Degrees of Guilt

by H S Chandler

  ‘He wanted to watch me die. My death, I think, was just going to be a side effect of him getting the thing he desired the most. It didn’t matter to him if I cut myself too hard deliberately or if it was a side effect of the cutting. He’d spent our whole marriage building to that point. That was when I knew, if I didn’t kill him, I would walk up those stairs to my death. So I went to get a clean dishcloth from the pantry to wipe up the last tea cup that was still in the sink, and that’s when he spoke again. He said, “You could always try a different part of your legs, maybe the softer skin. Fresh skin. Towards the inside of your thighs. Virgin territory. Would you like that, Ria?”’

  She’d always hated it when Edward called her that. Only Andrea was supposed to call her Ria. It had been their pet name for each other – Ria from Maria, and Rea from Andrea. The jury didn’t need to know that, though. Not how angry she’d been that afternoon. Furious enough, in fact, to have killed.

  ‘When he suggested I try the softer skin, all pretence was gone. He wanted me to slice closer to the large artery. More blood, harder to apply pressure, less chance of it being able to clot before I passed out. He was smiling when he said it, and flushed. Excited. Inside the pantry, I had no idea what I’d grabbed. It could have been a tin of beans or an old saucepan, I just pulled whatever was nearest. I didn’t realise exactly what it was until it was all over. The leg had been there from where a chair had broken a few weeks earlier. The rest of it was in the garage. Edward had been meaning to fix it.

  ‘When I stepped out of the pantry he was staring out into the garden, waiting for me to do what I’d been told and go up the stairs. I always went first. It was a master of the house thing with him. He ordered, I obeyed, readied myself. Then he could just walk into the moment and enjoy it. I’m not sure he knew I was still in the kitchen, to be honest. When I think about that moment now, I see it in black and white. I don’t know why.’

  Maria did know why. She knew perfectly well. Want to show people you were dissociated from your feelings or acting outside your body? You saw it in black and white. Some people had described an out-of-body experience, seeing themselves doing something in the third person. That, she thought, was probably a step too far. The library was an amazing source of information if you were looking to read up on psychology.

  ‘I walked up behind him, raised the chair leg and swung it down on his head. I don’t remember hearing anything. There was this buzzing inside my head, and all I could feel was fear. I was scared of what would happen if I didn’t do it. Really terrified, like I’d never been before in my life. Edward didn’t say anything or turn around. It was a good connection. He sort of … crumpled. I stood there a while, I don’t know how long. Everything was silent then – as if I’d gone deaf. I must have been in shock because I remember staring out into the garden a while.’

  True. The garden had been looking glorious.

  ‘When I came to my senses, I walked into the hallway, took Edward’s mobile from his jacket pocket and phoned the police. I told them what I’d done straight away, but by the time they arrived it felt unreal. I was relieved and horrified all at once, but I was glad to be alive, for the first time in years. And I knew I didn’t have to cut myself again. I knew I wasn’t going to die that night, and that was all that mattered. After nearly twenty years of keeping everything a secret, I just couldn’t find a way to explain it in the interview.’

  22

  There was no mistaking the look on Imogen Pascal’s face as she stood up to cross-examine. She was out for blood. James Newell had repeatedly reassured Maria that court cases were never personal for the barristers involved, but winning was clearly personal for Miss Pascal. This was a high profile case, and one the prosecutor did not want to lose.

  ‘Mrs Bloxham,’ Pascal started, pausing briefly, but Maria was ready for that one. The prosecutor wanted her to lose her temper. She was determined not to. ‘You’ve painted an extraordinarily unpleasant picture of your husband’s character. Do you accept that he was very highly regarded in his professional life?’

  ‘I do,’ Maria nodded.

  ‘And that he had no previous criminal convictions indicating any propensity towards violence or dishonesty?’

  ‘I’m sure that’s right.’ Maria kept her eyes on the desk in front of her.

  ‘So you’re the only person who has ever made an accusation of this nature against Dr Bloxham,’ Pascal continued.

