Gamekeeper's Gallows
Page 17
‘They waited long enough to dispose of the body,’ Potter said.
‘Because Thos had been talking in a desultory fashion for some time about burning an effigy of Kingsey. The women daren’t try to hurry him: he might just have wondered why they were so keen. I tell you, Albert, they were obsessed. Amy Harrington’s corpse was with them morning, noon and night. Then the Rector robbed Thos of his garden, and he was really stirred. Remember: the figure of Kingsey was a work of art, but the Rector was a botched job.’
There were few passengers on the morning Fly. The women’s wrists were joined on the chain. They did not speak, either to each other or to anyone else. They did not even seem aware of their surroundings. Brunt saw the crags at the mouth of Piper’s Clough slip behind a tongue of overlapping hill. There was still a red glow at the foot of Pedlar’s Stump.
‘So Kingsey and Fletcher might or might not be heading for a stretch,’ Potter said.
‘They will be. I get a feeling in my veins for the windfall that breaks a case. Those paintings dumped on Castlethorpe Station can’t fail, Albert. They mustn’t be allowed to fail. Art thefts that have been on the country’s books for a decade and more – I only hope they let me do the work on Fletcher in the long silent hours: with Kingsey too far away to be consulted, and any lie I can think of put into Mosley’s mouth—’
‘Happen Kingsey will see it coming. Happen he’ll have made a reasonable settlement on the girl.’
‘Happen.’
‘Happen they did each other a bit of good last night.’
‘Happen.’
Copyright
First published in 1976 by Macmillan
This edition published 2012 by Bello an imprint of Pan Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited Pan Macmillan, 20 New Wharf Road, London N1 9RR Basingstoke and Oxford Associated companies throughout the world
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Copyright © John Buxton Hilton, 1976
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