Night and Day

by Caron Allan

The watch was a surprisingly ordinary one, however, with a worn brown leather strap and a plain face. There was no inscription on the back.

  In addition to these, there was a wallet, and a silver cigar case and a lighter of the new Zippo variety. The cigar case was almost full. Both case and lighter were inscribed to Archie Dunne from his parents on the occasion of his twenty-first birthday.

  The wallet looked fairly new, was of good quality leather lined with silk, and contained forty pounds, a number of betting slips, a photograph of a scantily-clad young woman who was most definitely not Mrs Dunne, and a few other bits of paper. Hardy emptied the wallet’s contents out onto the table and looked at each item in turn. In addition to the betting slips and photo, he found a business card for an insurance agency, an old bus ticket, a small piece of paper folded a number of times to make a parcel around a tiny scrap of pinkish fabric, and a receipt from a jeweller’s shop dated about two weeks earlier and showing a scrawl which said, ‘items of ladies jew’ry and cleaning of same, quote for reset. Brooch next week urgent.’ The receipt carried the address of the shop at the top. Hardy would pay them a call.

  Finally, having put these back into the bag, Hardy was left with a few smaller items: a handkerchief, more or less clean, a small and ordinary penknife the handle of which was inlaid with mother-of-pearl, a shilling and a sixpence, a small diary with the pencil in the spine, and the usual type of latchkey.

  The clothes, apart from being still slightly damp from the rain and somewhat bloodied, were not especially remarkable. There were no tailors’ labels.

  ‘You can take it all with you,’ the medic told him, ‘I’ve done all I need to do.’

  Hardy thanked him and gathered everything up once again, and took it back to the police station here he sat and looked through it all much more carefully. Then he began to log each item on a large sheet of paper to add to the case notes.

  The diary showed that for the last several months before Archie Dunne’s death, he’d been meeting two people each week on an average of two occasions each. At least, Hardy surmised they were people. The dates in question merely showed an initial D or V, followed by a time. Hardy felt reasonably sure these were indications of Dunne’s liaisons with women. There were few other entries. Even Dunne’s own wedding only warranted a brief note: ‘April 4th, Wedding 2pm’, and the other details of his life were treated equally briefly, ‘May 1st, return from Honeymoon’, ‘May 12th, Susan’s birthday, 26’. There were other birthdays marked, and the Grand National horse race, but nothing that helped to enlighten the policeman.

  With a sigh, Hardy set the diary to one side, and entered it into his list. Reflecting on the initials D and V he had seen in the diary, he wondered if the D might stand for Dottie. He hoped very much that it might stand for something else. He didn’t want to believe it could be Dottie. He realised that he would have to go back through all the statements and notes he had to try and find a V. What women’s names began with V, he asked himself. He got as far as Victoria and Violet, and then was stumped.

  Dinnertime that evening found him still at his desk, going over the statements and the personal items from the mortuary. His stomach growled and reminded him he had not eaten all day. Feeling frustrated and a little overwhelmed, he locked everything away and went out into the street to make his way home. He hoped Longden would be back in the morning, but somehow, that hope seemed something of a forlorn one.

  *

  At eleven o’clock on Monday morning, Hardy was summoned to a meeting with his superiors: Superintendent Edward Williams, Chief Superintendent William Smithers, and Assistant Chief Constable Henry Rhys-Meadowes. Required to give an account of his actions, he explained what he had done both on the night in question and in the hours since the murder had been reported; he succinctly informed them of all the information he had gathered thus far and gave them an account of his conversations with the medical examiner and other policemen. He outlined the witness testimony he had gathered and expressed his dissatisfaction with the behaviour of Mrs Dunne and her father. There was an indefinable something in the air in the assistant chief constable’s meeting room. An air which did not emanate from the highly polished table or the comfortable leather-upholstered seats.

