Every Second Thursday

But any man would call Alma Driscoll attractive – probably, the Chief considered, because Alma found men attractive, was interested in them, didn’t disguise that interest.

Miss Jordan inclined her head politely towards Mr Foster, then she took her seat beside Alma Driscoll. She leaned forward and exchanged a word and a pleasant smile with the two Pritchard men, then she and Alma began to chat in hushed tones.

Foster remained staring ahead. It must be an ordeal for him, Kelsey thought, waiting for proceedings to begin, having to go through it all yet again, hearing the same painful story once more from successive lips.

Doctor Tredgold came hurrying up the courtroom steps only a couple of minutes before the town-hall clock struck three. He glanced over at Kelsey as he came in and gave him a friendly nod, then he sat down at a little distance from the Lynwood party.

Kelsey saw that the doctor’s face wore a look of slight unease. No mystery about the cause of that unease. Tredgold couldn’t be happy about the fact that he’d prescribed another bottle of pain-killing tablets for Mrs Foster, tablets which she made use of almost at once to take her own life, when he knew that she had once before attempted suicide.

True, that earlier attempt had been passed off at the time by all concerned as an accidental overdose, but Tredgold knew well enough what that meant.

Not that the Chief Inspector was disposed to be critical of the doctor. He’d come across him many times over the years. He liked and respected him, had always found him helpful, a man of integrity and sound professional ability.

Easy enough to say with hindsight that the character of the dead woman was known to Tredgold, that he could have prescribed the tablets in much smaller quantities or entrusted their care and use entirely to Miss Jordan.

But there had been only the one previous attempt at suicide and that was nine years ago at a time of sudden and highly unusual stress. And a doctor didn’t perform his work in some ideal society but in the real world where haste and overwork, forgetfulness and irritation, hunger and fatigue all played their part.

I certainly wouldn’t like to be held up to public censure for every error I’ve made over the years, Kelsey thought with a shudder.

The clock struck the hour. At all events Tredgold’s lucky with the coroner, Kelsey thought as the proceedings began.

The coroner was a retired doctor who knew Tredgold well, belonged to the same golf club. Not likely to strive for press headlines by making noble utterances about the duties and responsibilities of the medical profession.

The afternoon wore on with no surprises. There were sympathetic looks for Gerald Foster as he gave his evidence. He stood looking straight ahead, his hands hanging loosely at his sides, his slight figure held stiffly upright.

Yes, he had known of his wife’s earlier attempt to take her own life. He had been one of the two people who had found her on that occasion, it was he who broke down the bedroom door and summoned the doctor. That was before he and Vera were married, when he had been an employee of her late father.

Yes, the marriage had been happy, he would call it very happy. He and his wife were well suited, there were no worries, financial or otherwise.

No, it had not seemed foolish to leave the tablets within reach of his wife. She had been subject to attacks of sciatica for some years, had had access to pain-killing tablets during all that time, with no untoward occurrence. And the earlier overdose was nine years before, in most exceptional circumstances. He had never had reason to suppose there would be any repetition.

He had phoned his wife as he always did when he was away, he rang her just after nine in the evening, from the Falcon Hotel in Lowesmoor. She had sounded very much as usual, she said nothing to cause him alarm.

No, she had left no letter – nor had she left any letter in the previous attempt. The card which lay under her fingers was one she had always treasured; it was the last written communication she had received from her father, a postcard he had sent her shortly before his death, on one of his rare absences from Lynwood.

The card was normally kept in a drawer of a small desk in her bedroom. The last words of the message had been heavily underlined. No, they had not been underlined by Duncan Murdoch when he wrote the card, nor had they been underlined the last time Foster had seen the card, which he thought must have been three or four months ago.

His wife would sometimes take the card out and read it, would talk to him about her father, and so on. Yes, he would definitely have remembered if the words had been underlined, he would have noticed it, would have commented on the fact to his wife.

He had no doubt that it was his wife who had underlined the words just before she took the fatal overdose. The pen she must have used lay on the bedside table. The sentence she had underlined read: See you very soon, my dearest.

There was a hush in the courtroom as Foster spoke the words. He stood for some moments with his head bowed.

Could he in any way account for his wife’s action in taking the fatal dose? the coroner asked gently.

‘I can only suppose,’ Foster answered in a tone of profound regret, ‘that the sciatica was more depressing than I realized. And the tablets must also have been more lowering than I realized. My wife was a woman of impulse. And she didn’t like—’ he hesitated – ‘she didn’t like the fact that she was no longer a young girl.’ He closed his eyes briefly. ‘She found it difficult to accept.’

Yes, he was some years younger than his wife. Not that this had made or ever would have made any difference to his feeling for her. But yes, it could have heightened her own sense of the passing of her youth, she certainly never liked to think of his being younger than herself, she would refer to it sometimes when she was in low spirits. Yes, he would agree that she could be fairly described as an emotional woman.

