‘No, sir, she hasn’t,’ she reassures him. ‘It’s in relation to the recent homicide of a man named Milo Harrison.’
‘Well, thank goodness for that at least. I mean for Erin, not this poor Milo chap.’ His eyes shift focus between us once more. ‘So, why exactly are you here? What does it have to do with Erin Santos?’
‘Dr Wainwright. You were Erin’s primary psychiatrist while she was a patient here at Larksmere, weren’t you?’
‘Yes, that’s right, I was. Erin came to us in 2019, after she was convicted of manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility.’
‘And you diagnosed her yourself?’
‘Of course. She was my patient.’
I look over at the wall to the left of me, spot the painting above the huge bookcase that’s crammed with antique leather-bound books. It’s an oil on canvas portrait of Dr Wainwright looking terribly regal, with his chin raised and his glasses perched halfway down his nose. It’s in keeping with the period feel in the room and, I imagine, Dr Wainwright’s opinion of himself.
‘But by the time she left Larksmere, she was repentant for her crimes and, I believe, with the continued help of prescribed medication and God’s love, she could be rehabilitated, hencewhy I was in favour of granting her recent release.’ He pauses. ‘These things don’t happen quickly, or without much due consideration and discussion, you understand.’
‘Was Erin schizophrenic, Dr Wainwright?’ Davis asks.
He taps his fingertips together as he considers his answer.
‘She was certainly delusional when she first arrived – she held recalcitrant beliefs that weren’t based on any reality, refusing to change her mind even when presented with evidence to the contrary. She was experiencing visual and auditory hallucinations. I believe she heard voices – or at least one other than her own internal voice – and she appeared disorganised, disorientated. I remember that she was quite lethargic when she joined us initially, very out of sorts – she had anhedonia.’
‘Anhed—?’
‘Onia –anhedonia,’ he explains. ‘She couldn’t find the joy in anything. She had a loss of interest in pleasure, in life itself.’
I should imagine most people who find themselves here would. Even the set of colourful flower paintings on the adjacent wall look somehow depressed.
‘And how was Erin’s behaviour throughout her stay here, was she a good patient? Was she ever aggressive or violent?’
‘Violent? No, never.’ He shakes his head. ‘Generally she interacted well with staff and fellow patients and largely abided by the rules we have here at Larksmere, and she accepted her treatment without incident, or some of it anyway.’
‘Some of it?’
‘Well, Erin wasn’t keen on the idea of ECT; she objected most vociferously to it initially. There were times, in the beginning, when she needed to be sedated to allow us to…help her. But eventually she complied.’ He breaks eye contact, looks away.
‘What did she tell you about Samantha Valentine? I’m presuming you know who I’m talking about when I mention that name?’
‘Yes, of course I do.’ He pushes his glasses further up his long face. ‘I got to know Samantha quite well over the years. Erin told me a lot about her, in great detail. Samantha was another identity, if you will, a character that enabled Erin to mentally transform between one version of herself and another.’
‘And that was your belief, was it, Dr Wainwright?’
‘Mybelief? Detective Chief Inspector?’ His bushy ginger eyebrows start to twitch. ‘It was myprofessional diagnosisthat Erin was suffering from dissociative identity disorder and that she had created another identity, Samantha Valentine, in a bid to protect herself from her childhood trauma, and later, from the truth that she had killed a man. Though I suspect it was even more complex than that.’
‘How’s that? I’m sorry,’ – I apologise, playing to his ego – ‘I’m afraid I’m only a detective, not a trained psychiatrist.’
He links his fingers together on top of his antique leather desk.
‘Of course.’ He nods, graciously, now that he’s certain I know my intellectual place. ‘Erin Santos was a somewhat depressed, traumatised individual. She had BPD – that’s borderline personality disorder – and she showed signs of bipolar disorder. Her mistrust of others prevented her from forming meaningful and lasting relationships throughout her life. However, this sadly perpetuated her loneliness and ability to feel socially accepted, and I believe was largely the reason why she created Samantha Valentine, a character who was dynamic and desirable and magnetic – all the things Erin herself wasn’t, or didn’t believe herself to be. She, Samantha, that is, was a coping mechanism.’
‘Like an imaginary friend, you mean?’ Davis chimes in. ‘I had one of those as a kid.’
‘Not quite.’ He cocks his head at Davis with a condescending smile. ‘Imaginary friends are not a diagnostic tool for mentalillness, DS Davis, and neither are they necessarily a sign of psychosis or future mental health issues. Having an imaginary friend as a child is a perfectly normal, healthy part of a child’s development, and often provides a sense of comfort, or a way in which to explore one’s creativity, or emotions.
‘Dissociative identity disorder, however, is almost always preceded by some kind of severe trauma as a child, be it abuse, or neglect, critical illness, or experiencing a traumatic event, such as in Erin’s case, witnessing her mother being stabbed to death. I believe it was this trauma that led to her splitting, and to her creating a narrative whereby she got to be the heroine in the end this time, the one who saved her “friend” from her abusive partner,by killing him.’
He pauses, thoughtfully. ‘She carried a terrible burden around with her, the guilt of being unable to help her mother, to save her life. And she used drugs and alcohol to self-anaesthetise, to deaden these feelings that were just too painful to live with, like so many of us do, Detective.’
I nod, pause for a moment to digest what he’s told me – that Erin and Samantha are, in fact, one and the same person.
