Read Online The Dark Assassin by Anne Perry - Free Book Online

six," Runcorn went on. "Found his master on the floor
of the room where they keep the hay and feed. Lying on his back, shot through
the head. One clean bullet into the brain. Must've been standing near the
middle of the room, and fell backwards. Blood exactly where you'd expect it to
be. Gun fallen out of his hand but not more than a foot away."
    Monk felt a
chill settle over him.
    "Boy went
in and told the butler-can't remember his name," Runcorn went on.
"Carter, or something like that."
    "Cardman,"
Monk supplied.
    "That's
right," Runcorn agreed, blinking several times. "He went out to look.
Saw just what the boy had said, and sent the footman for the police. It was
nearer eight o'clock by the time I got there. Didn't know Havilland personally,
but I knew him by repute. A very decent man. Hard to believe he'd taken his own
life." He looked up at Monk suddenly. "But one thing police work
teaches you: You never know what goes on in somebody else's mind. Loves and
hates that their own families don't ever dream about."
    Monk nodded. For
once he had no quibble at all. He tried to imagine Runcorn and the scene: the
small stable, the straw, the sound and smell of horses, the leather harnesses,
the gleam of lantern light on polished brass, the dead man lying on the floor,
the sickly smell of blood.
    "Were the
horses frightened?" he asked. "Any injuries?"
    Runcorn frowned.
"No. Bit nervous. They'd smelled blood and they must have heard the shot,
but nothing was disturbed as if there'd been a fight. No wounds, no wood
kicked, no cuts, neither of 'em really spooked. And before you ask, there were
no other marks on the body, no bruises, clothes as neat as you please. I'd lay
my reputation no one struggled or fought with him before he was shot. And the
way he was lying, either he shot himself, which everything pointed to, or
whoever else did it stood within a couple of feet of him, because there was
nowhere else to stand in a room that size."
    "And
nothing was taken, nothing missing?" Monk asked without hope now. He had
outwitted Runcorn many times in the past, but that was years ago. They had both
learned in the time between: Monk to be a little gentler, and more honest in
his reasons for cleverness; Runcorn to think a little harder before coming to
conclusions, perhaps also to keep his attention on the case more, and less on
his own vanity.
    "Nothing to
take in the stables," Runcorn replied. "Unless you count the odd
horse brass, but the stable boy said they were all there."
    "Coachman
agree?" Monk put in.
    "Seems a
footman doubled as coachman," Runcorn answered. "He was handy, and
with a butler and junior footman who doubled as boot boy, that was all that was
necessary."
    "And the
house?" Monk pressed. "Anyone intrude in the night? Or impossible to
tell, if Havilland had left the door open. Had he?"
    "Yes. The
butler says he sat up late. Told them he wanted to work in his study, and sent
them all to bed. But a thorough search was made and both Miss Havilland herself
and the housekeeper said nothing at all was missing, or even moved. And there
were plenty of nice things, easy to carry, if a burglar'd wanted. Easy to sell."
    "What time
did he die?" Monk was not yet willing to give up, although it was
beginning to look more and more as if Mary Havilland's belief in her father's
murder was simply a desperate young woman's refusal to accept the truth that he
had killed himself.
    "Police
surgeon reckoned between midnight and about three, close as he could tell.
Pretty cold in the stables, late autumn. The thirteenth of November, to be
exact. Frost was sharpish that night. I remember it was still white all around
the edges of the leaves on the garden bushes we passed going in." Runcorn
was hunched up, as if the memory chilled him.
    "No one
heard a shot?"
    "No."
Runcorn gave a tiny, bleak smile. "Which was unusual. You'd think someone
would've. Tried shooting the thing myself, and it