Wife On Demand

by Alexandra Sellers

  “He said, ‘He’s lying about that letter,”’ said Hope softly, her voice cracking.

  “I’m sorry, I don’t think the members of the jury heard you. Would you repeat that, please?”

  “‘He’s lying about that letter.’”

  There was a brief pause, while Sondra Holt stood with slightly opened mouth and raised eyebrows to take it in. She nodded with the utmost interest. “‘He’s lying about that letter,’” she repeated carefully. “And Ms. Thompson, were those the last words that your father spoke to you, effectively on his deathbed? The last words, so far as you know, that he ever spoke?”

  She risked one glance at Jude. He looked poleaxed. Nicholas Harvey was leaning casually back in his chair, surreptitiously looking at his watch with a bored eye, and then back at Hope, stifling a yawn, as if her testimony were a tedious but uninteresting ritual that had to be got through.

  “Yes.” Hope coughed to clear her stricken throat. “Yes. But he didn’t say who—” she began urgently.

  Sondra Holt simply ran over her verbally, as if not even noticing the attempt at a rider. “Did you tell anyone about this, Ms. Thompson?”

  “No.”

  “No one at all?”

  “No.”

  “You didn’t tell the police when they talked to you, for example?”

  “No.”

  “Did you tell Jude Daniels?”

  “No.”

  “He didn’t advise you to suppress this evidence?”

  “No. He didn’t know about it.”

  “You would agree, wouldn’t you, that the words might have a deeply significant bearing on this case?”

  She simply could not gather her wits. She had been dealt too much of a blow. Hope lifted her hand to her head and frowned. “Um...well, I thought—I didn’t know who he meant.”

  “Do you believe the jury has a right to hear those words and make up their own minds as to what he might have meant?”

  “Yes, I guess so. Yes, if they—”

  “But you independently decided to keep the jury from hearing them.”

  “I object, Your Honour. The witness has made no attempt to conceal any facts from the jury.”

  “The witness by her own admission did not tell the police about a deathbed communication from her father, who was in perhaps a better position to know the facts than anyone else save Jude Daniels. I think that fact speaks for itself, Your Honour.”

  “Then it ought to be allowed to speak for itself, Your Honour, and my learned friend should refrain from putting words in the witness’s mouth,” said Nicholas Harvey dryly.

  Sondra Holt dropped it. “Now, Ms. Thompson, during the period in question, that is, during the final stages of construction on the Rose Library, did you have any connection with the firm of Thompson Daniels?”

  “Yes, I was working as my father’s temporary office manager.”

  “And how did that come about?”

  “I had just got back from Europe and his office manager broke her leg. He asked me to fill in for her.”

  They established the exact dates of her tenure.

  “Now, can you tell us about the way mail is treated in the firm?”

  “There’s so much important mail coming into the office that it’s never left to anyone junior, like the receptionist. My father’s office manager always opened the mail, and in her absence, his secretary.”

  “And did that continue while you were substituting for the office manager?”

  “Yes, it did.”

  “Was opening the mail one of the duties that you undertook?”

  “Yes, it was.”

  “Will you tell us, please, exactly what the process was?”

  “I opened the envelopes, stamped each page of any enclosure with the date stamp, and initialled the top page.”

  “I see. Why was this procedure so rigorous?”

  “There were invitations to tender and things like that, and you never knew when it might be important to know exactly when something had been received.”

  “I see. Thank you. When you had stamped the mail, what did you do with it?”

  “If it was important, I passed it on to whoever it was addressed to, usually my father or Jude Daniels. If it wasn’t important, or I could act on it myself, I afterwards filed it.”

  “Now, I show you two sample letters which the police have taken at random from the Thompson Daniels office files, that were received during the period of this year when you have told us you were working as the office manager. Are these letters stamped in the way you have described?”

  “Yes, they both have my date stamp.”

  “And what is this squiggle here in the lower right hand corner of the stamp impression?”

