The Mantle of God

by Caron Allan

  He turned to say, ‘Of course.’ Then leaning past her to reach his cup, he downed the beverage in one long swallow. He stepped back and signalled to the waiter for their coats. He helped her on with hers, draping his own over his arm, and hurried off towards the exit, leaving her staring in surprise at his retreating form. In less than five minutes she was closing the front door of her parents’ house, and he was already driving off in his taxi. He hadn’t attempted to kiss her, had barely even troubled himself to see her up the steps to the door, before calling out heartily, ‘Well, goodnight!’ In fact the taxi was already driving away as she stood on the step looking for her latch-key.

  ‘Well really!’ Dottie said to herself as she took off her cape and hung it up. Then she smiled. It didn’t matter, nothing mattered. The evening, the ill-fated dinner with Dr Melville she had so been dreading, was finally over. It hadn’t been a success, but at least it was over. She could tell Flora in the morning that she was never going to see Melville again.

  Dottie went into the drawing room and halted just inside the door. Her eyes took in the scene: her father was standing beside her mother’s easy chair, his face stern, his hand on her mother’s shoulder. Her mother was dabbing at her eyes, clearly distressed. Cook and Janet hovered uncertainly in the background, grim-faced and worried. And seated opposite her mother was Inspector Hardy, pale, tired-looking, a notebook balanced on his knee, a pen poised to write.

  ‘Hello Mother, I’m home. What’s going on? Good evening, Inspector Hardy.’ What a contrast in her feelings between her first glimpse of Dr Melville earlier that evening and how she felt on catching sight of the handsome young inspector now. Her heart fluttered. She blushed. She couldn’t look away from his mouth.

  Hardy, ever polite, rose to his feet and came forward slightly. He almost bowed but settled instead for a grave smile. ‘Good evening, Miss Manderson. I’m afraid your family has suffered a break-in during your absence. I’m afraid we haven’t quite finished checking upstairs yet.’

  Nothing had been taken. Her parents had been at dinner when the intruder or intruders had gained entry to the house via the back door. Neither of the staff—of whom only two were on the premises at the time, the daily help having gone home for the day—had seen or heard a thing until the back door had slammed shut, shattering the glass. It appeared the door had not been locked. In fact, Dottie was surprised to discover, the back door was rarely locked before eleven o’clock. Anyone could have walked in off the street and along the side alley to the back of the house.

  Her father was shouting angrily and her mother, uncharacteristically womanly and clinging, continued to grip his arm and dab her eyes with her handkerchief.

  ‘As soon as our specialist has checked for fingerprints, you can all move about the house again as normal,’ Hardy told them. ‘I’ve asked him to start upstairs, so that the ladies can retire to bed as soon as possible. I’m afraid it is rather a long process.’ He was preparing to leave, Dottie could tell, and neatly side-stepping Janet and Cook, she walked with him into the hall, wracking her brain for something, anything, to say to keep him there a little longer. A thought occurred to her.

  ‘Did the thief or thieves actually go upstairs, then?’ she asked. He halted and turned to face her.

  ‘Yes, your mother found that things had been disarranged in her room and I believe there was a possibility that someone had also entered your room. There’s no one there now, obviously. I’ll ask that your room is checked as soon as your parents’ room has been done. It shouldn’t be too much longer.’ He paused on seeing her expression, and held up a hand to calm her fears. ‘Your mother is certain nothing has been taken. She says all your jewellery is still in its case. You can go in the room, just try not to touch anything.’

  Dottie felt genuinely nervous of going upstairs alone. She flashed a glance at him, hesitating. Lacking her mother’s overly particular attitude to social convention, Dottie would never normally feel the least concern or embarrassment about asking any other male friend to come upstairs and check inside the wardrobes or under the bed, and she would be perfectly comfortable leaning on any other male friend for emotional support or reassurance. Yet still she hesitated.