  ‘As far as I know,’ Maria said, keeping her voice neutral. Imogen Pascal was going to follow whatever script she’d written. Trying to score points off her would be futile. All Maria had to remember was not to engage.

  ‘Except for your friend Andrea, of course? Is she going to be appearing as a witness in your defence?’

  Maria froze. Andrea, the grief at her loss, was her Achilles heel. It must have been apparent to Imogen Pascal as soon as Maria had started talking about her.

  ‘Most of what Andrea knew about Edward, she’d only heard from me. I didn’t feel like I’d left the relationship on good terms. It’s been nearly twenty years since we spoke …’

  ‘I see, so even your friend Andrea couldn’t have given the court any independent evidence. It would all have been what you’d fed her. That explains why she’s not here.’

  Maria took a shaky breath, giving Miss Pascal the opportunity to continue.

  ‘Well, let’s see what see we can agree on. So you met Dr Bloxham when he was volunteering at a charity that offered support to self-harmers. How did you find out about that group?’

  ‘Andrea made enquiries. She thought I needed help to ensure I didn’t lapse.’

  ‘Dr Bloxham was volunteering there before you started attending?’ Miss Pascal clarified.

  Maria nodded.

  ‘You’d accept that this is further evidence of his decency and public mindedness then?’

  Maria laughed.

  ‘Is something funny, Mrs Bloxham?’

  ‘You really can’t see it?’ Maria grinned. ‘He was there looking for someone. He found me. It wasn’t some happy coincidence. Nothing in Edward’s perfectly planned life ever was. He wanted a woman he could control, so he went out to find someone broken. And I think – I know, having lived with him for so many years – that he was entranced by watching me cut myself. He wasn’t volunteering to help other people. He was only helping himself.’

  ‘You’re saying his very presence there was part of some greater plan to get into a relationship with a woman who self-harmed?’

  ‘Yes,’ Maria replied firmly.

  ‘May I ask if you’ve ever been diagnosed with paranoia?’ Miss Pascal asked.

  ‘I have not,’ Maria said. ‘I’d never seen a psychiatrist until this court case.’

  ‘So you would accept then, that it’s possible you are suffering from a mental state such as paranoia but you’ve just never been diagnosed.’

  Maria made tight fists with her hands, and the blood began dripping from the wound again. ‘I’d think I’d know if I was suffering from a mental illness,’ she said.

  ‘Really? You’ve spent most of your adult life cutting yourself. Perhaps that deserved a diagnosis?’

  James Newell stood up. ‘The defendant can’t answer questions like that. Could we move on?’ he asked the judge.

  ‘I’m not crazy!’ Maria blurted. ‘That’s what Edward told me everyone would think. It’s not true and it’s not fair!’

  ‘Please calm down, Ms Bloxham, no one’s saying you’re crazy,’ the judge reassured her.

  DI Anton murmured something unintelligible into the ear of the officer next to him and they both laughed. Maria wanted to slap him.

  ‘I can move on,’ Imogen Pascal agreed. She’d got what she wanted. ‘For the duration of your marriage you were housed in desirable accommodation in a nice area, and you were not required to earn money to contribute to the household financially?’

  ‘It was the house my husband chose for us. I wasn’t allowed to go out to work after the incide
nt where Andrea turned up,’ Maria replied.

  ‘And we’re back to your absent friend Andrea again. The way you told that part of your story was as if you believed her rather than your husband, who had done nothing before then to make you suspicious of his motives. Would you agree that sounds somewhat paranoid?’

  ‘By then he’d persuaded me to give up my car, was dictating what we would eat and had already refined my clothing choices to what he deemed acceptable. It might be the benefit of hindsight, but I don’t believe Andrea made a pass at Edward at our wedding. I believe she was trying to warn me against him only I was either too stubborn or too desperate to see clearly at the time.’

  ‘You said Andrea promised to get in touch when she joined the army. Did she?’ Pascal asked.

  Maria shook her head. ‘No. I wasn’t expecting to hear from her for a month or so, and I was distracted. When Edward encouraged me to start self-harming again, for a few weeks I was pretty much consumed by it. It took me a while to realise that we’d stopped getting post altogether after that.’

