by Caron Allan
‘Jolly good.’ He seemed distracted, and why shouldn’t he be, she told herself, he’s got two dead bodies to deal with. He looked around, said something she couldn’t hear to someone she couldn’t see, then stepped back without another word and closed the car door. But he hadn’t left her. He came around and got into the driver’s seat, saying over his shoulder, ‘I’ll just take you home,’ and he started the engine.
She felt guilty. ‘Oh no! There’s really no need, I can call a taxi. You’re far too busy...’
‘Don’t be so bloody stupid,’ he growled. So she leaned back in the seat and close her eyes. Because now, she had only just realised, the main drama of the evening was about to begin.
Arriving outside the Mandersons’ home, he supported Dottie by her uninjured arm, up the steps to the front door of the house. He knocked.
‘Oh dear,’ Dottie said and bit her lip. He had no time to ask what she meant. Dottie took a step back. The maid who opened the door was pushed out of the way by Dottie’s mother, and she was not a happy woman.
Chapter Twenty-three
After the funeral, Muriel hugged her and they talked for a few minutes, and even Colonel and Mrs Moyer came over and thanked her for what she had tried to do, although to her mind, failed miserably, as she constantly reminded herself.
The Cyril Pentermans were there. Dottie saw that the new Mrs Penterman was still every bit as tall, thin, and elegant as she’d remembered. She made Dottie feel childish, and somehow, unfinished. Cyril had tried several times to catch Dottie’s eye but she had refused to allow it, keeping her eyes very determinedly fixed elsewhere: the ground; her folded, gloved hands; the floral tributes or some spot about a thousand yards away. Anything to avoid giving him the opportunity to smile and act as though they were friends, as if he had treated her in a decent manner.
George drove Flora and Dottie home after the funeral, and the journey took them past the Dunnes’ house, now standing empty, and as they turned into the end of the road, Dottie felt her heart begin to pound, and her stomach gave a violent lurch; although she managed to remain outwardly calm, her thoughts and feelings were in a whirl. And she heard Flora say to George in a low voice, ‘George darling, you shouldn’t have come this way,’ so Dottie leaned forward over the front seat to assure them it didn’t matter a jot, but then there was the house, looking just as it always looked, or possibly even less inviting if that were possible, and they were past it and it was over. Her heart settled back again into its normal stately rhythm, and the taste of bile left her mouth, though her arm and shoulder ached as if in sympathy.
That afternoon she gave Flora the first pair of bootees and matching matinee jacket she had knitted for Bonzo. Flora was delighted and cooed over them, making George admire them too. Dottie was certainly pleased with them; the decorative pattern of the jacket had gone wrong at one point but no one would be likely to notice unless they really studied the pattern. She had started the set the morning after that night at the Dunnes’ house, and she had felt consoled to be making something for the new baby. When Inspector Hardy had called to visit, he had found her sitting up in bed, knitting the baby jacket in soft pale yellow wool. He had given her the oddest look, a truly very odd look, which had made her blush to the roots of her hair, and that had been when the accident to the pattern had occurred.
He had stayed and talked somewhat uncomfortably for half an hour, with her mother there as chaperone, and then he had gone again. Another officer had called the following day to take her statement, and it had now been ten days since she had last seen the inspector.
As if reading her mind, Flora said, ‘Have you seen Inspector Hardy since that night?’
Not wanting her sister to know about him calling to see her at the house, she simply said no, she hadn’t seen him, adding, ‘But I imagine he’s very busy with bringing the case to an end. There must be a ton of paperwork involved. All those reports and things. There was really no reason for me to see him once I’d made my statement. He must be very busy with other cases by now.’
‘No doubt,’ agreed Flora with a sideways glance at her husband.
*
The next morning, she was at home on her own. Her parents were both out, her father at his club, and her mother was off doing good in the community somewhere. Janet helped her redress the wound, which had almost healed but still had a tendency to get caught or rubbed by the fabric of her clothes.
