Read Online Skeleton Plot by J. M. Gregson - Free Book Online

been discovered.
    For the moment, she could relax.
    The farmhouse was a hundred and eighty years old and built in Cotswold stone, mellow and solid. It was itself a replacement for a much older building on this site. It had been built just before the great agricultural decline of the nineteenth century made such spending impossible. The Corn Laws had had their effects here, ushering in a long period of rural poverty, with minimal profits for the farm owners and starvation wages for those unfortunate enough to work on the land. These stones had witnessed tragedies worthy of Thomas Hardy’s pen.
    But those sufferings were long gone and long forgotten now. The building, with its mellow stone, would have brought a handsome price as a private residence. But it was still the centre of a working farm, one of the few of its size to survive in Herefordshire. There was wheat shooting up vigorously in the field they had driven past on their way to the ancient cobbled yard. Free-range hens strutted and pecked on the square of green fenced off for them beside the farm. There was no sign of the caravan site which so many farmers had decided represented an easier form of income than working the land. The barn beside the farmhouse no longer housed hay, but it had not yet been converted into ‘desirable residences of character’. It housed the tractors and other expensive machinery which many farmers left to take their chance in the open.
    Jim Simmons was standing in the doorway by the time Lambert had parked the car. He was a powerfully built man, just under six feet and with the muscles which develop with daily physical work. He had thick brown hair without a trace of grey and wide brown eyes which narrowed a little as he assessed his visitors. ‘I knew you’d be coming.’ He voiced it as if it were an accusation.
    ‘And now we’re here. I’m Chief Superintendent Lambert and this is Detective Sergeant Hook. From the little we know at present, it seems highly probable that we are engaged upon a murder inquiry.’
    Simmons nodded calmly. ‘It’s about the body found in the Jacksons’ garden, isn’t it?’
    Lambert smiled, playing for time for a second or two, trying to weigh up this seemingly very calm man and decide what his attitude might be. ‘Yes. The body which was buried on your land.’
    Simmons returned his smile. ‘Fair enough. I sold that land to Joe Jackson last November. Just a fifth of an acre, to make his garden much bigger. Good business on both sides: it made his plot around the bungalow much more spacious and I was happy with the price he paid me. But I went up there this morning and peeped over his new fence. The spot where that skeleton was dug up was definitely on my ground at the time it was buried.’
    ‘And when was that, Mr Simmons?’
    He grinned at them. ‘Nice try, Chief Superintendent. I could have incriminated myself there, couldn’t I? But only if I’d known the answer, of course. As it is, my reply is that I’ve no idea. I was going to ask you when and how that gruesome thing got there.’
    ‘“When” is about twenty years ago. “How” is what we’re trying to find out now.’
    ‘And I can’t help you with either. This shouldn’t take long.’ He gave them a smile which had little mirth and much challenge.
    ‘You were one of the men on the spot at the time. We haven’t so far discovered many of them.’
    Before Simmons could react, the door of the room opened and an attractive woman, probably in her mid-thirties, Hook thought, brought in a serving wagon which contained a large pot of tea and home-made scones, butter and jam. ‘You shouldn’t have bothered,’ said Lambert immediately, embarrassed not just by the fact that he had not been asked whether he required refreshment but by the extravagance of what was offered.
    ‘Sunday afternoon,’ said the woman with the wagon. ‘You’re working outside your working week and my husband is being quizzed outside his normal working