The Fingerprint (2 page)

LOOKING BACK on it afterwards, Frank found himself remembering a number of disjointed bits and pieces. The complete picture had been there like one of those large jigsaw puzzles laid out upon a table. It had been there for him to look at, and if it is true that the memory never really loses anything, it was still there to be remembered. But when he came to look back on it, it was as if someone had picked up a handful of pieces here and there and tossed them into his lap. Some of them fell in groups, and others singly. Some of them fell right, and some of them fell wrong. Some made nonsense. He had to unscramble them and try and get them together again. One of the more successful efforts brought back the scene in Jonathan’s study. They had finished dinner and there was time to fill in before the dance guests arrived. Now just how many of them were there? Himself and Anthony. It was Anthony who had asked whether Jonathan would show them his collection, and Lord Pondesbury had said, “Not for me, old boy. I don’t know one end of a fingerprint from the other and I don’t want to. I’ll go and have a word with Marcia Warrender about that two-year-old of hers.”

Mr. and Mrs. Shotterleigh hadn’t been interested either, but the girls came into the study, and so did Mirrie Field and Mr. Vincent, but not Lady Pondesbury, or Georgina, who remained in the drawing-room to play hostess. He thought about the rest of them crossing the big square hall and coming into the study with its book-lined walls and the handsome maroon curtains drawn across the windows. It would be rather a dark room by day, but under modern lighting pleasant enough, with comfortable chairs and a carpet in tones of red and green. Mirrie Field’s white frills and the pink and blue of the Shotterleigh girls stood out against the dark furnishings.

When they were all there and the door shut, Jonathan got out his heavy albums and found room for them on the writing-table. Nobody thought about sitting down. Johnny Fabian stayed by the door, amused for the moment but prepared to escape if he was bored, and Mary Shotterleigh stayed with him. She had grown up rather pretty. She looked sideways at Johnny and he said something which brought her colour up in a bright attractive blush. The other girl, Deborah, came up to the corner of the writing-table and stood there looking shy. Mirrie Field was with Anthony Hallam, pressed up as close to him as she could get and holding on to his sleeve rather as if she was afraid that something might jump out of one of the albums and bite her. Frank himself was over by the fire with a man called Vincent, a newcomer to the neighbourhood after some years in South America. According to Anthony there was plenty of money, but no wife or family. As they stood together, Mr. Vincent observed that he couldn’t imagine why anyone should want to collect fingerprints, to which Frank replied that it wouldn’t appeal to him personally, but he understood that Mr. Field’s collection was unique. Mr. Vincent fixed him with a dullish eye and enquired,

“How do you mean unique? I should have thought the police collection would be that.”

“Oh, the police only get the failures. They don’t touch the potential criminal or the chap who has never been found out. And that, of course, is where Mr. Field has the pull. He has been collecting for the last forty years or so, and he is so well known that it is quite a compliment to be asked for a contribution. In fact anyone who refused would be sticking out his neck and asking to be suspected of dabbling in crime.”

Mr. Vincent said it all seemed rather dull to him, but then what he was really interested in himself was stamp-collecting, and he went on to describe how he had found and subsequently had stolen from him a two cent British Guiana 1851 of which only ten copies had been previously known to exist. It was a tragic tale told in the dullest possible manner. A tepid man with not even a spark of the collector’s fire in his belly.

“He went down over the rapids and the stamp with him, and no one would go in to look for the body because the river was so dangerous, so now there are only ten copies again.” He shook his head with faint regret and added the one word, “Pity.”

All this while Jonathan Field was laying out two large volumes on the flat top of his writing-table and hovering over them with an index or a catalogue or whatever he chose to call it.

“Now what shall I show you? Hitler’s thumb and forefinger? Most people want to see those. I’ve got quite a nice little group of the Nazis—Goering, Goebbels, Bormann, and poor old Rommel.”