  At the end of this account, at a nod from the assistant chief constable, the superintendent leaned forward and said to Hardy, ‘Very well, wait outside if you would, Sergeant. I shall call you in a moment.’ Puzzled, the young sergeant got to his feet, briefly half-bowed to the gentlemen and left the room. In the hall, a dozen or so feet from the door, he spotted a chair, and settled himself on it, wondering why they wanted him to wait. What did it all mean? Were they going to take him off the case and give it to a more senior officer? That wouldn’t exactly be a surprise. Had Longden returned from his holiday? Did Longden know what was going on? Did he even care?

  By the time the door opened and Superintendent Williams looked out and nodded to him, a somewhat depressed Sergeant Hardy had drifted off into thoughts of Dottie Manderson. He knew her mother called her Dorothy, but it seemed everyone else knew her as Dottie, as he had heard her called. Even he called her Dottie in his mind whenever he thought of her. Which was often.

  He sat on the same chair and looked at the three faces on the other side of the desk. There was a palpable tension in the air. What was going to happen? Were they displeased with his handling of the case?

  ‘Well, Hardy, seems like you’ve done a good job of covering all the essentials of the case so far in Inspector Longden’s absence. We’ve discussed the situation and are content to leave you to manage the case for a day or two until we appoint a more senior officer to take responsibility. What do you say to that?’

  Greatly surprised, and struggling to conceal the fact, Hardy struggled to find the words but after a short pause managed to say, ‘Well, er, thank you, sir, I mean, sirs. I shall do everything in my power...’

  ‘Excellent. And er—go easy on the young widow won’t you, her type are not used to being interrogated by the police. Get the body released. The p.m’s been done, so no real reason to hold onto the poor woman’s husband any longer than that. Well, well, keep up the good work.’

  And Hardy somehow found himself back in the hall again. And still in charge of a murder investigation. He immediately went to telephone to the mortuary. Then he telephoned Susan Dunne. She declined to come to the telephone, but her maid promised to deliver the good news that Mr Dunne’s body could now be released to the family for funeral arrangements. Hardy headed for the jeweller’s

  *

  Hardy handed over the receipt, the elderly jeweller leaning forward to take it from him with fingers gnarled and bent from long hours carefully piecing, turning and burnishing precious metals to form delicate ornaments to adorn the fingers, bosoms and heads of the great and the wealthy.

  ‘Yes, it’s one of mine. Hold on.’ The old man stooped to retrieve a vast leather-bound tome from under the counter, and leafing through dog-eared pages, he finally paused. Pulling out a loupe from his coat pocket, he huddled over the page, his lips moving as he read the entries until he found what he was looking for.

  ‘Ah yes, I remember. Mr Dunne, to clean and repair a set. Pendant earrings, a ladies’ dress ring, and a brooch. I think there may have been a necklace, too, but he didn’t bring me that, though I would have liked to take a look at it, purely out of interest. Lovely work. Quite old. Very dirty of course, but still really quite lovely. He should have collected them yesterday as a matter of fact. Hold on,’ he said again, and he turned to go through a curtained doorway to the rear of the premises. A few minutes later he returned with a small wicker basket, velvet folds of cloth sticking out of the top of it.

  He separated the folds of velvet to reveal a neat wooden box. The box was removed, set upon the counter and opened. Inside, a pair of pendant earrings and a small ring gleamed softly against a background of more velvet. The stones appeared to Hardy’s untrained eye to be sapphires and diamonds, and the gold w
as very yellow.

  ‘Are they real?’ he asked the jeweller, and couldn’t help lowering his voice.

  ‘Oh yes.’

  Hardy let out a long whistle. ‘Worth a few bob.’

  ‘Oh definitely. Very handsome set. Very, very good craftsmanship. About two hundred years old. Quite the loveliest items I have ever seen in my career. They were rather grubby. But now, as you can see...’

  ‘I suppose he owes you a packet?’

  ‘No, all paid for. I always take the money up front. One never knows in this line of work...’

  ‘Very wise,’ said Hardy. ‘Did you mention a brooch?’

  ‘Ah yes,’ he turned back to the ledger. ‘It says here—I remember now—he came to collect the brooch early. Told me to do that piece first as he needed it for a particular occasion. Tall chap, I seem to recall, modern appearance, youngish fellow. Fair hair, slicked back. One of those ridiculous little moustaches. Not very remarkable apart from that.’

