My theory of everything -
1. SL is a vivacious intelligent beautiful young 25 year old in 1986 - with the world at her feet and dreams of success and happiness in her eyes. She comes from a supportive family and friends circle.
2. Her parents did not want her settling for her first ever boyfriend before 'seeing what's out there' and encouraged her work on the ship cruise to get her some perspective.
3. She falls in love with boyfriend no 2 on cruise working in close quarters, this relationship grows distant however , after she is back on land in Putney.
4. She works as beautician and makes another circle of friends in that profession.
5. She then in the mid 80s finds that she is successful at her job in the estate agency business. she is dating the person labelled her BF circa 1986 (A - forget surname).
6. She falls in love perhaps naively , perhaps impulsively, certainly unfortunately, with a married man in her circle of friends ( yes, we do have a theory on this thread who that could be, but no evidence so wont name, not even initials)
7. During her bf's few weeks away, she decides to break it off when he gets back.
8 She does this on the Friday evening.
9. One of the BF's well-meaning friends, work to get her diary off her, to see the why behind the break up and if there is one or more mystery other men behind it - it is just a peek in her diary at this point, by an acquaintance, hardly a national news level crime.
10. The diary is obtained, the intensity of the affair with the married man is noted and his identity confirmed from SLs own writings.
11. On or by the Sunday, one of the ppl the diary has been passed on to from SLs circle of friends, passes the diary on to the wife of the married man. SL is a friend of the wife too, perhaps, but maybe not).
12. The wife's emotional response, is to deface the diary or the pages where her Husband is written about , exclaiming how her trust has been betrayed and the hurt and anger and shock she feels. More so, if SL was a close friend and was trusted.
13. After the diary has been placed back at the POW, where it was taken from by the sunday - said wife has a change of heart and wants to confront SL in person and catch her off guard to see her reaction and get the full truth , IMO. It seems too coincidental , or chancey, that the diary would be placed on the steps hoping the new bartender would find it and call SL to return it (could just as well have taken the cheque book and thrown away the diary etc , how could 'they' know for sure how he might react even as regulars at POW they could only have known him three weeks) - I believe that the Boyfriends friends or the wife , or both took the POW manager into confidence that they wanted the diary of this 'scarlett woman' given back to her to let her know she has been outed. Manager agrees to return diary back, no crime has been committed at this point , its all cool
14. Sunday night , wife confronts married man and has it out. MM (married man) apologises and begs to be given another chance ? Wife wavers but still wants to have it all out in the open. She calls SL to meet up , SL cannot meet on the Monday , maybe later in the week or weekend is discussed as a possibility.
15. Monday morning, MM says SL means nothing, wife says I need you to look her in the eye and tell her that, with me there with you. MM calls SL , asks her to meet close to lunchtime. SL agrees and asks him to come to the vacant house noted in her 1245 diary appointment as it is too short notice to ask for a long lunch hour instead of the usual desk food for lunch.
16. SL meanwhile gets call from POW asking her to come claim her stuff, says she will swing by evening.
17. SL does something she usually would never do and makes up a client to view the house - the first name that springs to mind when she notes the address is her ex Haddock who lives on the same street therefore prompting another fish related name.
18. She meets MM outside 37 SR but realises she has forgotten the keys in all the chaos of that morning - the missing personal diary that has turned up that she hopes no one read, the unusual tone of MMs call to her to meet asap etc. Wife is in his car outside out of SLs view by lying down backseat.
19. He asks her to come to the park they meet at sometimes - near the Stevenege address, she parks near the house for sale by her work , almost subconsciously. She has picked up on the tension in MM, and feels it is ending and possibly that it may be someone read her diary and told the wife , guilt + fear + anxiety + confusion = haphazard distracted parking?
20. Before she turns up at 12.45 at 37 SR and sees MM, he and wife wonder if she might pick up the diary first, see the defaced page and know that they know. Which then changes things as she will have her guard up and may not meet him completely unaware he has a livid wife beside him whom he desperately needs to now prove to that SL means nothing to him and is the 'bad guy' in this betrayal (she seduced me blah blah). they call POW and ask if she has picked up diary yet etc.
21. what begins as a heated conversation at the park , escalates - and one of the couple knock her out when emotions run high - how well can we expect a 25 year old to handle this situation compassionately, esp if she was the one seduced by a much older perhaps man. SL gets hurt falling down when slapped or whatever. They put her in their car, and drive her away.
22. They do away with her when she threatens to call the police for injury caused as soon as she regains consciousness or similar. They cant risk their kids futures , they do away with her and bury her somewhere on the quiet, no CCTVs back then - police get their alibi for the day (with each other?) but do not track their movements in the days thereafter ?
23. It is possible a number of her friends know about the diary, the secret, and some pages were removed that day as they were implicated in the theft of the diary that unintentionally led to her downfall when all that was intended was a moral vigilante against married affairs (or similar)
24. The POW manager may be partly in the know and paid/reasoned with - explaining there were small kids in the picture that would be effectively orphaned if their parents were put away .
25. Eventually the secret was too big for the marriage to survive much longer?
The reason no 'one' was found out was so many ppl were involved in the outing of the affair portion of it and helped cover it up to hide their part in it - they felt culpable ? A cover up by those who convinced themselves they were on the side of right ?
All the above my (and a few others on here) MOO/JMO - playing devil's advocate in the LE theory - which would be the occam razor to the above theory ? Also I can see the flaw - LE would have said if pages in the recovered diary were torn out or defaced or revealed the MMs identity as he would have been automatically POIed.