No, there was no spare key to either of the two doors leading into his wife’s bedroom. Or at least not to his knowledge.

Miss Jordan took the stand next. She gave her evidence in a calm and precise manner.

No, she had known nothing of the earlier attempt at suicide by Mrs Foster. She had been engaged some two weeks before Mrs Foster’s death to assist the lady during her illness. She had no previous acquaintance with Mrs Foster or with anyone else in the household, she had never in fact set foot in Abberley before going to Lynwood.

She had given Mrs Foster one of the tablets with a beaker of drinking chocolate – Mrs Foster’s usual night-time beverage – at a quarter to ten, and then settled her down for the night. She returned the bottle of tablets to the shelf in the little wall cabinet over the wash-basin in the bedroom. This was where such bottles were normally kept.

Yes, in her opinion Mrs Foster was perfectly capable of getting out of bed and walking across to the cabinet and then to the desk. She had thought Mrs Foster a good deal better than she would admit.

She had formed the impression that Mrs Foster was a lady who liked a little extra attention, didn’t object to staying in bed, was perhaps inclined to remain there longer than was necessary. She had said as much to Doctor Tredgold on his last visit; he had not disagreed with her.

Yes, looking back now, she would agree that perhaps this attitude of Mrs Foster’s could have been an indication of depression. And yes, she would agree now with Mr Foster’s opinion that the sciatica could have been a good deal more lowering than any of them had realized.

Mrs Foster had asked for the photograph of her father earlier in the day, had indeed fallen asleep in the course of her morning nap holding the photograph. Miss Jordan had later returned it to its usual place on top of the dressing-chest.

No, Mrs Foster had not again asked her for the photograph during the evening. She must have got out of bed and fetched it after Miss Jordan had left her for the night.

Miss Jordan had never seen the postcard before, nor did she know of its existence. Mrs Foster had never shown it to her or mentioned it.

She had heard no sound in the night, had not been disturbed. She had been tired, had gone to bed as soon as she had settled Mrs Foster. She had fallen asleep at once, had slept soundly till wakened next morning by Mrs Driscoll knocking on her bedroom door.

No, she had seen and observed nothing amiss in the domestic atmosphere at Lynwood. She had thought the marriage happy and Mr Foster an attentive and affectionate husband.

Ned Pritchard, smart in his best navy-blue suit and pale blue shirt, wasn’t called to give evidence – to his deep disappointment. His son Bob was duly called and in the eyes of his proud father did well, spoke up clearly, told what he knew, didn’t stumble or rattle on.

Yes, all the lights were on when he broke down the door of Mrs Foster’s bedroom. Both doors to the room were locked; both keys had been removed from the locks and lay on top of the dressing-chest in Mrs Foster’s bedroom.

No, he saw no letter, though of course he didn’t go searching round the room. Just the postcard and the photograph, as if Mrs Foster had been holding one in each hand at the last.

When Doctor Tredgold took the stand he looked old and tired. He had been called out at four in the morning to a patient in the next village who was suffering from a violent gall-bladder attack.

When the doctor returned home he didn’t go back to bed, knowing from experience that he wouldn’t be able to sleep again. He had stayed up, dealing with paperwork until the start of his normal working day. He felt now in an exhausted, dreamlike state. While waiting to be called he had difficulty in keeping his eyes open.

The old boy really ought to retire, the reporter from the local paper thought without sympathy, himself a bright lad of twenty-five, still under the illusion that his own vigorous youth was under some kind of exceptional protection and would last for ever.

The coroner, looking at his old friend, listening to his account, remembered a time or two during his own years in general practice when he had taken the stand to give evidence in not very dissimilar cases.

And a time or two when he had been lucky not to have been called. And a great many times when he had felt at three o’clock in the afternoon after a long and semi-sleepless night and difficult morning, very much as Doctor Tredgold looked now.

The doctor gave his evidence in a flat clear tone. Yes, he knew that Mrs Foster – at that time of course still Miss Vera Murdoch – had suffered an overdose of sleeping tablets on the day of her father’s funeral. He had been summoned to treat her.

No, it had never been represented to him as an attempt at suicide. It had been described, both by the lady herself and those connected with her, as an accidental overdose arising from fatigue, strain, grief, and so on. No, he had had no difficulty in accepting this account of what had happened.

It was several years ago and the circumstances of Mrs Foster’s life had very much changed since then. He had felt she was living a normal life with every chance of stability and well-being. He believed she was happily married and had an excellent husband.

Yes, he had from time to time treated her for nervous upsets, bouts of insomnia and the like, but these minor distresses were in his experience very common among ladies, particularly childless ladies no longer in their first youth.

No, he certainly hadn’t looked on her as a potential suicide risk when he prescribed for her sciatica. No, it hadn’t occurred to him to ask Miss Jordan to take charge of all medicines.