Prophets and Loss (A Johnny Ravine Mystery)

by Martin Roth

  Prologue

  I met my mother just once more after she died.

  She told me she was happy now, that she didn’t regret dying. She was dressed in a purple sarong and she smelled of camphor wood, the fragrance that the Japanese sailors used to give her. A golden glow came from her shiny black hair, and when her hands moved I could see a soft blue light. She was standing right in front of me, but her voice was muted, as if she were on the other side of a thick curtain.

  In the dream, or vision, or whatever it was, she said she had always loved me. I tried to ask why she had abandoned me, and what had happened to my father, but she just stared ahead, a wistful smile on her face. Then she was gone.

  It was the most beautiful experience of my life.

  But it didn’t stop me becoming a killer.