  Hardy noted her pale face, the long slender fingers of her restless hands entwining, her large dark eyes gazing up into the shadows at the top of the stairs. As a friend, he wanted to put an arm around her shoulders and hug her, to tell her he would check under her bed for monsters. But were they friends? That was a point of deep uncertainty. Sometimes he felt they were, yet at others, he couldn’t quite define their relationship. At this point he firmly, if reluctantly shoved aside those thoughts as they tried to intrude.

  As a policeman he had the authority to ignore social niceties and to say with great officiousness, as he did right now, ‘On second thoughts, Miss Manderson, I just need to check something upstairs, I shan’t detain you long.’

  Her relief was immense, and undisguised. She made a play of stepping back and indicating with a gesture of her hand that he should precede her up the stairs. ‘Certainly, Inspector. Please feel at liberty to go wherever you wish. We’re only too glad to help the police.’

  He mounted the stairs, aware of her following behind him. He made a few unnecessary examinations of the handrail with a small magnifying glass he took from his pocket, after spending a full minute polishing it with his handkerchief. She pointed to the door to her room, her cheeks charmingly aflame. His heart melted a little more. With difficulty, he kept his mind on his role as detective. Further along the hall, a figure was bent over a door handle with powder and brush. ‘Good evening Sergeant Carson.’

  The figure turned, and the brush was waved in salutation, a small amount of powder drifting down onto the carpet.

  Hardy examined the door handle carefully before reaching out and gripping it with his handkerchief to open the door. Glancing back at her, he looked directly into her now-laughing eyes. She was not fooled for a second. He cleared his throat. She snapped on the light before he could stop her, even though he already knew the room was empty, any intruder long gone, yet the switch had not been fingerprinted. Not, he reminded himself, that the intruder was likely to have touched the light-switch. The room was bathed in the brilliance of electric light.

  He looked about him. An instinct prickled the back of his mind, niggling away at his good-natured charade and filling him with disquiet. He held a hand out to her, to tell her to stay back out of the room, but she misunderstood and stepping to his side, she took his hand in hers, wrapping her other arm around the arm he held out to her, her body shaking against him.

  ‘What is it?’ she whispered, and the laughter was gone from her eyes.

  ‘I don’t...’ he murmured, and looked about the room. It was the typical room of any single young woman of a well-to-do family, very like his sister’s own room, in fact, in spite of his own reduced circumstances. A bed, a chest of drawers, a screen behind which was a tallboy with a jug and basin set on the top, and a mirror. A much-loved rag-doll sat on a small chair in a corner. A pair of wardrobes. A dressing table. A few items of clothing were strewn across the bed including, even now he couldn’t help noticing with masculine interest, some very filmy, lacy night-attire in the soft petal pink often seen on babies. The room was a lot neater than his sister’s, actually, though Dottie’s room held far more storage for her possessions than his sister at present had, and of course Dottie was a crucial two or three years older than Eleanor. And she had a maid.

  On the dressing table, the open jewellery box was fairly full. He pointed to it, and turned to ask her, ‘Is everything here?’

  She peeked round him, glanced at the dressing table then nodded. Her eyes were still as huge as saucers. Lovely eyes, he thought irrelevantly, and not for the first time. He patted her chilly fingers.

  ‘It’s all right. There’s no one here. You’re safe.’

  The eyes fixed on his face, then after a few seconds his words sank in, she nodded again, an
d some of the tension left her. She blushed as she looked down to see that she was hugging his arm, and released him, stepping back. His arm still felt warm from the contact. She looked again at the jewellery box.

  ‘Yes, that’s everything, it’s all here.’

  He took a closer look. If anything, he was a bit surprised at how little proper jewellery she had. Most of it was the cheap modern costume jewellery his sister liked. There were, in addition, a few items that were undoubtedly valuable. He touched a ring and a pair of earrings.

  ‘My grandmother’s,’ she said, ‘other than those, and the pearls I’m wearing, I don’t have anything of real value. Nothing to tempt a thief. I’m so glad they didn’t take Grandmama’s jewellery, that would have broken my heart.’

