her client didn’t want her to give evidence and she went to the court with her suitcase packed, ready to go to jail rather than break his confidence.’

  ‘What happened?’

  ‘Fortunately she wasn’t called! Of course, that’s an extreme case, but we really do regard it as a very important rule. So when you rang, naturally our secretary had to get clearance from the powers that be. And check with John Holmes, of course, that he had in fact given his permission for the interview.’

  ‘But I told her he had.’

  ‘We had to be sure.’ She grinned again at the look on his face. ‘I don’t suppose you’re used to people checking up on you!’

  True, he’d experienced a momentary spurt of anger at the idea, but then he realised that this was unjustifiable. If it had been his marriage which was under threat of being exposed to a third party, he would have been glad to know it was protected so carefully. He said so.

  ‘Good,’ Mrs Thorpe said briskly. ‘And now …?’

  There was silence as Thanet marshalled his thoughts. He felt he could trust this woman and decided to be frank with her. ‘I’ll give you the position first,’ he said.

  Briefly, he related the facts of the case and she listened carefully. She sat quite still, according him a quality of attention rare in his experience. People on the whole were far more interested in talking than in listening.

  ‘… so you see, I’m here because I feel I have to try to find out all I can about Mrs Holmes, in the hope that this might lead me to finding out who killed her. There is one promising lead at the moment, but it might well just peter out, they often do.’

  ‘Yes, I see. Well now, perhaps it would be best if I give you a brief account of the Holmes’s case and then you can ask questions if you wish. But first, how is John – Mr Holmes – taking it? Hard, I would guess.’

  ‘Very hard. He’s very depressed, I’d say … He told me he had an appointment with you last night. He didn’t turn up, I gather?’

  ‘No. Hardly surprising, in the circumstances … Perhaps I’ll give him a ring. It’s difficult, isn’t it? But it might just help, to talk to someone about it. If he doesn’t want to, fair enough.’

  ‘At least it might make him feel someone cares. He had nobody, I gather, no one at all.’

  ‘I’ll do that then.’ She paused, thinking. ‘Well now, let me see. I’ve seen them five times in all. Four joint interviews and one, a fortnight ago with Julie alone. They’ve been married for three years and there was trouble right from the start. They came, ostensibly, with a sexual problem. Julie had no interest in sex, and although they made love from time to time there was no enjoyment in it for either of them. I think John hoped that when they moved here, started a new life in a different place, things would be different, but of course they just brought their problem with them and when he saw things weren’t improving he persuaded her to come here. He’d been thinking about it for some time, I believe. Anyway, they’d only been in the area for a week or so when they first came.

  ‘The trouble was, of course, that it wasn’t just a sexual problem. As so often happens, their sexual difficulties were just a reflection of their day-to-day relationship. Julie … was a very reserved, withdrawn sort of girl and John quite a thrusting, aggressive, masculine type. That surprises you, I see. But you must remember you’ve seen him only in a state of acute depression.’

  ‘True. And I can see that logically you are right. He’d scarcely be the youngest manager in the chain of Homerights’ if he weren’t pretty thrusting, as you put it.’

  ‘Oh is he? I didn’t know that. Yes, that is interesting. Anyway, these two types can go well together – the girl likes being dominated, acquiescent – but in this case Julie … well, it seems that she was incapable of any response. It was as if her feelings, her emotions were locked away somewhere inside her, inaccessible to anyone. And of course the trouble was that someone like John always responds to that sort of reaction by pressing harder, pushing for some kind of response, all the time. Then she withdraws more, like a snail retreating further into its shell, he redoubles the pressure, she withdraws even more and so on. It’s a vicious downward spiral, in which the participants are helpless to prevent the situation from becoming progressively worse. In this particular case John’s jealousy didn’t help, either.’

  ‘Was it justified, you think?’

  ‘I can’t be sure, of course, but no, I don’t think so. I think Julie was as fond of John as she could be of any man. The trouble was, she was incapable of showing that affection in the way which would convince her husband that she did love him, and he therefore tended to suspect that she was as she was only because there was someone else.’

  ‘And you’re really pretty certain there wasn’t? In your own mind, that is?’


  ‘I told you, no.’ Mrs Thorpe was silent for a moment, thinking, then she added, ‘Not from Julie’s point of view, anyway. I’m not saying there wouldn’t have been someone hovering in the wings, ready to snap her up if her marriage went wrong. She was the sort of girl who would be very attractive to the same strong, masculine type as John. She appeared so soft, so gentle and feminine, that they would imagine conquest as inevitable and see resistance only as a challenge.’

  ‘No one specific was ever mentioned?’

  ‘No.’ She sounded doubtful, though. ‘There was someone in London before they moved down here. Someone who knew her before she was married and wouldn’t leave her alone afterwards. John even had a fight with him once, but it didn’t seem to put him off. I think it was the main reason why John was so keen to move down here when the opportunity arose.’

  ‘It’s surprising, in the circumstances, that he left her on her own in London while they were looking for a house down here.’

  ‘Well, apparently this other man was abroad at the time, and this was the only reason why John agreed to the arrangement. And he used to ring her every evening, I gather, and go home at weekends, of course.’

  ‘Do you remember this man’s name?’

  Mrs Thorpe thought for a moment. ‘I’m not sure … it was … Kenny, I think. Yes, that’s it. Kenny.’

  ‘And his surname?’

  ‘I don’t think it was ever mentioned.’

  ‘I’m sorry, we seem to have wandered somewhat. Do go on.’

  ‘Yes, well let me see, what was I saying? Ah yes. They had become locked in this sort of impasse, then, with the situation becoming progressively worse, when they decided to come here. At first we got absolutely nowhere. It’s absolutely essential, you see, to have your clients’ complete confidence. And Julie, as I’ve explained, is the sort of person who finds it near-impossible to open up to anyone. She was just beginning to be less wary of me, I felt, when the situation suddenly began to deteriorate in a most unexpected way. Julie began to have nightmares of a particularly frightening kind. That was when she rang up and asked if she could come to see me alone. When she arrived she was in a terrible state – for the twenty minutes or so she just sat there, shaking. Eventually I managed to get out of her what was upsetting her.