  ‘Thank you, sir. Of course, I’m afraid I’m going to have to take these with me.’

  ‘Very well, sir. I’ll just wrap them up for you.’

  ‘It’s not a gift,’ Hardy reminded him. ‘Just some newspaper will do. It’s going in my inside pocket.’

  ‘Of course, sir.’

  Chapter Six

  It was Wednesday morning and a large crowd was gathered in the hall of the St Peter’s church for the inquest into the death of Archibald Dunne. The room was hot and crowded, the noise of voices and scraping chairs was deafening, and that a large number of the spectators had been gathered for some time was evident by the pall of blue-grey smoke hanging just below the ceiling, making the room appear almost three feet shallower than it really was. Dottie felt claustrophobic and wished she hadn’t worn her fox-fur wrap.

  She squeezed into a gap on the bench next to Flora, George and George’s pals Charles and Alistair. Across the way she saw the odious police sergeant sitting between two other men, both in police uniform. The sergeant was in a shiny new suit with a collar that irritated him. Dottie could see the back of his neck was red.

  Susan Dunne was accompanied by an older gentleman of an imposing military bearing whom Dottie assumed was her father. Susan was wearing that same tired black costume she had been wearing when they had visited her, although this time she had added a black hat-and-veil combination that partially hid her features. No attempt had been made to soften her appearance with jewellery or a corsage, or indeed any make-up, from what Dottie could see of Susan’s mouth and chin. In one hand she clutched her black-edged handkerchief, but as Dottie later realised, at no point during the afternoon’s offices did Mrs Dunne feel the need to make use of it. She’s acting, Dottie thought. None of it is real.

  Dottie herself was both excited at the prospect of giving evidence and extremely nervous. But the proceedings were performed in such a dull manner by the authorities as to rob the occasion of its most nerve-wracking aspect. It was almost as boring as going to the dentist.

  Dottie was called upon to explain how she had happened upon Mr Archibald Dunne, the thirty-one-year-old stockbroker of 191 Ryton Gardens, South West London. She told the gathering that she had returned from the theatre intending to visit her sister’s house, as they kept late hours when they had guests and wouldn’t mind her turning up at that time of night. She explained how she had got out of the taxi, only to find she had given the wrong house number and that she would have to walk the forty or fifty yards or so back along the road to reach her sister’s house. No, she hadn’t recognised the gentleman she found lying on the pavement, but her brother-in-law had known him and told her his name later. Bearing in mind not only that she was under oath, but that she felt a moral obligation to continue with the very slight deception she and Flora had perpetrated, Dottie was then forced to add not only that the deceased had sung to her a song she recognised from a particular West End show, but also that he had, moments before dying, clutched her hand and begged her to pass on his message of love to his dear wife.

  Dottie felt rather guilty about the lie, especially as she was under oath, and she hoped no one other than Flora—who knew her so well and was obviously also acquainted with the truth—would recognise her deception. She found it hard to look the coroner in the eye as she gave this part of her ‘evidence’ and was glad she had thought to bring a handkerchief with her, so she was able to cover her guilt by lowering her head modestly and dabbing the handkerchief to her eyes two or three times. She knew that her slender, apparently fragile build, and her youth would create a favourable impression in the minds of all those present. They would see her as a poor brave little thing happening on a desperate but unavoidable situation and keenly affected by the experience.

  However, as she glanced around the room, she noted that not only was Susan Dunne frowning in puzzlement but the sergeant was absolutely glaring at her. She faltered as she replied to a question posed by the coroner, and a general murmur of sympathy and approval went around the room. She stammered a response that no, she hadn’t seen anyone in the vicinity nor had she seen a weapon. She was excused with a kind smile.

  Next the coroner called forward the widow, Mrs Susan Dunne, and he offered her the court’s sympathy and asked her to state her name and address for the record. She sat leaning slightly forward. Her small, thin frame and black ensemble gave her the appearance of a gaunt crow hunched against the weather. Her gloved hands gripped one another in her lap as she perched on the upright chair placed in front of the audience.

