Southend U3A

April 2024

Patience is a virtue - Malcolm Fyfe

As the saying goes, that was certainly true but we can’t be sure it applied to Maria, who yawned and stretched next to the aircraft window, the blind having been pushed up by a cabin steward.

As he did so with a waft of cologne, she noticed his perfectly shaped and polished finger nails, the sight of which caused her to reflect for reasons which will become clear a little further on. ‘I’m afraid you’ve missed breakfast, but I’ll get you a coffee if you like.’

‘No thanks,’ she replied, ‘we’ll be down soon.’

The early morning sun flickered on the clouds that floated beneath her, the occasional glimpse of Ireland’s green fields sliding silently by.

Soon, a pleasantly efficient sounding voice announced a ‘good morning and it’s a sunny day; we will be landing at Belfast International airport in half an hour, we do hope you had a pleasant flight.’

Maria was musing and looking forward to whatever came her way with certain mixed feelings but she would deal with it having planned her homecoming very carefully.

Born of a Catholic Belfast family, with her mother being the true matriarch, her strident voice and an abrupt manner developed in the ginnels and back alleys of the back-to-back terraced houses in Northern Belfast.

Her regular habit was to welcome the local priest who in cassock and biretta would arrive for Sunday tea and cake without fail - Maria’s father strangely absent on these occasions.

Maria had for years been obedient, perhaps to a fault, which was rapidly changing as she grew up with a fiery nature, red headed and freckled with the temperament of an Irish colleen.

Now studying for her final exams, she sat in her room surrounded by books with revision in mind. The alarm on her phone pinged to remind her to give her mother, now recumbent in her bed, her usual cup of tea. Before she could move the recognisable sing song voice penetrated even through a closed bedroom door. ‘Maria, its four o’clock and I’m gasping for a little drink. Tea would be nice and, oh perhaps one of those scones Mrs McGilvery bought round, maybe with a little butter and jam.’

Maria's reaction was of a combination of controlled irritation and a quiet faraway smile. She rose, calling out ‘Just a few minutes, mother and I’ll be there.’ But not for much longer she thought; free of the old witch. Hallelujah! Then momentarily wondered if that was irreverent. ‘Have the priest at me for cussing.’

She glanced around her room surveying the packed rucksack with the passport, tatty paperback and money bag perched on the lid, thinking to herself, soon I’ll be gone, finally free.

The next two weeks simply flew by: final exams finished, endless goodbyes from friends, restless nights with the tinge of the odd well disguised hangover.

The afternoon before her trip to Bangkok, a city of promises she always wanted to explore, Maria sat with her mother, excited but outwardly calm but with her thoughts in a turmoil.

‘As you know I’ll be away tomorrow before you wake.’ She was bemused at the apparent indifference shown by her mother at the thought that her daughter was taking off to lord knows where.

When Maria told her of the umpteenth time of the carer’s rota and that her brother might come in, produced the acid comment, ‘Oh him. As much use as your father and I haven’t seen him in weeks.’

Biting her tongue, Maria spoke gently ‘I’d like to do your nails for you, look,’ holding up a bottle of nail varnish. I’ve done mine a pretty pink, you like that,’ thinking to herself rather cattily, ‘same colour as your eyes.’

Her mother held up a hand sighing, ‘If you must.’

The next morning the taxi turned up as Maria was taking a last look through the bedroom door at her mother, restless and rather pale. Marie stared with a cold curiosity. She’d wondered how it would be, as though her mother was simply a specimen of interest in a bottle, hardly the thoughts of a loving daughter - quite the opposite.

After a long flight to Bangkok of some eleven hours, Maria passed through immigration with the required scanning of her passport, perhaps not realising her wished for anonymity was a naive illusion as her details were flashed to a highly complex data base that could search and locate those that really didn’t want to be found.

She had a marvellous time exploring but inevitably her money dwindled, so, inevitably, she turned for home.

Marie had taken an overnight flight that would land around seven in the morning at Belfast. Dragging through immigration was tedious but a quite uneventful passport check and a walk to the baggage carousel.

Standing waiting and yawning she watched, looking for her now somewhat battered rucksack to appear. She felt crowded by a thick set man standing at her elbow, she moved a few inches away but her way was baulked by a young woman dressed in a black uniform jacket who looked at her with a cold stare with eyes the like of which she only seen on a club bouncer -definitely not friendly.

The man spoke softly, ‘A word, Miss Thomas,’ in a tone that denied any argument. ‘I am inspector Brooks from the Belfast city Police and this is my colleague constable Davy.’