Afterwards, Dottie wandered about the house aimlessly, bored, unable to settle to anything, uninterested in any of her usual pursuits, including the second baby jacket. She halted by the window in the drawing-room, the one that looked out upon the street. But it was not the street that she was seeing, but the scene that night in the Dunnes’ house.
Several times the image of Susan, dead, and Leonora, screaming as she lunged at Dottie with that knife, had come to Dottie in dreams, and she had awoken, shivering in terror, her heart pounding, and had lain in her bed with the light on, afraid to sleep again.
But during the daytime she could think more calmly about what had happened. She wondered how things would have worked out if she had not gone to the Dunnes’ that night. Would Susan still be alive? Would everything still be going along in its same strange—but living—manner?
As she stood there looking out at the street, she saw a black car pull up outside and Inspector Hardy got out. Dottie felt flustered, as if her breath had all been sucked out of her. He ran up the steps and knocked on the door. Dottie hurried to open the door, and he came in, showering droplets of rain from his hat and greatcoat.
‘I’ll order some tea, or coffee, if you prefer,’ she said. ‘I’m afraid my parents are out.’
‘It was you I came to see,’ he said, following her into the drawing-room. ‘I won’t have any tea, if you don’t mind, this is just a flying visit. I wanted to see how you’re getting on.’
‘Oh I’m all right. My arm is almost better. But I keep going over and over things in my mind. I can’t seem to stop thinking about it. I keep thinking if I hadn’t gone there, Susan, and even Leonora herself, would still be alive,’ Dottie said.
‘You mustn’t think any of this is your fault,’ he said. The gruff professional exterior seemed to have fallen away, and he was almost boyish in his earnestness as he leaned forward to impress this upon her. ‘It is clear from the medical examination that Susan Dunne was killed almost as soon as she’d finished speaking to you on the telephone. Even if you hadn’t gone to the house last evening, Susan Dunne would still have been killed.’
‘But Leonora...’
‘She must have overheard her mistress telephoning to you. Even if she didn’t know to whom Mrs Dunne was speaking, she could have probably guessed, but it made no difference—clearly Mrs Dunne intended to speak to someone and therefore she had to be silenced. As soon as the maid heard Mrs Dunne begging the person on the other end of the line to come to the house once Leonora had gone out, I’m afraid her fate was sealed.’
‘Thank you. I’d completely forgotten you were watching the house. It’s lucky for me you were. For one terrible moment, I thought...’
He looked at her, and she felt as though she was being scrutinised rather too closely. Then he leaned back in the chair and the air seemed to come back into the room, and he said, ‘For one terrible moment, so did I. But as you say, we were watching the house. Constable Maple saw you go in and after a few minutes he decided to let me know. It’s a good thing he did.’ There was a lengthy pause then he added, ‘It’s possible even if you hadn’t gone to the house, Leonora Simmons would still have made away with herself. None of her belongings were packed, so there was no indication she planned to escape.’
‘The things she said, I can’t decide if they were ludicrous manglings and mashings-together of lots of different bits of the Bible, like we used to learn scriptures at Sunday School, or if it was some lunatic stuff she’d made up in her own mind. All that stuff about living only to serve him. About duty and sacrifice. It
was horrifying at the time, just watching her face, the way her eyes were practically rolling in her head, and listening to her voice as she shrieked it all at me. I’ve never seen someone so unhinged before. That was even more frightening than walking into the room and seeing Susan Dunne’s dead body. Yet I still wanted to try and help Leonora. Though she’d said I was patronising. I didn’t mean to be. I just saw how upset she was about Archie Dunne’s death.’
‘It wasn’t my finest hour, I’m ashamed to say. I was already certain that Susan Dunne killed her husband, though we had no real proof. The maid backed up everything her mistress said. But although I’d noticed the maid was upset, it never occurred to me to wonder why or to think about what that might mean. I never once thought Susan Dunne could be in danger.’
‘But why did Susan choose that night of all nights to kill Archie? It was so cold and wet?’