The book opened easily at the place. Everyone crowded to see, and there they were, exactly like the prints which any of the people in the room might have made. These men had grasped at the world, and it had slipped from them. They were gone. There was nothing left but ruined lands and ruined people and some black prints in Jonathan Field’s collection.

The prints were all very neatly mounted and set up, a legend under each, with a name and sometimes a date. What an extraordinary hobby for anyone to have. And Jonathan was as keen as mustard, there was no doubt about that. He stood behind his writing-table and snapped off little anecdotes of how he had come by the exhibits. Some of them were amusing, and some of them were tragic, but it was a very good performance. Nobody seemed to look at the prints very much, but they all listened to the stories.

When it had been going on for about half an hour Georgina came in and said that people were beginning to arrive for the dance. Jonathan didn’t look pleased. He said in a pettish voice,

“All right, all right, I’ll come.”

He took up the left-hand album and then put it down again.

“The most interesting prints are in here, but I never show them to anyone.”

Looking back, Frank could admire the showmanship. He was going to finish the performance with a bang.

“I don’t know the man’s name, and I probably never shall, but I’ve got his fingerprints, and I think—I say I think— I should know his voice.”

Georgina stood in the doorway in her silver dress. She looked across at him and said “Darling!” on a note of protest. But Mirrie clasped her hands and breathed in an anguished tone,

“Oh, Uncle Jonathan, please! You can’t stop there—you must go on!”

There was no doubt which was the popular niece for the moment. Jonathan frowned at Georgina, cast a softened look at Mirrie, and said,

“Oh, well, some other time. It’s too long a story for now— quite dramatic though!”

He half opened the volume and shut it again. It didn’t shut down smoothly. There was an envelope in the way. Frank had just a glimpse of it over Mirrie’s head. And then Jonathan was going on.

“Oh, yes, quite dramatic. We were buried under a heap of rubble in the blitz, not knowing each other from Adam, or caring cither for the matter of that, and neither of us thought we’d ever see daylight again. Curious how that sort of thing takes people. I never felt more alive in my life—noticed everything more than I’d ever done before or since—everything speeded up, intensified. There was a pain, but it didn’t seem to belong to me. The other fellow was where I could just reach him. He wasn’t hurt, just trapped and mad with fright—what they call claustrophobia. I passed him my cigarette-case and matches—that’s how I got a fingerprint—and with the third cigarette he began to tell me about a murder he had done. In fact two murders, because he said he had had to kill a possible witness in order to make himself safe after the first one. He had got it all worked out in his mind that the second one didn’t really count. He said it was practically self-defence, because she would have gone to the police if he hadn’t stopped her, and the only way he could be sure of stopping her was by finishing her off. He was perfectly clear about it, and it didn’t seem to bother him at all. But the first one bothered him a bit. You see, he’d done that one to get hold of some money. He said he ought to have had it anyhow and the man he murdered had got it by undue influence, and he seemed to think that would make it all right about the murder. At least he hoped it would, but when a couple of bombs came down pretty near us he didn’t feel any too sure about it. He may have been making it up, but I didn’t think so then and I don’t think so now, so when he passed the case back to me I wrapped my handkerchief round it and slipped it into my breast pocket just in case.”

Anthony said, “What happened after that?”

Jonathan looked across at him with something that wasn’t quite a smile.

“As far as I was concerned that was the end. There was another bomb, and I didn’t know anything more until I woke up in hospital with a broken leg. As a matter of fact that last bomb was a blessing in disguise, because it shifted the stuff that was over us and the Red Cross people were able to get me out.”

“And your murderer?” That was Anthony too.

“Never saw hair, hide or hoof of him. He must have crawled out and got away, because there were no corpses lying about. So he’s probably walking around somewhere and still trying to make up his mind whether he’s a double murderer or not.”