  A silence settled over the room. They stood side by side in the pool of light, their shadows stretched and bent by the light, seeming to lean in and touch one another. Hardy couldn’t seem to make his brain function. All his instincts screamed at him to kiss her. Yet good sense told him it would be an unpardonable liberty that would blight their friendship. If indeed, he reminded himself, they were friends.

  He forced himself to step back and turn away from her. Behind him, he heard her exhale slowly and realised she too had been holding her breath.

  ‘What about this?’ He reached a hand out to point to the scrap of paper that was on the bed, barely visible beneath the folds of her nightgown, not that the flimsy item really was substantial enough to warrant such a name, he added to himself yet again. He refused to dwell on the sudden mental picture of Dottie dressed in the garment. Why did these thoughts plague him so? She stared at him, a little surprised by the odd sudden shake of his head that seemed not to match his actions.

  She reached out to take the piece of paper from him. She flattened it out on the palm of her hand with trembling fingers. It was the paper the tiny scrap of fabric had been wrapped in. He could see the ink, the spidery words scratched on the surface, ‘The Mantle of God’.

  ‘That wasn’t there when I went out,’ she said immediately. ‘That’s not where I keep it. I keep it in the back of the top drawer of the tallboy, under the towels.’

  He wasn’t surprised to hear she had hidden it; he had known he could trust her to take care of it. But where was the scrap of fabric? It wasn’t by the paper on the bed. ‘I think we have to admit at last that something has been taken after all,’ he said, and felt as though his heart had sunk to his heavy, ill-fitting boots.

  She smiled, and reaching for the hem of her skirt, she turned it back to reveal the tiny piece of fabric pinned there.

  His eyes glowed with admiration. Blue eyes, Dottie decided, were definitely what she was looking for in a man. Blue eyes like William Hardy’s, deep, expressive, now pensive, now laughing, and full of life. That was what she wanted in the man she would marry.

  ‘Thank God,’ he said fervently.

  ‘Is everything all right up there?’ her father’s voice called from the hall below. Dottie, startled, bit her tongue, but nevertheless managed to call back in a perfectly normal voice, ‘Yes, Father, everything’s perfectly fine. The inspector is just making some notes.

  ‘Hmm,’ her father replied, ‘Don’t care what he does so long as he catches the blighter.’

  The sense of intimacy dispersed, the atmosphere lightened. To her amusement, Hardy insisted on checking inside her wardrobes for intruders, then he made certain the windows were secure. Lastly, with a teasing grin, he flung back the fringe of the deeply-draping counterpane, and bending over, peered beneath the bed, then turned back to assure her gravely that no robbers lurked in her room and that she could sleep in perfect safety.

  She laughed softly and made a playful slap at his arm, turning to plant a quick soft peck on his cheek. He moved at the crucial moment and she found her lips on his.

  He froze. She leapt back, horrified but laughing, her hand going to cover her mouth, her cheeks infused with pink. He cleared his throat to hide his confusion and turning for the door, began to stammer his goodnights and hastily took his leave.

  She reached the top of the stairs in time to see he was already turning away from her father and heading towards the big front door that Janet was holding open for him. And then he was gone.

  Dottie went to sit in her parents’ room whilst the fingerprint man carried out his examination of hers. All she wanted was to go to bed. She just wanted to shut out the world and think about what had just happened. At long last Sergeant Carson called out to her that he had finished. Everywhere seemed to be covered in grey patches of dusty powder, but that would have to wait until morning.

  She said goodnight to her parents, unwilling to risk any conversation with them regarding her all-but-forgotten dinner with Dr Melville. Under the covers a minute later, she thought about that accidental kiss. She saw—or thought she saw—in her mind’s eyes, his surprise at her action. She felt his unmoving mouth against hers.

  Sudden realisation struck her. He had been chivalrous and charming, a gentleman, allaying her fears about the break-in, and she had acted like a thoroughly brazen and fast modern girl of the worst kind, flinging herself at him, in her bedroom, of all places, and how disgusted he surely had been by her behaviour. He hadn’t lost a second in leaving the house. She felt this small disaster assume greater and greater proportions, and her evening with Melville now completely forgotten, she sobbed into her pillow at the thought of losing William Hardy’s regard.