‘We can only guess, with all the main witnesses dead. But it seems to me that she just couldn’t take it anymore. He’d left her for several weeks, and gone to live at his club, then he came back, evidently there was some attempt at a reconciliation. And the night he died, he’d just left her again. And possibly she’d found out that he really did mean to divorce her for this other woman.’
‘George’s sister, Diana? Was he really going to marry her then?’
‘I believe so. Mrs Dunne met her husband outside his club. He’d arranged to meet Miss Gascoigne at the flat, and was intending to take a cab there, which is why he wasn’t wearing an overcoat or carrying an umbrella. But according to the doorman at the club, a woman, and it was a small woman, so I believe it was Mrs Dunne, met Mr Dunne outside and persuaded him to walk with her. They went in the general direction of the flat. I can only assume she’d insisted on him taking her to the flat to confront Miss Gascoigne, and had actually stabbed him once they got to the seclusion of Mortlake Gardens.
‘So Susan killed Archie. She must have cared a lot more about his philandering than she appeared to do.’ Dottie coloured violently and broke off, not wanting to spell out the more sordid side of the affair. ‘Did you find out anything more about the cloak?’
‘That gold thing Leonora Simmons was wearing? Seems fairly certain that she just wanted to have something like her mistress’s, something she no doubt paraded about in and fancied herself glamorous. A maid’s life is pretty dull, you know, and her things weren’t particularly valuable or of good quality. We know from what the doorman said that Mrs Dunne had one like it.’
‘Are you sure that’s all it was?’ Dottie asked, surprised. ‘I wondered if there wasn’t something more behind it.’
‘Well,’ he said, getting to his feet. ‘The case is closed now, due to Simmons’ confession to you and the taking of her own life, and that’s all my superiors are concerned about. There’s no direct evidence that Mrs Dunne killed her husband, and in any case, she can’t be charged now. Also there’s the possibility that Simmons killed him in a fit of hysteria, and somehow her mistress found out about it. But there, it’s all over and done with. I hope your wound continues to heal quickly, Miss Manderson. Thank you for your help.’
‘So you don’t think there’s anything odd about the picture and the cloaks and everything I told you Leonora said to me?’
He turned at the door. ‘Well, as you’ve already pointed out, there were quite a few of those garments about. Seems they’re all the rage. I don’t think we need to go into that any further. And the rest of it, well, it’s just a slightly odd religious view, but there’s nothing in it, you know, just one lonely woman with a few strange ideas.’
‘I’m not so sure...’ Dottie said.
‘I must go, I’m afraid. It’s my sister’s birthday today and we’re going out to dinner and then the theatre. I’ve got quite a bit of paperwork to do before then.’
‘I hope you’re not going to see that show, Gay Divorce,’ Dottie said.
He looked at her. ‘We are as it happens. Why?’
‘The song,’ she said, ‘the song Archie sang as he lay dying. It was from that show. Night and Day. Remember?’
‘I remember you singing it to me that night. You have a delightful voice.’ He paused again in the hall outside her room. ‘Good day, Miss Manderson.’
‘Oh please, call me Dottie. Miss Manderson is far too formal. After all, I still have two of your handkerchiefs.’
Chapter Twenty-four
Ten women sat about the long rectangular table. Candles lit the centre of the room, and the corners were lost in a kind of flickering shadow. There were two empty seats. The ten women, their heads and shoulders swathed in gold wool, bowed their heads whilst one of their number, the one seated at the head of the table, softly spoke a prayer. At the end of the prayer, she said, ‘Amen,’ and all around the table the women chorused the same word.
There was a pause then the woman at the head of the table said, in a marginally less hallowed voice, ‘Finally, daughters of the Queen, let me remind you all, we are faced with two tasks this evening. First of all, it is a matter of gravest sorrow and disappointment to me, and to us all, that our two sisters should have destroyed one another through their refusal to remember our primary purpose: to serve our Kings, and our secondary purpose: to support our sisters. We must remember, we are called to be modest, unselfish, and loyal above all things. We do not seek our own benefit nor to take status and position for ourselves. Let us learn this valuable lesson and never again allow deviation from our purpose to wreak such devastation upon our House.