Georgina made a little gesture that said, “Oh, well—” and turned round and went away, leaving the door open behind her. Now was there any importance in that, or wasn’t there? There might have been. Because anyone in the hall could have come up close enough to have heard what Jonathan had said and what Jonathan was saying now. Georgina had stood in an open doorway. She had gone away and left it open behind her. Anyone could have heard what Jonathan said.

THE DANCE went very well. Frank met quite a lot of people he knew. He danced with Cicely Hathaway. She wore a flame-coloured dress and she was enjoying herself. She told him it was said that Mr. Vincent was looking for a wife and she didn’t envy her.

“If Mrs. Shotterleigh had her way, it would be Mary or Deb, but either of them would rather have Johnny. Anyhow the Vincent man must be at least twenty years older than they are, and he’s the dullest man I ever met in my life. Has he told you how he lost his British Guiana stamp?”

“He has!”

She laughed.

“He tells everyone. Did you go to sleep, or just come over numb with boredom? And you know, it ought to be an exciting story!”

“Yes, he’s like that. But we needn’t talk about him.”

When he had danced with his Aunt Monica, a charming inconsequent person to whom he was devoted, he approached Miss Mirrie Field, who fluttered her eyelashes at him and said, “Oh—” in rather an alarmed sort of way. If that was her game, he was in the mood to play it.

“I don’t actually go about arresting people at dances, you know.”

She let him have a good view of her eyes. They were an unusual shade of brown and very pretty.

“But you do arrest them sometimes?” The words were just breathed.

“As occasion offers.”

“That must be horrid—for you.”

He allowed himself to laugh.

“I believe it hurts them rather more than it does me.” He put his arm round her and they slipped into the dance.

Someone had built on a ballroom at the back of the house. Jonathan’s grandmother was an heiress, and she had six daughters. The ballroom had no doubt assisted her in her determination to supply them with eligible husbands. It stood at right angles to the block of the house, and thanks to a wealth of creepers and a charming formal garden which brought it into harmony with the terrace under the drawing-room windows, it was no longer the eyesore which it had been when it was new.

The floor was very good, the music delightful, and their steps went well together. She was a little soft, light thing and she could dance. He had a passing wonder as to how she might compare with Georgina Grey. She passed them at the moment, coping with Lord Pondesbury who had a tendency to treat every dance as if it were some kind of a jig of his own invention. In the circumstances Frank gave Georgina marks for the kindness of her smile.

Mirrie looked up at him and said,

“How well you dance!”

“Thank you, Miss Field.”

She gave him a dimpling smile.

“Oh, you mustn’t call me Miss Field—I’m just Mirrie. And this is my very first dance.”

“No one would know it. You are very good.”

She said, “I love it,” in a reverential voice. “I wanted to go into ballet, but you have to start so young, and there wasn’t enough money for me to have lessons. Did you ever want anything dreadfully, dreadfully badly and have to give it up because there wasn’t enough money and there simply wasn’t anywhere you could possibly get it from? I don’t suppose you ever did, so you can’t possibly know what it feels like.”

Frank knew very well, but he wasn’t going to say so. He had been intended for the Bar, and he had had to give it up when his father died. He said,

“It was a pity about that. What are you going to do instead?”

Her colour rose becomingly. The dark lashes came down and hid her eyes. She said in a murmuring voice,

“Uncle Jonathan is being so kind.” And then, “Oh, don’t you love dancing?”

They danced.

Later, when they were sitting out, she stopped suddenly in the middle of some artless prattle about this and that to lift a fold of the white frilly skirt which billowed out over the low chair and say,

“Do you know, this is the very, very first dress of my own I’ve ever had.”

He was stirred to amusement and something else.

“And who did the others belong to?”

She said, “They were cast-offs.”

“You mean you had older sisters?”

“Oh, no. They belonged to people I’d never heard about— people who send parcels to poor relations. You don’t know how horrid it is to get them.”

“It might have been much more horrid if you hadn’t.”

