Read Online The Deadly Game by Jim Eldridge - Free Book Online Page A

they’d checked in, Robert got hold of his pal, Andy, on his mobile, and Jake did the same with Michelle. Both reported that they weren’t far away from Glastonbury, and they agreed to meet up at the pub at one o’clock for lunch, and to draw up their plan of action.
    Robert decided he wanted to go and freshen up after the journey, but Jake was keen to check out the town and get as much information as he could from the tourist office and the local shops. That way, he reasoned, it would help convince anyone who might be watching him that he really was in Glastonbury to find out about King Arthur and the Grail, and not searching for the hidden books. As he walked away from the Grail and Thorn, he couldn’t help casting a sweeping look around to see if he could spot anyone who might be watching him. The trouble was, how would he know? Anyone who was keeping him under observation, and was good at their job, would be doing it without Jake being able to tell.
    He tried committing the faces of some people to memory, choosing those he thought looked suspicious; but then he gave up. In a town like Glastonbury, that seemed to attract all sorts of oddballs, nearly everyone he saw could have been described as suspicious.
    The town itself seemed to be aiming at two separate sorts of tourists: religious pilgrims, and ageing hippies. There were shops and information booths dedicated to the Christian history of Glastonbury: Joseph of Arimathea, the Holy Grail, St Dunstan, and the history of the abbey; but there were far more stores selling souvenirs of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table; and even more whose windows were crammed with crystals for divination, candles of all shapes and colours, magic pebbles and rocks, maps showing ley lines, and clothes that wouldn’t have looked out of place in the 1960s.
    Jake picked up three maps, one showing the tourist attractions in the town; another, a plan of the abbey, and the third a map showing Glastonbury Tor and the key places on it. He also bought a couple of slim books about the King Arthur and the Grail legend. By the time he got back to the pub, Michelle had arrived, and was sitting with Robert in the garden. With them at the table was a cheerful-looking guy with a large black and white dog.
    ‘Jake, meet my rugby pal, Andy,’ said Robert.
    Jake and Andy shook hands.
    ‘And the other one is his working partner, Woody, the wonder-dog,’ put in Michelle.
    Jake forced himself to give the dog a friendly smile. Jake had always been a bit wary of dogs. When Robert had first mentioned using a sniffer dog, he’d consoled himself with the thought that a sniffer dog would be trained and ought to be safe.
    Andy rubbed the dog’s head, and Woody’s tail wagged heartily. He seems friendly enough, thought Jake. And, if it was true that dogs grew to be like their masters, then Andy certainly seemed a cheerful and open guy. He was shorter than Robert, but chunkily built, as fitted a rugby player. His hair was cropped short, possibly so that opposing players couldn’t grab it in the scrum, reflected Jake. But then he remembered that Andy worked in search and rescue, so it was possibly a military thing.
    ‘So, Robert says we’re looking for some kind of book,’ said Andy.
    ‘Yes.’ Jake sat down at their table.
    ‘Valuable?’
    ‘Yes and no,’ said Jake. ‘To be honest, it’s only really worth anything to people who are interested in history.’
    ‘History can be worth money,’ said Andy.
    ‘That’s what I told Jake,’ put in Michelle. ‘That Roman helmet that’s worth two million, for example.’
    ‘Yes, well, this is nothing like that,’ said Jake. He looked around, and then said in a low voice: ‘Anyway, officially, that’s not why we’re here. We’re looking for something of King Arthur. The Holy Grail, or something similar.’ And he shot an accusing look at Robert.
    ‘I had to tell Andy what we were looking for,’ hissed back Robert defensively. ‘After