The Reservoir by John Milliken Thompson

Published by Other Press on June 21, 2011

The Reservoir is a novel of psychological suspense flavored with a bit of courtroom drama rather than a conventional murder mystery. The opening pages describe Tommie Cluverius standing on an embankment atop a reservoir in Richmond, Virginia, looking down at Lillian Madison's pregnant, floating body. The unsettled question is whether Tommie killed Lillian and, if so, why? John Milliken Thompson's novel is based on historical fact -- Lillian died in 1885 and Tommie became the defendant in a murder trial -- but what actually happened at the reservoir is the subject of Thompson's informed conjecture.

For most of the novel (maybe for the entire novel), whether Tommie killed Lillian remains an open question. As envisioned by Thompson, Tommie isn't the kind of person who commits murder. Since there were no witnesses to Lillian's real-world death, it's possible she went to the reservoir alone and committed suicide (although footprints suggested the presence of another). In Thompson's version of Lillian's death, Tommie is with her at the reservoir. Their relationship is not a happy one, a fact that could motivate suicide or homicide. Whether or not he killed her, Thompson imagines Tommie's understandable regret about the role he played in Lillian's life. As Tommie explains it to his brother in one of the novel's telling passages: "There's strange things that happen in the world sometimes, I've come to understand that, and they don't fit in with the rest of our lives. These things, they're like a burl in a tree, Willie -- they don't belong there." Tommie sees himself as a victim of fate, yet the novel repeatedly makes the point that people make choices and that bad choices lead to bad consequences, however unintended a particular consequence might be.

Fate may have played a larger role in Lillian's life than in Tommie's.  Tompson sensitively portrays Lillian as a woman marred by actions beyond her control -- a modern perspective that might have been less accepted in 1885. Other characters are equally realistic and complex. Tommie's brother Willie -- simpler and steadier than Tommie, but involved in his own way with Lillian -- is torn between his desire to trust his brother and his growing concern that the charges are true. A reservoir laborer finds a watch key and, forming a strange attachment to it (as if he could become close to the dead woman by holding close to the key) fails to turn it over to the police until his boss asks him about it a week later. Some characters succumb to law enforcement pressure and give statements that aren't entirely accurate, while Lillian's embittered father has reasons of his own to fabricate testimony. Thompson has a strong understanding of the factors that impair the truth-seeking function of a criminal trial. His fictional account gives voice to the reality that juries, like witnesses, are imperfect instruments for measuring the truth.

Although the story is tightly constructed, Thompson includes a wealth of detail in his depiction of Richmond and its inhabitants. Thompson drew on a variety of sources to help him craft the novel (he lists them in the final pages), including articles from the Richmond Dispatch and Tommie's own published story. As is often true of criminal accusations, the truth will probably never be known. Thompson's fictional account of the circumstances surrounding Tommie's trial is nonetheless captivating.

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