Read Online The Blood-Dimmed Tide by Rennie Airth - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Rennie Airth
Ads: Link
in an influenza epidemic before the war: to hear from his own lips of his subsequent descent into the hell of the trenches, an experience from which he’d emerged so injured in spirit that, until fate cast him into her arms, he had ceased to have any hope or belief in his future.
Long dispelled, these shadows no longer troubled their lives. What concerned Helen now was the irrational fear she had felt at the sight of her husband being drawn once more into a police investigation after so long an absence from the profession. His decision to quit his job and start a new life with her had not been taken lightly. Nor was it one he had ever regretted. If he was allowing himself to become involved now it could only be in response to some deep anxiety, and this realization kept the pulse of uneasiness throbbing inside her.
The happy years they had spent together had been born out of tragedy, something she could never forget. Indeed, the thought was fresh in her mind as they drove through the village, past the green and the moss-walled churchyard and along the straggling line of cottages that led to the high brick wall surrounding Melling Lodge. Leased by a succession of tenants in recent years, it was empty at present and the locked gates and dark, elm-lined drive lent it a mournful air.
Time had dulled the pain of that summer morning more than a decade past when an urgent summons from Will Stackpole had brought her, the village doctor, speeding through those same gates to confront the unimaginable reality of a household brutally slain; her dearest friend among the victims. When she drove by now it was of her husband she was thinking.
Yet the two were inextricably linked. It was the subsequent police investigation that had brought them together, and although the love that had flowered between them had drawn a line under Madden’s tortured past, their future together had been dearly purchased. The case, one of the bloodiest in the Yard’s annals, had come close to costing him his life.
7
Feeling out of place in his town clothes – he was clad in a grey pinstriped suit and homburg – Chief Inspector Angus Sinclair paused at the edge of the green to take in the scene before him. Quite close to where he stood a cloth banner erected on poles bore the words HIGHFIELD FLOWER AND VEGETABLE SHOW in bold capitals, and beyond it, the broad stretch of grass ringed with cottages was filled with stalls, where the fruits of a long summer were on display.
Vegetables piled high in baskets – beans, peas, potatoes, carrots – rubbed shoulders with swollen marrows, while beside them there were tables overflowing with bunches of late roses and chrysanthemums. Pumpkins, apples, pears, blackberries, nuts, brown speckled eggs – there seemed no end to the variety of items arrayed for inspection and the avenues between the stands were thronged with villagers dressed in their Sunday best.
Searching the crowd, the chief inspector’s eye lit on a tall, elegant figure wearing a cream-coloured linen dress and a wide-brimmed straw hat standing beside a table stacked with preserves. He gave a grunt of appreciation. A widower now for several years, Angus Sinclair considered Helen Madden to be the best-looking woman of his acquaintance, and it always gave him particular pleasure to see her.
The long tresses she had worn when he first knew her, the fashion of the time, and a legacy of girlhood, perhaps, had long since vanished, but the chief inspector found consolation in the slender white neck their disappearance had revealed. His spirits, dampened earlier that morning by the pathologist’s report and accompanying photographs he’d been obliged to examine at Guildford police station, rose at the sight of her.
But his relief was shortlived. Aware of his approach, Helen put down the jar of honey she was holding.
‘I was wondering when you’d appear, Angus.’
Taken by surprise – he’d expected a friendly greeting at the very least –
Long dispelled, these shadows no longer troubled their lives. What concerned Helen now was the irrational fear she had felt at the sight of her husband being drawn once more into a police investigation after so long an absence from the profession. His decision to quit his job and start a new life with her had not been taken lightly. Nor was it one he had ever regretted. If he was allowing himself to become involved now it could only be in response to some deep anxiety, and this realization kept the pulse of uneasiness throbbing inside her.
The happy years they had spent together had been born out of tragedy, something she could never forget. Indeed, the thought was fresh in her mind as they drove through the village, past the green and the moss-walled churchyard and along the straggling line of cottages that led to the high brick wall surrounding Melling Lodge. Leased by a succession of tenants in recent years, it was empty at present and the locked gates and dark, elm-lined drive lent it a mournful air.
Time had dulled the pain of that summer morning more than a decade past when an urgent summons from Will Stackpole had brought her, the village doctor, speeding through those same gates to confront the unimaginable reality of a household brutally slain; her dearest friend among the victims. When she drove by now it was of her husband she was thinking.
Yet the two were inextricably linked. It was the subsequent police investigation that had brought them together, and although the love that had flowered between them had drawn a line under Madden’s tortured past, their future together had been dearly purchased. The case, one of the bloodiest in the Yard’s annals, had come close to costing him his life.
7
Feeling out of place in his town clothes – he was clad in a grey pinstriped suit and homburg – Chief Inspector Angus Sinclair paused at the edge of the green to take in the scene before him. Quite close to where he stood a cloth banner erected on poles bore the words HIGHFIELD FLOWER AND VEGETABLE SHOW in bold capitals, and beyond it, the broad stretch of grass ringed with cottages was filled with stalls, where the fruits of a long summer were on display.
Vegetables piled high in baskets – beans, peas, potatoes, carrots – rubbed shoulders with swollen marrows, while beside them there were tables overflowing with bunches of late roses and chrysanthemums. Pumpkins, apples, pears, blackberries, nuts, brown speckled eggs – there seemed no end to the variety of items arrayed for inspection and the avenues between the stands were thronged with villagers dressed in their Sunday best.
Searching the crowd, the chief inspector’s eye lit on a tall, elegant figure wearing a cream-coloured linen dress and a wide-brimmed straw hat standing beside a table stacked with preserves. He gave a grunt of appreciation. A widower now for several years, Angus Sinclair considered Helen Madden to be the best-looking woman of his acquaintance, and it always gave him particular pleasure to see her.
The long tresses she had worn when he first knew her, the fashion of the time, and a legacy of girlhood, perhaps, had long since vanished, but the chief inspector found consolation in the slender white neck their disappearance had revealed. His spirits, dampened earlier that morning by the pathologist’s report and accompanying photographs he’d been obliged to examine at Guildford police station, rose at the sight of her.
But his relief was shortlived. Aware of his approach, Helen put down the jar of honey she was holding.
‘I was wondering when you’d appear, Angus.’
Taken by surprise – he’d expected a friendly greeting at the very least –
Similar Books