  Chapter Five

  AFTER LEAVING THE MANDERSONS, Hardy went directly to the police station where he wrote up his report. That done, he spent another half an hour looking over the evidence that had been accumulated for the dinner-party robberies. Maple had used a table on one side of Hardy’s office as a central point for all the documents and files relating to their investigation. A large metal box labelled ‘Property of Hertfordshire Police’ took up a lot of space. They had borrowed it for all their notes and copies of the Herts’ case documents. He was too tired now, he decided to wait until the morning when he was fresh to start going through its contents again.

  He stretched and yawned. Time to go home. His watch showed him a few minutes short of one o’clock in the morning.

  On leaving the station, the desk sergeant gave him a solemn nod, one that conveyed sympathy and fellow-feeling. At least someone knows I’m putting in all these extra hours, Hardy thought.

  Outside, the breeze was far too damp and cold to be called bracing, and as he made his way home, walking as quickly as possible, turning up the collar of his coat, he hunched his shoulders against the chill. The streets were silent, almost pitch black in the long gaps between the lamps. He remembered how Dottie Manderson had found a man dying in the street just before Christmas, in just such a dark patch between two streetlights. He thought about her as he walked along, his steps echoing through the air. Her lips had been soft and warm. He had so longed to give in to his desire to really kiss her.

  Turning into his road, he could see that his house was all lit up. At first he felt a little curious about that, then puzzled, then finally his emotions turned to fear and he quickened his walk to a run.

  One o’clock, and every light in the house was lit, and the front door standing open... Alarm bells shrieked in his head. He raced in at the gate, up the three steps, in at the front door, colliding with a dark-suited gentleman who carried a black bag.

  ‘Wh-what?’ Hardy said but didn’t wait for a response. He went straight into the little sitting room and recoiled at the scene.

  His sister sat on the floor, weeping quietly. She held their mother’s hand. Their mother, still wearing her now-customary white apron over her day dress, was seated in the chair beside the fire. Her eyes were closed, her head tilted back against the cushions. No longer her normal pinkish colour, her face was a mask of strange, dull grey.

  Hardy stared. He became aware of voices. A woman whom he recognised from the house next door was speaking to him. Eleanor turned her face up to look at hi
m, her eyes reddened with weeping. She broke out afresh as she saw her brother. The dark-suited gentleman had followed Hardy back into the house, and he was speaking. They were all speaking. But he could only look and look at the body of his mother, neatly seated in her chair, neatly arrayed in her dress and apron, her hair smooth, her hands neatly folded in her lap, a gleam from the light bouncing off the plain gold wedding band on her finger.

  He fell into the chair opposite her, unable to wrench his eyes from the sight of her face. Eleanor ran to fling herself into his arms. He rocked slightly with the force of her slender body, automatically catching and holding her, but still, still he couldn’t fix on what she was saying.

  He turned his head. The man in the dark suit gave him a small glass of something. Hardy knocked it back, still not sure why he had even taken it from the man or why it was thought he needed it. The brandy seemed to set fire to his throat, burning inside him and making him choke.

  And all sound suddenly fell upon his ears. They were all speaking at once. Eleanor, sobbing as she explained, clearly feeling it was all her fault. ‘We had just sat down with a cup of cocoa before bed. She said she felt tired. I went upstairs for a book, and when I came back... Oh William! When I came back...’ She was sobbing again, clutching at his jacket.

  ‘I’m so sorry, Mr Hardy. I’m happy to stay and help as long as you want me. All mine are tucked up in bed, so they won’t need me. I’m free to sit up with Miss Hardy all night if needs be...’ the neighbour woman was saying.

  ‘Nothing to do, I’m afraid. Very sudden. Acute and fatal cardiac arrest. She wouldn’t have suffered, not that that will be much comfort to you at the moment, I fear, but...’ The man in the dark suit was watching William with concern. He was the doctor, it came to William now.