  “Those are my initials.”

  Sondra Holt smiled as she gazed down at the mark. “This mark represents your initials?” she drawled, glinting a grin at her. The courtroom tittered with friendly laughter, and suddenly Hope felt she wasn’t so dangerous after all.

  “Well, it’s my scrawl,” she said, smiling.

  “Is there any attempt to form an H and a T?” The Crown Prosecutor was still amiable.

  “It’s more just a kind of H,” Hope admitted.

  The two letters were passed to the jury.

  “Now, Ms. Thompson, I show you another letter—” Hope unconsciously tensed “—taken from the files of Thompson Daniels, also with a date stamp, this time of August fifth this year.” She handed Hope the letter and stood beside her looking down at it. Hope breathed again. Not yet. “Now, the first thing I notice about this is that the date stamp is slightly different from the previous one we saw. The capital R on the word Received is different. Would you agree with that assessment?”

  “Yes, this is the date stamp from Lena’s desk.”

  “Who is Lena?”

  “Lena Thorpe-Mason. She’s my father’s secretary.”

  “And here the initials are quite plain, aren’t they? A printed LTM.”

  “That’s right.”

  “Why would this letter have the date stamp and initials of your father’s secretary rather than your own?”

  “Well, either I was busy and Lena was doing the mail, or I was off sick that day.”

  The Prosecutor was back at her table, casually glancing down, her hands in her pants pockets, speaking as if absently. “Can you remember which it was?”

  “No. But the office records would show whether I was there or not.”

  “I see. I now show you a letter that we have previously heard was sent by Mr. Bill Bridges to the defendant’s office. It is date-stamped August sixth of this year, and it also has a squiggle in the lower right hand corner of the stamp.”

  Sondra Holt took her hands out of the pockets of the grey suit trousers she wore under her legal robes and accepted another sheet of paper from her junior. She approached the stand again and offered the paper to Hope. This time she stood not at her side but facing her, confrontational. Her face had lost its smile. The sudden change of attitude unnerved Hope.

  “I ask if you have ever seen this letter before.”

  Hope looked at it. “Yes, the police showed it to me.”

  “When was that?”

  “A few weeks ago, when they talked to me.”

  “The police interviewed you about this case and showed you the letter at that time?”

  “Yes.”

  “Had you seen it before that?”

  ...and nothing but the truth...

  Hope tilted her head. “Um...no, that was the first time I saw it.”

  Sondra Holt flicked her a look. “Ms. Thompson, are you sure you understood the question? I asked whether you had ever seen the letter before the police—”

  “Oh, Your Honour,” said Nicholas Harvey lazily, only half-standing from his position at his table, “I think this witness is intelligent enough to understand even my learned friend’s piercing style of questioning.”

  “Sorry, Your Honour,” said Sondra Holt, as someone
in the courtroom tittered. “Ms. Thompson, I draw your attention to the lower right hand corner of the date stamp on this letter. Can you identify the initials there?”

  “No,” she said stiffly.

  “Ms. Thompson, forgive me, but to an untrained eye, I have to say that the squiggle on this letter looks remarkably similar to the squiggles on the two previous letters which you identified as your own.”

  Jude’s face was a blank, everything shut inside as he watched her. He was a stranger, completely detached. She thought of him saying, And you’re supposed to have forgotten whether you saw it or not? Don’t be ridiculous, Hope! It’s not something you’d forget! He had convinced her then. What did she believe now?

  “It’s not mine. It can’t be mine.”

  Sondra Holt heaved a determined but unhappy sigh, turned back to her table and lifted a sheaf of papers from the top of a stack of documents. Her junior approached and handed one to Hope, and one to the judge.

  “Ms. Thompson, I draw your attention to the transcript of your conversation with the police on October fourth of this year. Do you remember that conversation?”

