Ellis - Looks Could Kill

LOOKS COULD KILL

David Ellis

ISBN:978-1-300-94077-7

Copyright 2013 David Ellis

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book, or portions thereof in any form. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored, in any form or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical without the express permission of the author.

This is a work of fiction. Names and characters are the product of the author's imagination and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

PublishNation, London

www.publishnation.co.uk

I glanced at a buzzing bee,

a dull grey pebble fell

to the ground.

I glanced at a singing bird,

a handful of dusty gravel

spattered down.

From 'Medusa' by Carol Ann Duffy

Introduction

The idea of this novel was conceived whilst on holiday in Italy.

I saw this unusual sign above a doorway and found out what it meant.

'Il Malocchio'(the evil eye)

The novel has a medical theme and it deals with issues relating to life and death.

The people and places are fictional but the clinical situations are commonplace.

David Ellis

London

Vicar found dead in home

Police investigate 'suspicious' death of Rev John Stoddard, whose body reportedly had lain undiscovered for more than a week in record hot temperatures.

John Quinn

The Surrey Guardian, Tuesday 18 June 1963

Police have launched an investigation into what was described as the "suspicious" death of a vicar who was found inside his vicarage on Tuesday morning.

He was named as the Rev John Stoddard, whose partially decomposed body was discovered by workmen who turned up at the building on Tilford Road, Hindhead, in Surrey.

The vicar is understood to have moved to the area from a parish in Witham, Essex, during the previous summer.

Detective Chief Insp Michael Crisp, of Surrey police, told the Guardian: "A full search and examination of the property will take place, and we're determined to find the cause of the death. Unfortunately, the weather has been extremely hot recently and the body is badly decomposed.

He added that the investigation was at an early stage and that a pathologist and a forensic scientist were assessing the scene.

Local people in the village, about 17 miles south of Guildford, expressed shock. Mrs Veronica Bennett, 49, housewife and churchwarden, said: He seemed so well when he baptised my grand-daughter Emma two weeks ago; I really cant believe that hes passed away.

The vicar worked nearby at St Albans church on Wood Road.

July 1963

Emmas mother, Mary, was very upset by the vicars death and thought that she had somehow hastened his demise. She became more preoccupied with religion and spent all her waking hours studying The Book of Revelation. She took to her bed and stopped eating. Emmas milk supply dried up. For a short time, Emmas father, George, tried to get around the problem by switching to bottle feeds and a succession of volunteers to look after Mary and Emma when he was at work. It didnt work. Mary lost more and more weight. It all reached a crunch point one evening.

George, come up here!

George bounded up the stairs. What is it, darling?

Take this thing away, shes evil, Mary screamed, pointing at Emma, now deposited four feet away from her at the end of the bed.

What do you mean, darling? How can our daughter be evil?

I tell you she is. I can see its in her eyes. Its the way she looks at me. Shes trying to suck my life away. Thats why Im dying.

Youre not dying, darling, youre just depressed, said George, trying to be patient.

Get out, get out and get her away from me! she screamed. Mary started scratching herself and pulling at her hair.

George scooped Emma up and ran downstairs. He went to the phone and dialled 999.

Ambulance service, please. Its Dr Jones at 34 Church Lane, Hindhead. My wifes five months post-partum and shes become violent. Im scared for the baby

George ran up the stairs again and discovered Mary trying to suffocate herself with a pillow. He tried to wrestle it away from her whilst holding on to Emma. Just then, there was the sound of the ambulances siren and a blue light was flashing through the windows. He ran back downstairs to open the door.

The ambulance crew were accompanied by male and female police officers. He gave them a brief account of what had been happening and they all went upstairs. Marys attempts at harming herself hadnt abated and she was now trying to hang herself with the flex from the bedside light. The female police officer said: Look, Dr Jones, I think its best if you go downstairs with your baby, well deal with this.

The long and the short of the evenings excitement was that Mary was taken in the ambulance to the nearest hospital and she was detained under the Mental Health Act for her and the babys safety.

Not surprisingly, George was very upset by these unfortunate post-natal developments. Its bad enough having a relative admitted compulsorily to a psychiatric ward, but even worse when its your wife in a small village with wagging tongues. Indeed, with all the ambulances and police cars with their flashing lights and sirens not to mention Marys screams, which apparently were heard as far away as Mr Smiths fields thered been a lot for the village folk to wag about.

***

Mary was initially assessed in Accident & Emergency by a junior psychiatrist whilst the police officers were still in attendance. She was continuing to behave in a highly irrational way, screaming about the Whore of Babylon and her daughter being evil, and theyd had to prevent her from strangling herself with whatever was to hand.

Two psychiatrists attended A&E and completed the necessary paperwork which enabled her to be admitted compulsorily to the local psychiatric hospital. They had some discussion about finding her a bed in a specialist unit for mothers and babies, but it was felt that her mental state was too unstable for that to be practical.

And so Mary came to be on Nightingale ward in Stone House Hospital. As wards went, it was absolutely standard for the 60s, with large dormitories split up into male and female areas, although there was some latitude in this, particular when patients wandered about at night looking for the opposite sex. But Marys self-harming behaviour needed rather more than a bed in a dormitory and she ended up in a seclusion area for her own safety. She also required sedation and was given a rather painful intramuscular injection of chlorpromazine.

The following morning, Mary woke up feeling groggy but calmer. A nurse came into her room to offer her a cup of some orange medicine and she was moved to the main dormitory area of the ward. A young doctor came to ask her questions, and then George visited her in the evening after surgery had finished. Food was offered but she refused to eat it. The following morning, a nurse came to tell her that the consultants ward round was about to start.

The ward doctor commenced his presentation: Mary Jones is a 29-year-old woman married to a local GP. She was admitted yesterday under the Mental Health Act after the police and ambulance service were asked to attend the family home by her husband. She had given birth to a daughter five months previously at home. Breast-feeding was initially adequate and there was reasonable attachment with the baby. In recent weeks she had become preoccupied with religion and blamed herself for the death of the vicar who baptised her daughter. She refused to care for the baby and was not eating. Over a few hours on the night of admission, she developed a delusional belief that the baby was evil and this culminated in her throwing the baby to the end of the bed and trying to suffocate herself. This behaviour continued in the A&E department and she was therefore assessed under the Mental Health Act. She has no formal prior psychiatric history. Both her parents appear to have rigorously enforced religious beliefs, which may have some bearing on her preoccupation with evil. The diagnosis is manic-depressive reaction and immature personality.