Page 102 of The Instruments of Darkness

That also bothered me. Had the opened bottle of wine been available for examination, we could have established whether it had been tampered with. But if that was the case, either Mara Teller had gained access to the bottle or someone close to Colleen had spiked it. From what Colleen told me, that could only have been her mother or husband. But it was idle speculation. The bottle was long gone.

“We’re not going down that route again,” I said.

“You may not be,” said Colleen, “but I am.”

I changed the subject.

“Did your husband ever mention an ex-girlfriend named Beth Witham?”

Colleen gave up on staring at her feet.

“Sure. He went out with her for a while, before we met.”

“A long while?”

“A couple of years. They broke up six months before Stephen and I became an item.”

“Do you know why they broke up?”

“He said she was a bitch. She wasn’t always, but she turned into one—though that’s what a lot of men say about their exes, isn’t it? It may well be untrue. Is she involved in this?”

“Not beyond her past connection with your husband.” I tried to find a nice way to ask the next question, but there wasn’t one. “Colleen, did Stephen ever abuse you in the course of your relationship?”

“Did he hit me, you mean?”

“Hitting would be one form. There are others.”

“No,” she said. “I mean, he’s grabbed me once or twice, usually during arguments over money, or the amount of time he was spending away from home. His fingers left marks after, because I bruise easily. He was always apologetic, but I might have provoked him. I’d do that sometimes, just to get a reaction, and remind him I was in his life.”

The more I learned about the Clarks’ marriage, the less appealing it came to seem. Obviously, I’d encountered worse, but it struck me as dysfunctional in a grindingly depressing way.

“Would you say your husband has a temper?”

“It may sound strange after what I’ve just told you, but no. Even during the worst of our fights, there was something half-hearted about his participation. Stephen doesn’t really get angry, the same way he’s never been what you might call excessively happy on any occasion I can recall, not even on our wedding day. The only thing that really engages him is work—and money, but the two go together for him. It wouldn’t be enough for Stephen to win the lottery. He’d have to earn his wealth, so it could be an indicator of success in his professional life. His problem is that he’s not good enough to reach the level he aspires to, not without outside help, but if you go looking for assistance in business, it can come across as a sign of weakness. It’s complicated. Even when Stephen cultivated my father, I could see that it bothered him. He’d have preferred to be a self-made man, but that wasn’t an option, and still isn’t. It’s made him bitter. I wonder what he’ll be like when he’s old. I don’t think it’ll be pleasant to witness.”

Some of which echoed the opinions expressed by Colleen’s mother.

“And yet you stayed with him,” I said.

“I love him—for all his flaws, or because of them. I don’t need him to be a corporate big shot. I just need him to be a good man, a good husband, and a good father. But I understand now that some or all of those things may be beyond him. They’re not in his nature, or it could be that he ought to have found himself a different woman to marry. Beth Witham might have been the one, but I doubt it. Last I heard, she was working as a waitress, because Stephen mentioned that he’d seen her serving at a diner. That would never have been good enough for him, because he couldn’t have introduced a waitress to his fancy friends. You still haven’t told me why you’re asking about her.”

“A source claims Stephen didn’t break up with Beth,” I said, “but that she dumped him after he beat her.”

Colleen shook her head.

“I don’t believe that, not about Stephen.”

“Regardless, I’m going to speak with her tomorrow.”

“Why?”

“If your husband did hurt her, I want to know the circumstances.”

“No, it doesn’t sound like Stephen.”

“You don’t think he’s capable of it?”

“It’s not that,” said Colleen. “I just can’t see him caring enough to bother.”

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