“It couldn’t have been.” She had a mournful and accusing look. “You don’t know how horrid it was. Some of the things were so ugly, and they didn’t really fit. I expect some of them belonged to Georgina. She says no, but I expect they did. She is older than I am, you know, and a whole lot taller, so her things would always have been much too large. They used to put tucks in them all over and say I would grow into them in a year or two, but I never did. I expect they kept me from growing. Don’t you think if you hated a thing very much it might keep you from growing into it? There was a perfectly horrid dress with yellow stripes exactly like a wasp, and I had to wear it whether it fitted me or not.” She gave a heartfelt sigh and added, “I did hate my relations.”

Frank leaned back lazily. It was not the first time that he had been the recipient of girlish confidences. After a long apprenticeship with female cousins they no longer embarrassed him.

“I don’t know that I should make a practice of hating them. I have hundreds, and they all mean well.”

He was thinking that if she didn’t know which side her bread was buttered she had better make haste and find out. And then with a touch of cynicism he became aware that she knew very well. There was a soft agitation in her voice as she said,

“Oh, you didn’t think I meant Uncle Jonathan—you couldn’t! I wouldn’t mind anything from him. He is different.”

“Is he?”

“Of course he is! He doesn’t give me old things, he gives me lovely new ones. He gave me a cheque to buy anything I wanted—real, real money to go into a shop with and buy anything I wanted! And a string of pearls for my birthday! Look at them—I’ve got them on! Aren’t they lovely? And he said this was to be my party as well as Georgina’s!”

It certainly looked as if Uncle Jonathan was spreading himself. Frank said idly,

“And what about Georgina—is she kind too?”

Mirrie fingered her pearls and looked down at the white frills. She said in a childish voice,

“She is very kind.”

It wasn’t until a good deal later that he arrived at dancing with Georgina Grey. She made a charming hostess and there was a good deal of competition, but in the end he got his dance and enjoyed it. Voice, manner and step were easy, graceful and charming. He remembered Cicely Abbott’s old nurse saying of somebody that everything she did became her. He thought it might have been said of Georgina Grey.

He was prompted to turn the conversation in Mirrie’s direction.

“Anthony tells me she has lately come to live with you.”

Georgina said, “To stay with us.” And then, “I think she will stay on.”

“She was telling me that she would have liked to go in for ballet.”

“Yes, but it has been left too late.”

“She dances very well.”

“Oh, yes. But ballet is quite a different thing. You have to start when you are about seven, or even earlier, and it means hours of practice every day for years.”

“I suppose it does.”

He was struck by the serious considering note in her voice. And then they were talking of something else. Mirrie Field as a topic didn’t crop up again.

One thing he did see which he was to remember afterwards. Everyone was breaking off and streaming in to supper. He had Cicely Hathaway as a partner, and just as they were nicely settled she said that she had lost her handkerchief. She knew just where it would be, and he went back for it— “The study, Frank. Grant and I were in there and I was doing my face. It’s one Gran gave me, with real lace.” He found it easily enough, and then as he stood with it in his hand he heard a small tapping sound from the direction of the window. He pushed Cicely’s handkerchief into his pocket and drew back the nearest curtain. It was the one which screened a glass door on to the terrace. The door was ajar and the sound which he had heard was the sound of it just touching the jamb and swinging out again. But as he drew the curtain back it was opened by something more tangible than the wind. Mirrie Field stood on the step in her white dress, staring up at him with her eyes quite wide with fright.

She said, “Oh!” and put her hand to her throat.

Well, girls did slip out at a dance, though it was a pretty cold night for that fluffy white dress. But where was the man? You don’t go out alone into icy gardens. At least if you do, it is sheer lunacy.

He said, “I’m so sorry I gave you a start. Come along and have hot soup. You must be frozen.”

Mirrie went on looking at him.

“I—I was hot—I just went out.”

They went back into the dining-room together. He didn’t think of it again until quite a long time afterwards.