Readers' Wives

Detective Inspector Griffiths, didn’t like it, he didn’t like it at all but he knew he had no choice. The feminist and the women’s rights groups were going to make him public enemy number one, they would want his balls in a vice, but it wasn’t his fault, he was only doing his job, he had to make the arrest. It was always the same for domestics. The women’s libbers always found the woman innocent even when like in this case, the weight of evidence was overwhelming.  She had killed her husband, she had admitted it for fuck sake, and the evidence was right there in front of his eyes, the bleeding corpse, the bloody scissors, a sobbing blood-stained women being comforted by a WPC. He couldn’t just ignore it; she had to be arrested. But that would mean leading her out of the house and into the prying eyes of the TV cameras; the fucking satellite news crew had got there before Griffiths, who the fuck had tipped them off? Now the world would see him lead this poor defenceless woman out of the house.

'Mrs Edwards?' Griffiths's voice sounded harsh, he tried to soften it, 'Mrs Edwards?' it made little difference, the sobbing woman looked up slowly, In all the palaver Griffiths hadn't really noticed what she was wearing.  Why was she dressed like a Moulin Rouge whore? She wore a gaudy red and black basque holding up expensive looking stockings; her ample breast pushed up by the underwear. For a second or two there were nearly two stiffs in the room. 'Mrs Edwards, Why don’t you go and get changed and then we’ll need to get you down the station.'

Meryl rose a little unsteadily to her feet, her feet were encased in shiny black stilettos, the heels could have been the murder weapons themselves with a wicked, silver point. Griffiths found his mind wandering; how come he couldn’t get his wife to wear clothes like that yet this dead loser being bagged up by the forensics could?

Griffiths’s mind came back to the room he nodded at the WPC to follow the suspect through to the bedroom, the clothes needed to be collected and bagged, they were vital evidence. 
The women gone Griffiths surveyed the scene. What was going on here? Was this really the man’s wife, or was it some hooker he’d hauled in off the street? Or maybe he’d married a hooker in the first place? Maybe they were playing some kind of sick game that had gone horribly fatally wrong? Griffiths had heard of couples role playing to the brink of death, not something that happened in his conjugal bed, the only rolling going on there was the missus rolling away from him. Anyway the stiff was fully dressed so that probably ruled that out.

A sniff stopped his mind from wandering further. Meryl Edwards had come back into the room, she looked completely different in her joggers and trainers, no longer a sexy minx just a short, sobbing, slightly overweight housewife in her forties although maybe younger. The WPC followed her in and subtly handed the bagged underwear to the forensic officer. Griffiths sat Meryl down and tried to soften his voice again. He explained that she was being placed under arrest and that he had to get her down to the station where a specialist team would look after her for a bit. Meryl nodded her understanding and struggled to her feet again. Griffiths took a deep breath, took Meryl’s hand and headed into the bright glare of the television lights outside.

After he had got her into the car, he was left standing on the pavement alone, exposed like a lame wilderbeest. The questions came flying at him from the assembled pack of journos;

'Is he dead?'

'Can you confirm she killed him?'

'Are you looking for anyone else?'

'Why was she dressed in that way?'

'Can you confirm it was scissors what did it?'

Griffiths shook his head to signal he'd be making no comment and headed back into the house.

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