  Hope stared down at the stapled-together sheaf of papers. Don’t forget they will ask you about your earlier conversation with police, Nicholas Harvey had said. If there’s a discrepancy, you’ll be asked to clarify. Why hadn’t she got the message?

  “Yes,” she said.

  “If you will turn to page four of this transcript, you’ll find the record of your answers when these questions were put to you by officers of the Serious Crime Squad on that date. Have you found the place?”

  Listlessly, her brain almost lifeless, Hope turned the pages. “Yes, I’ve found it.”

  “Now, just above halfway down the page is a question from the officer, which I’ll read: ‘Have you seen this letter before?’ Now, would you be so good as to read your answer when that question was put to you six weeks ago?”

  “‘I can’t remember. I guess so,”’ Hope read.

  “Good, and then the officer said, didn’t he, ‘Is this initial yours?’ And what did you reply?”

  “‘It looks like mine. I suppose it must be.’”

  “Thank you. And the officer went on, ‘So you received this letter at the offices of Thompson Daniels and stamped and initialled it on August sixth?’ and what is your reply to that?”

  “‘I don’t remember, but I suppose I must have.”’

  “Thank you. Now, Ms. Thompson, on October fourth this year, you were prepared to say that the initial on this letter was your own and that you ‘must’ have received, date-stamped and initialled it at the offices of Thompson Daniels on August sixth. Today you’ve testified under oath, and your story is different. Could the court reporter read the questions and answers out to the court, please?”

  The court reporter lifted the paper coming out of her machine, found the place, and recited in a monotone, “‘I draw your attention to the lower right hand corner of the date stamp on this letter. Can you identify the initials there?’ Witness, ‘No.’ Ms. Holt, ‘Ms. Thompson, forgive me, but to an untrained eye, I have to say that the squiggle on this letter looks remarkably similar to the squiggles on the two previous letters which you identified as your own.’ Witness, ‘It’s not mine. It can’t be mine.”’

  “Thank you,” said Hope’s tormentor. “Now, Ms. Thompson, will you let us in on what happened to make you change your mind between the moment on October fourth when you were interviewed by the officer and admitted the squiggle ‘must be’ your own, and today, when you say that it ‘can’t be’?”

  “Nothing happened. I just realized it couldn’t be mine. I’d have remembered such an important letter.”

  “You just thought about it and came to a different conclusion?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you discuss it with anyone between those two dates?”

  Hope’s heart thudded in heavy, doom-laden beats. She swallowed and stared at the deadly, experienced woman who was her adversary, and understood that she had been led around by her nose through all of this. There was not a moment when Sondra Holt had lost sight of her goal or the way to it. Not a moment, from the time when Corinne Lamont had taken the stand, that Hope had not been ruthlessly manipulated.

  She opened her mouth to tell them about the conversation with Jude, but the Crown Prosecutor was too sharp to allow her to admit it freely after having been given the gift of that terrible, significant pause.

  “Ms. Thompson,” she jumped in accusingly, as if Hope had denied it, “I have here the visiting records of the Toronto Central Detention Centre, where Jude Daniels has been held without bail pending this trial. It shows that you visited Jude Daniels on the seventh of October this year. Do you remember that visit?”

  “Yes,” Hope said firmly, getting control of herself at last. “We—”

  Sondra Holt cut her off. “Ms. Thompson, did you and Mr. Daniels discuss your interview with the police at that meeting?”

  “Yes, we did.”

  “Did you tell him that you had virtually identified the letter from Environmental Glass Systems as being one which you received and stamped?”

  “I told him they had showed me a letter with what I thought were my initials on it.”

  “And did he tell you that you were mistaken in thinking so?”

  “Oh, please,” said Nicholas Harvey. “No leading questions are needed, Your Honour. The witness has been perfectly forthright and open throughout her testimony. My friend can ask without leading and expect an honest answer. No need to put words in the witness’s mouth.”

  “I withdraw the question, Your Honour. What was Mr. Daniels’ response to what you told him, Ms. Thompson?”

