Scaring Crows Read Online Free PDF

turned into the drive. The cows were causing havoc, wandering around the yard. They hadn’t been milked. So he comes round to the door to find out what’s going on. And he sees this.’
    â€˜Then what did he do?’
    â€˜Backs the tanker all the way down the lane to the neighbouring farm and telephones us.’
    A swift vision of the milk tanker blocking the lane reinforced the story.
    She glanced at a green plastic phone standing on the window sill. ‘He didn’t use this phone?’
    â€˜Nope. I can understand the man. He panicked. He just wanted to get the hell out of here. And I can’t blame him.’
    She looked at him sharply. ‘He claims he didn’t enter the room?’
    â€˜No. He could see it all from the doorway.’
    She thought for a moment then startled Mike by asking, ‘What’s happened to them?’
    â€˜Sorry?’
    â€˜The cows, Mike. I didn’t see the cows when we drove up.’
    â€˜Oh. The next door farmer came back with him and offered to do the milking.’
    â€˜A good neighbourly act.’
    â€˜Yeah. A good neighbourly act.’ But they were both police officers. Nothing could be taken at face value. Korpanski’s eyes darkened.
    She pressed her point home. ‘Someone who knew the door would be open, that the gun was not kept in a locked cabinet, someone who had the opportunity to make sure it would be loaded. Someone who knew the doors would be unlocked and where both father and son would be at that time of the morning.’
    â€˜But why?’
    â€˜I don’t know. And in my book, blasting a couple of farmers with their own shotgun doesn’t exactly comply with the Neighbourhood Watch scheme.’
    He picked up on that. ‘Neighbourhood Watch,’ he said. ‘What exactly are you suggesting?’
    There was an angry light in her blue eyes. ‘I’ll be looking at the locals first,’ she said slowly. ‘Shackleton knew about the gun. The point is who else knew and who loaded it because don’t try and tell me person or persons unknown arrives at the porch, picks up the gun, presses the trigger and, Hey Presto, what a bit of luck, it’s even loaded. And even I can’t believe the Summers were quite so careless as to leave a loaded gun lying around in an unlocked porch. No. I think it’s more likely that someone primed the gun. But why?’
    The two bodies lay motionless. ‘Look at them, Mike. From the way they’re dressed I’d bet they had nothing more exciting planned than a morning in the cowshed. So why slaughter them? Robbery? A thief could have slipped in at any time and pinched stuff without going to the bother of murder. So why? And who? And because I have to start somewhere we’ll start next door with our friendly neighbour. How far away is he?’
    Mike relaxed. He preferred facts to questions. ‘About half a mile. Three fields away. The farm’s called Fallowfield.’
    â€˜And this friendly neighbour’s name?’
    â€˜Pinkers. Martin Pinkers.’
    â€˜Right ...’ She thought for a moment. ‘We’ll start there and gradually widen our circle. We’ll need a good map of the area. I want to know everyone who lives within a two-mile radius. If we get no joy the circle grows.’
    â€˜From what I know so far a two-mile radius covers about four homesteads.’
    â€˜Good. That makes the job distinctly easier.’ She gave Mike one of her wide smiles. ‘I suppose it’s a bit soon to know anything about bad blood between the two farms?’
    â€˜Yeah. Far too soon.’
    She moved back into the bright, brave colours of the glazed porch and studied the Victorian panels of red and blue glass.
    â€˜The SOCOs might get some decent prints off this as well as the gun but I’m not too optimistic. Uugh.’ She gave an expression of disgust as a fly landed on her hand. ‘Where’s that bloody