Sophie Cleverly - A Case of Grave Danger

I looked at the names written on the top of the paper in my father’s neat hand. All of them read the same: John Doe . ‘The blond boy?’

‘Yes. Did you take it, perhaps?’ He gave me a stern look, and I began to feel a little uneasy. I certainly hadn’t taken it, but under his gaze I felt guilty, as though I had done something. Did he suspect me because he’d seen me talking to the boy as he’d lain there?

I squirmed. ‘No, Father. I haven’t seen the file at all.’

He wrinkled his brow. ‘Well, do you have any idea who might have done?’

I thought about it. ‘Thomas, perhaps? He was asking about the boy just now. He seems to have some theory about murder, but Mother said he’s just been reading too much nonsense.’

There was a moment of silence as Father stared at the wall, and then pushed his spectacles higher up his nose. ‘Thomas,’ he repeated. ‘Of course, I should ask Thomas as well.’ He walked back out of the shop again, in the direction of the house.

I went over to the window and brushed a few cobwebs away. We kept rows of flowers there, tastefully arranged in vases to show what manner of establishment we were. The sign above the door read

The Edgar that it referred to was my grandfather, now five years dead, and my father Edgar Junior was his only remaining son. I’d told Father that he ought to change it to Edgar Veil and Son and Daughter Ltd , but he had only laughed and ruffled my hair.

I had been serious, though. Why shouldn’t I be recognised as part of the family business just because I was a girl? I did a lot more work than Thomas did.

Well, except for when I was picking apples instead.

The glass in the shop window was rippled with age, but you could still see through it. Now, as I glanced up, I could see a woman on the outside, looking in at the porcelain flowers.

A mourner , I thought. A widow in black. She must be here to arrange a funeral.

Yet there was something strange about her. I couldn’t see her eyes behind the waterfall of black lace and pale hair that cascaded past her shoulders, yet I felt for sure they were now staring straight at me.

Bones began to growl softly, a low rumbling in his throat.

‘Shh, boy,’ I said. ‘Don’t scare the customers.’

I thought I ought to go out and greet her, but then the woman quickly turned her head and darted across the street, hitching up her skirts as she went.

I frowned. Why had she looked so furtive? But before I could think anything more of it, I heard raised voices coming from the house.

‘I did not take your silly file!’

‘Thomas! Don’t you dare talk that way to your father!’

My family could be rather a nightmare at times. Was it any wonder that I often preferred the company of the dead? At least they seldom argued.

With a sigh, I headed back to the kitchen.

* * *

That evening, after supper, Father lit the gas lamp and we all sat round the fire in the parlour. I tried to read my book, Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein , but I couldn’t concentrate and my eyes kept slipping away from it. It was dark outside, and I could hear the rain falling over the crackle of the fire. Bones was sleeping on the rug, pawing at imaginary rats in his dreams.

Thomas wasn’t talking to Father after their squabble earlier. He sat in the corner of the room, painting wooden soldiers with a grim expression on his face. Occasionally I heard him mutter something to himself under his breath about not being a thief.

I began to think again about the missing file as I stared into the flames. Maybe Father had just misplaced it, but was there a chance that someone had taken it? Who would want to steal records on a boy that nobody knew? If they’d known who he was, and that he was dead, they would have come to claim him, wouldn’t they? Unless Thomas was right, and someone had murdered the blond boy. I felt a tingle of a shiver run down my spine.

We’d had murder victims in before, of course. Not many, but enough. Yet the blond boy, who now lay in his apple-free coffin, seemed different somehow.

Tap .

‘What was that?’ asked Thomas.

I’d heard it too. I looked to the window. Only darkness.

Bones’s ears pricked up, and suddenly he was on his feet, staring in the direction of the sound.

‘Perhaps it was the tree outside,’ said Father, tapping the bowl of his pipe out into the ashtray. ‘I’ve been meaning to ask the groundskeeper to cut it back. The branches are getting too near the house.’

‘It didn’t come from upstairs,’ Thomas insisted. ‘It came from out there .’ He pointed to the front window.

‘Probably only the rain, my dear,’ said Mother. ‘Come along now, Thomas, it’s past your bedtime.’ She stood up and shepherded my little brother out of the room, despite his protests.

Father simply shrugged and went back to reading his newspaper.

But I hadn’t looked away from the window. Because I had seen something that the others had not.

A flash of white eyes in the darkness, and a shadow disappearing into the night.

couldn’t sleep that night, though goodness knows I tried. My down quilt felt hot and heavy, and no matter which way I turned I couldn’t get comfortable. I knew, though, that wasn’t the real reason I couldn’t sleep. It was because of the face I’d seen at the window.

The grandfather clock downstairs was chiming an hour past my bedtime, but my eyes hadn’t closed. I couldn’t stop thinking about what I’d seen. Someone had been out there, looking in on us. What if they had been a grave robber or a vandal? I wouldn’t forgive myself if something happened.

Why I hadn’t told my father about what I’d seen, I don’t know. Perhaps I thought he wouldn’t listen, given how preoccupied he seemed at the moment. But I hadn’t said a word, and now if anything did happen, I’d be responsible.

And it was after that thought that I heard a noise downstairs.

Bones, who had been sleeping on my bed (which, needless to say, he was not supposed to do), woke up and began growling softly. He hopped down, padded over to the door and started to paw at the floorboards.

I had to go and look.

It was a ridiculous idea, and I tried to talk myself out of it. What could I possibly do if I confronted a dangerous villain? Nothing but call for help, and by then it could be too late. If they ran, I could chase them, I supposed, but it was night-time and the autumn sky was black as ink.

I wasn’t scared of being in a graveyard – how could I be, when I had been raised here? In the daylight, when the sun was shining and the poppies and daisies would gently blow in the breeze, it was beautiful. At night, things where different. The moon wouldn’t be enough light to see by, and a candle would be extinguished by the rain. I was fairly certain I had nothing to fear from the dead, but the living were another matter altogether.

More noises came to my ears: shuffling and banging.

Bones’s tail went upright like an exclamation mark. His eyes met mine, and I nodded at him. I felt my courage building, knowing that he was by my side. He could probably give anyone he didn’t like the look of a good bite.

I found myself throwing off the covers and climbing out of bed. I pulled open the door as quietly as I could and tiptoed down the landing. I could hear Mother snoring gently and the ever-present rain on the rooftops.