  “He said that it was ridiculous to think I would have forgotten a letter of such importance and that if I’d seen it I’d remember.”

  “And that convinced you?”

  “It made me think about it, and I realized that the letter was too important for me to have overlooked.”

  “But it was Mr. Daniels’ attitude that made you re-think the situation?”

  “Yes.” Suddenly, involuntarily, she was thinking of Corinne Lamont saying, I told Marsha Good fellow that he did it so she would testify on his side, and she could not prevent her gaze sliding doubtfully to Jude.

  “Up until that moment you were satisfied that you had received the letter and stamped it and that the initials were yours?”

  “I couldn’t remember it, but I thought that must be what had happened. Now I realize...” But did she realize? Or had he convinced her?

  “Thank you,” said the Crown after a moment’s pause to let her hesitation sink in. “Ms. Thompson, what is your connection with Mr. Daniels?”

  “My connection? He’s my father’s partner.”

  “Do you have a personal relationship with him?”

  “Yes. We—we’re...” She faltered, not wanting to use the bald word ‘lovers’ but not knowing how else to put it.

  “Have you ever had a sexually intimate relationship with him?”

  “Yes. I do now. I mean, we did until—”

  “When did you first meet Mr. Daniels?”

  “In June, when I came back from Europe.”

  “And when did the relationship develop into something personal?”

  “In late July.”

  “I see. So just around the time that we have heard from Mr. Bridges that he telephoned Jude Daniels with the results of the lab tests on the glass, you and Mr. Daniels were developing a romantic relationship?”

  But Hope was learning. She looked at the Crown Prosecutor. “I don’t know whether Bill Bridges phoned, or when, or what the timing would have been relative to my relationship with Mr. Daniels.”

  Sondra Holt smiled. “Are you in love with Jude Daniels, Hope?”

  Her gaze locked with the brightly questioning gaze of her tormentor.

  “Oh, Your Honour, this is an unwarr—” began Nicholas Harvey.

  “I withdraw the qu
estion. Thank you, no further questions.”

  Nicholas Harvey leaned lazily over to glance at a piece of paper his junior had thrust under his nose and waved it away with blithe unconcern. Then he got to his feet. He was a big, lionesque man, with an extremely imposing presence. He looked completely unruffled by what had just passed, and Hope immediately began to feel that her testimony had not been nearly so damaging as she feared. She smiled involuntarily in response to his own easy smile.

  “Hope,” he began in a slow, friendly way. “When your father said those words to you—those ‘deeply significant’ words as my learned friend terms it—did you know who he was referring to?”

  “No, I didn’t.” She almost wept with the relief of being allowed to explain herself. “I jumped up to ask him who, but he—just lost consciousness.”

  He looked at her carefully, pausing, and she got the message: Don’t volunteer anything I don’t ask for.

  “So for all you know, he might not have been referring to this particular letter at all, or any letter relevant to this case.”

  “That’s right.”

  “Or it might have been Bill Bridges he was accusing of lying about the letter.”

  “Yes.”

  “Was your father fully conscious when he spoke, Hope?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “He might have been delirious, wandering?”

  “Yes, he might.”

  The lawyer nodded as though it all made sense.

  “Is that why you didn’t tell anyone about it?”

  “Yes.”

  “Was there any intention in your mind at any time to pervert the course of justice by not discussing your last moments with your dying father with the world?”

  “No, never. I didn’t think of it that way.”

  “Now, I ask you to look at these letters again, which have been chosen by the police from among the many thousands of letters, I imagine, that are in the Thompson Daniels offices. I notice that on the two letters actually initialled by you, one is in what looks like blue ballpoint, and the other in what appears to be black felt tip ink. Is this pretty representative of how you initialled the mail that came in?”

  “No, it’s not. I almost never used a ballpoint. I use felt tips.”

  “Why is that?” he asked curiously.