by Caron Allan
When at last she handed it back to Dottie, she seemed a little put-out, or—well, Dottie wasn’t sure what Mrs Carmichael was—she could only sense that there was a change in the room and the change came from Mrs Carmichael herself, and it was not a happy change, nor an interested change. It was a tense, angry, odd change and the room felt unfriendly.
But Mrs Carmichael simply shrugged her shoulders and speaking over her shoulder as she turned away to put off the lamp and put away the glass, she said, ‘Well it’s not much to go on, is it, just an old bit of something, I suppose. What did you want to know about it?’
Dottie was watching her closely, feeling rather puzzled. ‘What sort of fabric is it?’
‘Don’t know. Could be cotton, I suppose. Looks like it’s been in the wars a bit.’
‘Yes, it is a bit tattered,’ Dottie agreed. She put the fabric away again inside its much folded paper. There was a flash of the writing, but Dottie hoped Mrs Carmichael hadn’t seen it.
‘So, where did you get it?’ Mrs Carmichael asked. ‘What’s it from?’
Dottie smiled. ‘Oh, it’s just something I found. I just wondered what sort of fabric it was. Thank you so much for your time, I mustn’t keep you any longer. I think the party went well, didn’t it?’
Mrs Carmichael seemed to have to pull her attention back to Dottie from a long way off. As Dottie stood, and made her way to the door, Mrs Carmichael was still nodding her head and putting out her hand to heave herself onto her aching feet.
‘Well if there’s anything else,’ she said, but Dottie simply made herself shake her head and said no thank you, then with a bright smile, added,
‘Goodbye!’ She turned and hurried away, banging the street door as she set off for the bus stop.
Behind her, alone in her big warehouse, now all in darkness save for the single electric lightbulb burning in the little back office, Aggie Carmichael thought for a few moments then picked up the phone and got through to the operator. She asked for a number. At the other end of the line, along the miles of cable strung along the streets, twisting and turning across the vast busyness of London, she could hear the bell ringing, twice, three times, four, six, before the receiver was picked up and a refined voice said, ‘who is this calling? Please give your contact code.’
Chapter Four
It was Flora’s idea to take the scrap of fabric to the London Metropolitan museum. Dottie had her doubts, and tried to insist they would be wasting everyone’s time.
‘They’ve all sorts of costumes and things,’ Flora said, ‘they’re bound to have some kind of crusty old fossil who is the world’s expert on that sort of thing.’
The crusty old fossil was gazing at Dottie now. There was a quality in the gaze that reminded her of the cook’s dog when it spied a string of sausages. Dottie wondered what her own expression revealed, because certainly, the LMM’s tapestry, textile and costume consultant was worth looking at.
He couldn’t be more than thirty or thirty-two, she thought, and he was easily a foot taller than her own meagre five feet. He was broad of shoulder, had eyes of a piercing blue over which his fair hair repeatedly flopped, requiring him to push it back. His hands were like bunches of bananas, yet as he took the scrap of fabric from her hands and turned it over as he studied it, his touch was that of a mother with her newborn child.
Dottie exchanged a look with her sister. Flora’s eyes were wide and amused, which made Dottie blush, and turning her back on her sister she began to apologise to Dr Melville.
‘I’m afraid it’s probably nothing of interest. I’m afraid we’re simply taking up your valuable time, I’m sure you’re exceedingly busy...’
‘Nonsense,’ he murmured but didn’t take his eyes off the reddish piece of stuff.
‘Perhaps we ought to just...’ Flora offered, but he ignored her completely. Silence seemed to envelop them. Dummies stared from behind glass screens. Life seemed to halt, waiting on his pronouncement. Flora fidgeted, bending forward to relieve her aching back. Her tummy was stating to grow a little larger now she was in her fourth month of pregnancy, and her back sometimes complained.
At length, the LMM’s expert on tapestries, textiles and costume gave voice to his thoughts. Flora and Dottie regarded him with bated breath.
‘Perhaps you’d like to come this way? I need to look at this properly.’ He told them, and now Dottie was able to register his soft Scottish accent. Without waiting for them to respond, he strode away bearing Dottie’s fabric scrap in his right hand.
They quickly lost him. Turning this way and that between the displays, they came face to face with a door marked ‘Private’ which was just closing.
‘Well, go on, you ninny,’ Flora said. Dottie hesitated.
‘It might not have been him who just...’
‘He said, ‘come this way’,’ Flora pointed out. ‘He’s not here, so we need to find him. There’s a jolly good chance he went through there. If he didn’t, we’ll just apologise like sensible human beings and come out again.’ She turned the handle and bundled a still-hesitating Dottie through the door first.
They were in a long dark corridor. At the far end a door stood open, allowing the light to spill out into the darkness. All the other doors were closed. They made towards the light. But before they got that far, a face peered at them in the gloom and an impatient Scottish voice said, ‘Oh there you are, do come along.’ And suddenly Dottie didn’t think him so very attractive after all.
*
THANK YOU FOR READING THIS SAMPLE. I HOPE YOU ENJOYED IT. THE COMPLETE STORY ‘THE MANTLE OF GOD: A DOTTIE MANDERSON MYSTERY’ WILL BE RELEASED IN EARLY 2017 IN MULTIPLE FORMATS.