‘The second matter we must consider is this: these two empty seats amongst us must be filled, and we must decide who will fill them. If any of you knows of a woman, married or unmarried, servant or lady, who is of quality, goodness and purity of heart, let me know her name so that I may pray about the matter, and if it is seemly, interview them as candidates to be welcomed into our Household.
‘It is with sadness that I have been forced to take another decision. We must destroy our robes. They have become too easily recognised by the heathen. Therefore, we shall divest ourselves of these soiled garments and put on new, clean vestments of modest black. One at a time, sisters, go behind the screen and remove your outer garment and lay it aside, and with joyful hearts, take up your new garment from the stand. I’m sorry this has had to happen, I know you all take great delight in the lustrous colour of our beloved Queen Esther, but the colour is sadly too easily remarked upon as we have lately become aware. I have purchased a supply of gold, jewelled clasps that we may use to secure and adorn our somewhat plain new robes. Sister, if you please, we shall begin with you.’
The sister immediately to the right of the woman at the head of the table got to her feet, walked behind the screen and presently came out, no longer clad in gold but in a cloak of black, the edges closed together at the throat by a small gold clasp with tiny round jewels of blue, red and green. She resumed her seat, then the woman next to her departed to perform the same transformation. Within ten minutes, they had all changed their gold cloth for black.
‘Thank you, my dearest sisters. And now, we will end this meeting. As you know there will be no more meetings until the end of February. I shall contact you all with the precise date nearer the time. Let us say our closing prayer,’
The others joined their voices to hers and together they murmured the closing prayer of the Daughters of Esther the Queen:
‘Good Queen Esther, bride of the King, help us to walk with modesty and self-sacrifice in this world of men, ever ready to perform any office, without reproach, criticism or demand. Help us to remember to serve our Kings selflessly, as you served yours, and by so doing, to preserve our nation in the day of reckoning. Amen.’
THE END
Extract from
The Mantle of God: a Dottie Manderson Mystery
Chapter One
‘Do sit down, Mr—er—Inspector. How nice to see you again.’
‘Thank you, Miss Manderson. It’s been a few weeks since we last met, I’m very glad to s
ee you looking so well recovered.’
‘Would you like some tea? Or perhaps you prefer coffee?’
‘Tea please. Thank you.’
Dottie got up to ring the bell. She moved slowly, mainly because part of her was astonished as how she, how both of them, managed to keep up this polite banality, when their last meeting – the one he had been referring to – had been so – she fought to find the right word. Dramatic was not nearly dramatic enough. She rang the bell.
Resuming her seat, she turned a polite smile on him. He seemed to have run out of smalltalk. His right knee bounced nervously, and he adjusted his tie twice.
The door to the morning room opened and Janet the maid came in almost at a run and bobbed to a halt in front of Dottie. Of course, thought Dottie, Janet would have opened the door to him and taken his coat. No doubt the tea was being made downstairs already. Dottie smiled at Janet and said, ‘Please could we have some tea?’
‘Yes’m, right away,’ said Janet and dashed out again, flashing a quick look and a smile at her favourite policeman. Dottie knew Janet had hopes of a match between Dottie and Inspector William Hardy, whom she hoped would whisk her beloved Dottie away to a life of excitement and adventure, not only because she wanted Dottie to be happily married almost as much as Dottie’s mother did, but also because Dottie had promised that when she married, Janet could go with her. Janet’s main goal in life was to be the housekeeper of a large and beautiful home in what she termed a ‘nice’ part of London. Briefly Dottie wondered whether Janet would insist on looking over any proposals Dottie received to ensure the most suitable establishment was chosen for Janet, rather than for Dottie.
The door closed softly behind her, and Inspector Hardy again tried to bring himself to the point of asking Dottie what it was he had come there to ask.
He complimented her for a second time on her healthy appearance, then cast about him for something else to say. Dottie, often the despair of her mother in social situations, simply leaned forward, fixed him with her large, clear (what colour?) eyes and said, ‘What’s up?’ in the modern manner her mother would have deplored.