  ‘I don’t see the relevance,’ Imogen Pascal tapped her pen on her hand and cocked her head.

  ‘Edward had decided to have all our post redirected to his office. He didn’t discuss it with me. When I asked him about it, he said it was to reduce my stress and because it was easier for him to deal with the post at his desk,’ Maria said.

  ‘So once again, he was acting in your best interests and handling all the household correspondence, meaning one less responsibility for you,’ Pascal replied. Maria didn’t have to look up to know she was smiling. It was right there in her voice.

  ‘Actually it meant I had even less contact with the outside world. Not even junk mail. Edward told me there had never been any personal post for me. At the time I told myself that perhaps it was because he’d been telling the truth about Andrea. Later on I realised it was just another way of controlling me. I’m sure Andrea sent me her details. I believe Edward shredded the letter so I couldn’t get in touch with her.’

  ‘You keep using the word “realised” Mrs Bloxham, but it wasn’t realisation, it was your own assumptions and beliefs. There’s no proof of anything you’ve claimed in this courtroom, is there?’

  Maria gritted her teeth. She’d asked for one simple courtesy, and Imogen Pascal couldn’t even manage that. Innocent or guilty, every man or woman had a right to be treated with dignity. She took a deep breath and did her best not to shout. ‘I’d prefer to be called Ms rather than Mrs. It was mentioned earlier.’

  The judge nodded her agreement and peered at Imogen Pascal over her glasses.

  ‘You are still married though, aren’t you? So legally you’re still Mrs Edward Bloxham.’ Miss Pascal smiled politely at her.

  Maria gripped the sides of the witness stand, her injured hand a bright white ball of pain.

  ‘I’ll be issuing divorce proceedings. It’s just a bit more complicated when …’ Maria broke off. Imogen Pascal had dug a hole for her and she fallen straight in it.

  ‘When the defendant has been so brutally attacked that he can’t answer legal proceedings for himself? Is that what you were about to complain about?’

  ‘Bitch,’ Maria muttered under her breath.

  ‘Ms Bloxham,’ the judge cautioned her. Apparently Maria hadn’t been quiet enough. ‘This may be stressful, but I won’t tolerate the use of bad language or abuse in my courtroom. If you can’t exercise some restraint, I will have no choice but to …’

  ‘Your Honour, it’s not a problem. Please don’t intervene on my behalf,’ Imogen Pascal cooed, looking more reasonable then ever.

  Maria watched as the jury foreperson gave the prosecutor an approving smile. Manipulative bitch, Maria amended to herself. She’d underestimated Imogen Pascal.

  ‘So be it, if you’re happy to continue. You’ve been warned, Ms Bloxham,’ the judge said.

  Imogen Pascal shook out her gown, head held high, and kept her voice sugary. ‘At what point did you suddenly start to distrust Dr Bloxham?’ she asked.

  ‘There wasn’t a single point, that’s not how it worked,’ Maria replied, failing to keep the irritation from her voice. James Newell gave her a sharp look. ‘Edward was brighter than that. If I had to put a day on it, I’d say it was when he had the landline removed from the house. That was two years after we got married, and by then I had very little contact with the outside world. I wasn’t going out at all unless it was with him at the weekend. He didn’t want the expense of the home phone as well as his mobile. That was his explanation.’

  ‘So did lots of people phone you regularly before that? Was the landline an important part of your day?’ Pascal asked, her voice almost jaunty. Maria glared at her.

  ‘No. No one ever phoned me, but it was there in case of an emergency,’ Maria said, forcing calm into her voice in spite of the sense that she was being mocked.

  ‘In case, say, you needed to phone the police. You managed that perfectly well with your husband’s mobile after you’d assaulted him so it’s not true to claim you were completely cut off from the world, is it?’

  ‘That was the only time I ever touched his mobile phone,’ Maria said. ‘It was his personal property, not for me to touch.’

  ‘So he had a password or screen security, did he, to stop you using it? If that’s the case how did you call the police?’

