Who Wants To Live Forever?. Steve Wilson

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СКАЧАТЬ in Manchester, on Friday, January sixth, 1911. Just over a century ago, and this is the farthest back I intend to go on the course. The victim was a woman called Enid Rodgers, and she died of arsenic poisoning.”

      “A woman did it, then,” said Gail, but Louise shook her head.

      “I know poison is traditionally associated with the fairer sex, but in this case…well, that’s what I want to talk about. Let me just say that a woman wasn’t found guilty of the murder; in fact, it was Enid Rodgers’ husband who was convicted. As far as the notion of poison being associated with female murderers goes, there are some notable precedents of men being involved in poisonings, such as Dr Crippen, who was hanged in 1910 for the murder by toxic drug of his second wife, Cora. You may have heard about his capture, which came after a telegraph message was sent by the ship’s captain as he spotted Crippen on board during a voyage to Canada. However, the murder of Enid Rodgers is nothing like that.”

      “So what is so unusual about this one that warrants this discussion?” I asked, puzzled.

      “Ah, I’m coming to that. Let me give you the facts of the case first. Enid Rodgers lived with her husband, Alfred, in central Manchester, close to the junction of the rivers Irwell and Irk. Enid was forty-eight years old and she was a cotton worker at one of the county’s many mills. The couple had no children, and seem to have kept themselves to themselves as much as possible. Enid first became ill towards the end of 1910, and was bed-ridden over Christmas and the New Year. At first, her husband didn’t think there was anything to it, as ill health amongst mill workers was a daily occurrence in those times, but when the headaches showed no sign of improving he turned to one of Enid’s friends from work, a woman called Eve Rhodes. Eve had been a visitor off and on over the preceding few weeks — she seems to have been the only person other than Alfred and Enid to have frequented the tiny one-bedroomed house in Arnside Street.

      “Eve almost took up residence in the house over the festive period — it seems that she had no family over here, as she came over to England from Canada some time during 1910.”

      “Perhaps she did a swap with Crippen, then,” joked Emma. “She did it, I’ll bet.”

      “I knew I shouldn’t have mentioned Crippen yet,” said Louise, but she had a slight smile on her face. “But you could be right nevertheless,” she added, mischievously. “Anyway, Eve’s presence didn’t seem to make any difference. On the contrary, for Enid’s condition continued to deteriorate. The constant vomiting left her increasingly weak, and in desperation Alfred sent for the doctor, Patrick Woolley.”

      “Sure it wasn’t Crippen?” sneered Mike.

      Louise pointedly ignored the interruption. “The doctor came but it was too late. Enid fell into a coma on the morning of January sixth and never regained consciousness. She died later that afternoon. The doctor, her husband and Eve were all by her bedside when she passed. And that would have been it — just one more death in a city where early death was a fact of life as a result of the prevailing conditions of the time — had it not been for a keen-eyed clerk who read the doctor’s report of the death. Unfortunately, history doesn’t name this clerk, but without him this entire course might not exist.”

      I looked over at Trish as Louise said this and mouthed, “Why?”, but Trish only shrugged her shoulders in response. I turned my attention back to Louise.

      “…read that Dr Woolley reported seeing a ‘strange puff of dust’ at the exact time that Enid died, but he had no idea what it was. This intrigued the clerk, who decided to dig a little further, and he ascertained that there were some unusual aspects to the case. To begin with, Enid’s fingernails were discoloured with a white pigmentation called leukonychia, or — more commonly — white nail. The doctor hadn’t taken much notice of this, as it was relatively common, with any injury to the base of the nail a likely cause. But there was something else in this case — the whitening was in bands, called leukonychia striata, and the clerk knew that this was a symptom of poisoning, with lead or arsenic often the cause.

      “As Enid had also suffered hair loss prior to her death, the clerk was convinced that something untoward had happened and an investigation was launched once Dr Woolley confirmed that there was no arsenic present in any of the tonics he had prescribed. It was common at the time for some women to whiten their skin by using a mixture of vinegar, chalk and arsenic, but Alfred Rodgers was vehement that his wife never paid any attention to those ‘ridiculous desires of fashion’ as he called them.”

      “I take it,” said Debbie, “that her husband was putting a noose round his neck when he said that. Why on earth are some men so stupid? All he had to do was say his wife was fashion conscious and quite possibly he’d have walked away scot-free.”

      “Yes, Debbie, you’re correct. But then, if he had, we wouldn’t have anything to talk about tonight, would we?”

      “Stupid man,” muttered Mike. “Now we’re suffering a hundred years later because of him.”

      Again, Louise refused to rise to the bait, continuing instead with her tale. “After this, the investigation increased in intensity, and the police concentrated entirely on Alfred. Nobody even thought to question Eve Rhodes, even though she, too, was present at Enid’s death. Even Alfred failed to think of involving her, probably because he never thought he’d be found guilty. By the time it was evident that he was going to be charged, several months had passed, Eve had left the mill and nobody knew where she had gone to.

      “The case went to trial eventually, with the prosecution claiming that Alfred had been adding small amounts of arsenic to Enid’s meals over a period of several weeks until the concentrated levels in her bloodstream reached the fatal level. The jury seemed to be influenced in this by the fact that Enid had changed her diet in recent weeks, adding rice to most meals — rice was known to contain higher levels of arsenic than other foodstuffs. The prosecutor claimed that made it easy for Alfred to add small levels of arsenic and just hope it would be assumed to be the natural level in the rice if anybody analysed the cause of death.

      “In his defence, Alfred denied initiating the change to her diet, but was unable to offer a suggestion as to why she had so suddenly altered her eating habits. When pressed on the matter, Alfred said it must have been something to do with somebody at work, but neither the mill-owner nor Enid’s colleagues had any knowledge of this. The prosecution claimed that this was proof that Alfred was trying to deflect suspicion onto somebody else, and this proved to be the final nail in Alfred’s metaphorical coffin.

      “Alfred was found guilty of murder and was hanged at Strangeways on March twenty-fifth 1912 — and as we were talking about Crippen before, the hangman, Rochdale’s John Ellis, was the same man who executed Crippen in 1910, and he was also an assistant to Henry Pierrepoint, first of the dynasty of executioners.”

      Louise stopped and waited for a response. I picked up the detailed sheets and began skimming through them, more to avoid eye contact with Louise and a possibly difficult question than to glean any more facts. Then a thought struck me.

      “So this Eve Rhodes,” I began, “I mean, how come they couldn’t trace her? If she was the only other person present when Enid died, surely it would have been important to find her.”

      “So you’d think,” replied Louise, “but remember, this was 1911, and initially there wasn’t any thought of foul play. But, even so, once it became a murder investigation, you would think that they would have made greater efforts to find her. And that is the real point of all of this.” She looked at me and smiled, and I suddenly felt glad that I had been the one to ask the question.

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