Abattoir Blues Read Online Free PDF Page B

they? They’re all right. They don’t do any harm. The younger ones play cricket and footie, and the older ones maybe down a few cans of cheap lager, kiss and cuddle with their girlfriends. They’ve nowhere else to go, poor sods. Where’s the harm?’
    ‘Was there anything else going on out there that you know of? I mean kids might get into fights, might even organise them. What about cockfighting, that sort of thing?’
    Gilchrist shook his head. ‘I’ve never seen anything or heard any rumours of anything like that. I’ve seen lorries coming and going once or twice. Other than that, nothing.’
    ‘Lorries? Since when?’
    ‘Just the past year or so. Since I’ve been here alone.’
    ‘How often?’
    Gilchrist thought for a moment. ‘Maybe three or four times over the year. It’s not a regular thing.’
    Gerry Masterson could always check on what companies had the use of the place, if any, Winsome thought. If it came to that. ‘You said you think the government owns the land.’
    ‘Just a wild guess. I’ve no idea, really. It’s been like that as long as I can remember. All I know is it was used as an air-force base in the last war. Nice and flat around here, see, edge of the Vale of Mowbray, and most of the trees weren’t here back then. They were planted when Drewick was built in the fifties, to shelter it from the railway, I suppose. There was talk of building more houses on the airfield land a few years ago, but nothing ever came of that, and now it’s supposed to become a shopping centre. You ask me, people don’t want to live that close to the train tracks. It’s a busy line these days. London or the West Country to Scotland. And you can’t go wrong with a shopping centre, can you?’
    Winsome had used the East Coast train line often enough. Plenty of people lived close to the railway lines, she thought, remembering gazing dreamily over backyards with their rabbit hutches, dilapidated brick outhouses, washing hanging on lines and old tyres hanging from tree branches on train rides she had taken over the past few years. But perhaps Gilchrist was right, and such sites were becoming less popular for housing estates these days. A shopping centre would make more sense. Out of the way, background noise no problem.
    She couldn’t think of anything else to ask Gilchrist for the moment, not until she had a better idea about what might have happened in the hangar. She stayed and chatted for a while longer, finishing her tea, then said she had better get back to the airfield to meet her colleagues. Gilchrist helped her on with her coat, and as she slipped her arms easily in the sleeves, she thought how pleasant it was to have someone do that for her.

Chapter 2
    Banks wasn’t due back at work until Tuesday, but he felt restless and took a taxi to Eastvale police headquarters straight from Durham Tees Valley airport on Monday morning, dropping Oriana off at home on the way. He had enjoyed a wonderful weekend in a village on Lake Trasimeno, looking out over the Isola Polvese, with Oriana and her extended Italian family. Her parents lived in Yorkshire, as did Oriana herself, but there seemed to be a whole village full of aunts, uncles, nieces, nephews and cousins in Umbria. Most of the time Banks and Oriana spent eating fresh fish from the lake, talking and drinking the local Montefalco wines, and going for long walks by the lake, or in the nearby countryside, by olive groves, vineyards and winding brooks.
    And now they were back in wet and windy Yorkshire.
    He dumped his bags and hung up his raincoat in his office. He had taken with him only a small weekend bag for clothes and toiletries, along with his battered leather satchel, in which he carried his essentials – iPod, mobile phone, a book, notebook, pen, a couple of magazines, wallet and keys. There were no messages for him, and everything was as he had left it last Thursday. He walked along the unusually silent corridor to the squad room and found only