  ‘No password. He didn’t need one. He knew I wouldn’t break his rules. I wouldn’t have touched it under any other circumstances,’ Maria replied.

  ‘All right,’ Pascal said. ‘So let’s take a look at your claim that you were completely cut off from the outside world. There was a television in the house, right?’

  ‘Yes, but …’

  ‘Let me finish, please, Mrs Bloxham.’ Maria bit her tongue and tried to concentrate. Her feet were feeling numb and the blood that had run down her hand was crusting in the heat. ‘There was also a computer in the house. Presumably you know how to send emails and use the internet. It’s pretty much impossible to be out of social media circulation in this day and age. In fact, some people would say you were lucky, if indeed your claims were true.’

  A titter of laughter from the police officers in court followed the jibe. Maria knew it was designed to throw her off-balance. Imogen Pascal wanted her to lose her temper in the same way she had with the psychiatrist.

  ‘Both the television and the computer were kept in Edward’s office. They weren’t for me. I wasn’t allowed in there. He locked the door whenever he went out,’ Maria said.

  ‘You weren’t allowed in his office? Ever? You never once set foot in there? But Ms Bloxham, you were thirty-nine years old when this incident occurred. You’d been married for nearly two decades? Are we really supposed to believe you never once entered your husband’s study?’ Miss Pascal’s voice went up a pitch with incredulity. Maria wanted to tell her what she could do with her questions. She wanted to throw the glass of water at the prosecution barrister’s superior face and storm out. Instead she picked out the reassuringly bland spot on the wall and imagined she was talking to Ruth, who had never failed to believe her or questioned her. Imogen Pascal might be speaking, but it was Ruth’s voice she needed to hear.

  ‘I was allowed in just once a day …’

  ‘I’m sorry, we’ve gone from you never setting foot in the study to you being allowed in once a day. That’s a big leap, Mrs Bloxham. Do you even know what the truth is any more or have years of boredom and paranoia completely distorted reality for you?’

  ‘No!’ Maria shouted, catching her temper halfway through the word so that it died in her throat. ‘You interrupted me. I was saying Edward let me in there once each day while he was there, to clean out the fireplace, empty his waste paper bin, and vacuum as necessary. I meant I never went in there alone. The only time I touched his computer was to dust it.’

  ‘Come now, are you really claiming you weren’t allowed to watch the television at any time in the last twenty-odd years?’ Imogen Pascal huf
fed.

  ‘I was allowed to in the first couple of years of our marriage, but Edward didn’t like it. He said it was bad for my brain and created unreal social expectations. He watched it, though. I could hear it through his study door in the evenings.’ She remembered sitting on the hallway floor once listening to the canned laughter of some comedy, wishing she could be allowed to watch it too. She’d asked his permission the next day to be allowed some television time, perhaps one evening a week. Edward had laughed and asked what it was she thought she needed comic relief from, given the fact that she had no strains or worries in her life. The conversation had been closed.

  ‘I’d like to ask you about a mobile telephone that police found hidden in one of your shoes in the bottom of your wardrobe.’ Miss Pascal reached behind herself and an officer slid a clear plastic bag containing the mobile into her hand. It was given an exhibit number and passed by the usher to Maria. ‘Is this yours?’

  ‘It is,’ Maria said, risking a glance in the direction of the jury. A couple were whispering to one another. Some were shaking their heads. Imogen Pascal had scored some points.

  ‘So, far from being cut off from the outside world, you actually had your own personal mobile device. Who paid for it and who paid for the credit for you to make calls?’

  ‘I paid for it. I never made any calls though,’ Maria muttered.

  ‘But you didn’t have access to money. How could you possibly have bought yourself a phone?’

  ‘I saved up coins I found around the house. Back of the sofa, in Edward’s pockets when I was doing the washing, that sort of thing,’ Maria replied.

  ‘So you were stealing from your husband? He didn’t know you were taking those coins and spending his money on phones?’ The prosecutor managed to mix the perfect level of concern and disbelief as she rammed her point home.