  Through questions put to her by the coroner, she told the court that she and Archibald Dunne had been married for eight months, since the previous April, and that they had no children. There were a couple more ‘background’ questions as Dottie termed them to herself, then the coroner asked about the night Archie died. Mrs Dunne said she had seen him leave the house at about seven o’clock that evening, but that he had said nothing about where he was going or with whom, or at what time he expected to return home.

  ‘And after eight months of marriage, I knew better than to ask my husband questions,’ Susan Dunne said with an air of suffering. Dottie and Flora shared a look and another general murmur went around the room, accompanied by some shaking of heads and pursing of lips.

  ‘Did your husband frequently go out of an evening?’

  ‘Fairly frequently,’ she said, ‘usually two or three times a week. He generally left at about the same time of the evening. He normally returned home at about one o’clock, although sometimes he stayed out all night. He used to say that he had been at his club. However, I am not aware which club that was or whether he was there.’

  She was thanked and excused. The audience had continued to murmur, but now fell quiet as Alistair came forward, took his oath and began to give his evidence. He had a warm strong voice that carried effortlessly to the back of the room. He told the court he was a medical doctor and that he had been a visitor at the home of Mr and Mrs Gascoigne, who were dear friends of his, when Mrs Gascoigne’s sister had raised the alarm. He and his friend Mr Charles Holt had gone out into the street and had tried to help the deceased as he lay dying but it was immediately obvious that his wound was mortal.

  Charles was called to verify what Alistair had already said, and excused again almost immediately.

  Next, in the absence of a more senior officer, the police sergeant stood at the front and in his clear, well-modulated voice, told the coroner that Mr Dunne had no financial worries and that thus far, it had not been possible to determine a particular motive behind the attack on him. He did not incline to the belief that the attack had been an attempted theft as the deceased still carried a silver cigar case, his watch, a valuable signet ring and his wallet which upon examination was found to contain a fairly large sum of money. No one had been seen fleeing the scene, and no weapon or other evidence had yet been obtained. Mr Dunne was not known to have any enemies, nor was he known to have fallen out with anyone of late.

  Apart from his wife, everyo
ne will be saying, Dottie thought. It seemed to her that Susan couldn’t have made a better or a more subtle accusation against the dead man’s character, clearly everyone’s sympathy would be with the plain young wife who stayed fearfully at home whilst her husband went out gallivanting of an evening. But that sympathy would quickly turn to suspicion.

  Then the police medical examiner gave his findings. The deceased, a thirty-one-year-old man in good health and with no other injuries, had been stabbed in the chest in such a way as to pierce through the ribs and into the heart. The weapon was a long, extremely sharp blade, perhaps eight to nine inches in length, fairly broad, most probably a common kitchen knife. Upon examination he found that the deceased had eaten a light meal and had consumed a pint of beer approximately three hours before he was killed.

  The police sergeant stood to request more time to conduct enquiries and the coroner stated that he had no hesitation whatever in acceding to this request. Therefore, he adjourned the inquest until such time as the police had all the facts of the case in their hands.

  Outside, Dottie, Flora and George were debating the pros and cons of going with Charles and Alistair to lunch at a nearby hotel or of having a few brief words with Susan Dunne once more in an attempt to convey their sympathy. In the midst of all this, Dottie found a hand beneath her elbow and she was abruptly steered away from the group.

  ‘I want a word with you, Miss Manderson.’

  ‘Sergeant—er—whatever-your-name-is. How very pleasant to see you again.’ Dottie forced herself to smile even though her heart had plummeted to her shoes. He looked furious.

  ‘What was that you said in there about him sending a message to his wife to tell her he loved her? You haven’t mentioned that before.’

  She put a hand on his arm and flashed him a brilliant smile. He glared at her and she withdrew the hand hastily.

  ‘Oh dear, well, promise me you won’t be cross, now will you, Sergeant, but the thing is, we felt so awful when we went to see Mrs Dunne, that we just felt we simply had to...’