Naked Cruelty. Colleen McCullough

of trying West Point or Annapolis—brr!” She shuddered. “They really are institutions for men, and I’m not a committed enough feminist to buck those two fortresses. Besides, I have a funny feeling that being a cop is a more interesting life. I like working for solutions, I guess.”

      “I see.” He stood, a powerful man whose muscular bulk diminished his nearly six feet of height. The face turned to look at his wayward trainee was both broad and angular, its nose imperious and its mouth’s natural sensuousness disciplined into firmness. His eyes, as gold as brown, were widely opened and well apart, and had a fearless quality.

      Why did I try that stupid stunt? Helen asked herself as she left Captain Delmonico’s office. For the same reason, she decided as she climbed the stairs, that a little kid pokes a sleeping tiger with a stick.

      “Very true,” said Delia, in a frightful combination of acid-yellow and mustard-yellow with bright blue bows. “But in future, dear, do remember that poking a sleeping tiger is bound to see you squashed flat under one paw.”

      “Can’t I help you with the Dodo?” Helen begged.

      “No, dear, I have no desire to be pulp under the tiger’s paw. You’re with Paul Bachman in forensics for many days to come.” Delia sighed wistfully. “I scraped into Detectives through the back door—a head for plans, lists, paperwork by the ton—and it didn’t hurt to be the niece of the Commissioner, whose secretary I was. Before that, I had ten years with the NYPD in documentary fraud and anything else involving paper. But look at you! It really is a splendid program they’ve worked out for you. Everything we had to pick up on the job, so to speak, you’re being properly taught. So don’t you let my Uncle John down! If you do, you’ll feel the size of my paw.”

      “The cleaners did a wonderful job,” said Hank Murray as he emerged from the service elevator with Amanda Warburton on Friday, October 4. “You’ll be able to open for the weekend.” He produced his own keys and opened her back door, one of many on a broad service hall.

      As they walked inside he sniffed, smiled. “Smell, Miss Warburton. Sweet yet a tad herby—I hope that you don’t mind my picking the fragrance on your behalf. You’d never know that there was ever rotting garbage in here, would you?”

      “No,” said Amanda, sagging in relief.

      “Come on, take a look at the shop,” Hank encouraged as he steered her toward the shimmering curtain of glass beads. Then he stopped, so suddenly that Amanda cannoned into him.

      “Dear God!”

      She couldn’t help herself. Amanda shoved the Mall manager aside and ran into the shop.

      Almost every item had been moved to form a gigantic mound where her sole counter had been; it had been pushed, complete with cash register, against the only free wall, where her array of Lalique and Murano picture frames had hung. They too were in the huge heap displaying a corner here, an edge there. But the “yard” for drinking a yard of beer was still in place on the same wall high above, and below it, the entirely ornamental “half yard” of thick, heavy crystal was intact.

      Tears pouring down her face, Amanda rushed to the front window to check on the glass teddy bear himself. Yes, yes, he was there, unshifted, unmarked, sitting on his black velvet box and apparently ignored by the Vandal.

      What kind spirit had prompted her to leave her animals at home this morning? Fishing up her sleeve to find a handkerchief, Amanda Warburton knew in her heart of hearts that she had expected more trouble today; the dust and dirt of the previous assault had seemed— yes, definitely—unfinished. Today was a logical sequel to the first attack.

      Having notified the police, checked that no other stores had been vandalized, and learned that the three banks the Busquash Mall harbored were all okay, Hank was now kneeling alongside the pile of glass, not touching anything, but eyes busy.

      “Weird!” he exclaimed. “Miss Warburton—Amanda!—it is weird. As far as I can tell, nothing’s been broken—or cracked—or chipped. Look for yourself. If I get the same cleaners back to pick up everything wearing gloves, you shouldn’t lose much if anything. No, no, don’t cry, please.” He hugged her, trying to convey comfort and sympathy. Miss Warburton was a lamb, she didn’t deserve this malice, this—this cruelty.

      By the time Ike Masotti and Muley Evans arrived, Amanda was in the back room, with Hank Murray persuading her to have a little of his emergency brandy.

      “I have to notify Detectives,” Ike said on taking a look at the mound of glass. “May I use your phone, Miss Warburton? The air waves are full of flapping ears shouldn’t be listening.”

      “Please do.”

      “There’s definitely something weird going on,” Ike said to the phone. “You’d better come take a look-see, Morty. This is definitely not high school kids.”

      They waited over an hour.

      He couldn’t help himself; he’d had to call in to the Shamrock Bar for a quick snort en route to the Busquash Mall and that persnickety bastard, Ike Masotti.

      Nothing was improving, for all that Delia Carstairs kept telling him things had. She’d found him a great housekeeper, but he didn’t want a housekeeper, and nor did the kids—his kids. They all wanted Ava back. Bobby and Gidget, the lights of his life, not his? It was typical Ava, that’s all, to throw that one in. Only why had he decked her? So many years of knowing she played around—what was so different about that Saturday night? Except that he snapped at the taunt about the kids.

      Now the kids cried all the time, he cried whenever he could sneak to the cells … He cried into his Jameson’s too, and had to clean up in the Shamrock bathroom before he could nerve himself to do whatever Ike Masotti said at the Busquash Mall. His head was spinning, he had to stop and park for a few minutes to get some sanity back … Oh, Ava, Ava! Bobby and Gidget are mine!

      When he shuffled into the Glass Teddy Bear the two patrolmen exchanged glances—the smell of liquor was overpowering, worse than it had been last Tuesday.

      Morty gave the mountain of glass a cursory inspection and returned to the back room. “High school kids,” he said, shrugging. And, to the cops, “You’re wasting my time, guys.”

      “Less time to elbow-bend, you mean, Morty?” asked Muley when Ike wouldn’t. No one made undeserved cracks at Ike.

      “It’s high school kids,” Morty maintained.

      “It is not high school kids!” Ike yelled, exasperated. “This is nasty, Sergeant Jones. It feels wrong. No way that high school kids would pile up all that glass without breaking some, and none’s broken—not even chipped. This stinks of vendetta.”

      “I don’t care what it stinks of, Ike. No real damage has been done, there’s not enough here to put anyone up on charges.” Morty licked suddenly dry lips. “I gotta go.”

      Blinking, Amanda sat listening as if in a drugged haze; she was conscious that Hank’s hand on her shoulder had tightened its grip, and understood that the detective’s indifference had angered him. As Sergeant Morty Jones disappeared, she reached up to pat the hand. Thwarted, Ike and Muley followed Morty out, gazing at her in mute apology.

      “Would you mind calling the cleaning firm for me, Hank?” she asked. “I’ll have to stay to supervise them—they won’t remember whereabouts things belong, now I tore the plan up.” She gave a small squeak of distress. “To think I had to draw a plan even once! But to think I’d need it twice!”

      “First, your insurance agent,” Hank said firmly. “That lazy soand-so of a detective didn’t take any photographs, and someone should. If anything is damaged, you’ll need proof.” He pressed Amanda’s fingers gently. “From now on the Mall is going to be protected by a professional security company, something I’ve been saying to deaf ears since the Mall opened. But no, the owners didn’t want to spend the money. Now, they have no choice. A bank robbery and a vendetta against a tenant with fragile stock. I mean, what if the Vandal had