Maria nodded and felt slightly sick, and her knees felt slightly unsteady. ‘I would imagine you know what it’s about, you’re not under arrest but we would like to talk to you. Get your bags, then we would like you to come with us to Police Headquarters.’

In a blur she felt herself being escorted and taken to a car with a uniformed driver, escorted into the back seat and then smoothly driven away into the airport traffic.

A journey of some twenty miles into Belfast then, via Brook Street into the police headquarters, its fluttering flag with its emblem of a Harp against a green background stiff in the breeze then to the rear entrance its barrier rising smoothly.

An interview room was found, noticeably stark, just a table and several rather functional plastic chairs. She noticed the black eye of a ceiling mounted camera and what she guessed was a recording machine on a shelf.

‘Here we are now, would you like a drink?’

Maria croaked though a dry mouth, ‘Just water will do.’

The inspector reached forward, dropped a cassette into the player and the machines spun with hypnotic slowness. ‘There we are, ok now, you’ve been out of the country for a while, you certainly got around but we had some questions for you so we were able track you quite easily by your bank and credit card.

Maria looked startled at that. ‘Yes, we can do that quite easily nowadays, not many hiding places these days.’

‘Nobody has been able to contact you nearly two months with some bad news, I’m sorry to tell you your mother suddenly passed away, only a few days after you left.’ Maria sat on the hard plastic chair hands tightly clasping her knees. ‘You don’t seem surprised,’ he commented.

‘Well, she’s been ill.’

‘That’s not true, because the doctor has no record of seeing your mother for nearly a year. ‘When all the arrangements were done, your mother was laid to rest a few weeks back. As I said, your family couldn’t contact you, although your brother tried. ‘Funeral of course, your mother was Catholic.’

‘Now, talking of your brother, he started a chain of events that led us to where we are now. He was clearing out your mother’s room and found a bottle of nail polish’.

Mari shrugged. ‘So what.’

‘Well, it’s interesting because it was of a rather lurid pink, I’ve got it here,’ he said, rooting in an evidence bag and holding up the bottle.

Your brother thought it odd because he states that that your mother positively hated pink, wouldn’t have anything in the house pink, yet your mother’s nails were painted pink - why was that?’

‘We have a statement from the carer that you told her just before you went away that you’d given your mother a manicure including doing her nails, your prints are on the bottle by the way.’

‘I don’t remember that.’

‘What, telling the carer or doing her nails?’

Maria shrugged with supposed indifference.

‘Well, she found a tissue in the waste bin with nail polish residue on it which matched the polish on your mother’s finger nails, the same product as in the bottle, we tested it.

‘Let’s go on, the lab technician has a higher qualification in Organic chemistry, you studied it too but her qualifications and experience are a lot greater than yours, has a Ph.D. in chemistry in fact.’

‘Any comment so far Maria, for the tape? No, ok, I thought not, looks like you need a drink, you’ve gone a bit pale.’

‘This is what we think happened, for whatever reason real or imagined, you decided that you wanted to kill your mother, you’d had enough, she was very demanding, particularly to you. Now your studies told you about the effects of Curare, specifically muscular paralysis, lab records showed that you ordered a sample ostensibly for your work. Subsequently you deleted the order on the system but unfortunately not on the lab I. T. hard drive.

‘Curare is only effective for a few days, so you thought an ideal way was to apply it in a way that would leave no trace, specifically to the nails when you gave her a manicure. Clever but not clever enough as it happened.

‘Mistake number one was leaving the bottle around with the curare in the polish, it remains active in a sealed container so together with the tissue found in the waste bin that’s pretty damning I would say.

‘Mistake number two, tests show that the curare couldn’t or wouldn’t have penetrated the nail plate. Nails are made of Keratin that’s very tough horny substance.’

‘Now here is the irony of the situation, it turned out that your mother passed away of natural causes quite soon after you left, a stroke I believe, so it was all unnecessary.’ Hower there is enough evidence to show your intentions were to kill your mother by application of a poisonous substance therefore you will be charged with attempted murder. If you plead guilty it will go better for you but it will be up to the judge. You will be kept in custody tonight and charged in the morning. ‘Incidentally you did well in your final exams you would have obtained a first-class degree in Chemistry, thought you’d like to know that.

‘By the way, your mother, who owned the house, had left a will that specified that the entire proceeds of the sale will be given to the Church, you didn’t know that either did you? I imagine the priest will be pleased, left a bit for him as well.

‘What a waste of a good career, all for a little patience, it’s quite a virtue.’