The Celibate Mouse Read Online Free PDF Page A

skin?
    ‘Hard to tell,’ he thought, but because of the muck on the pillow combined with her blue lips – someone must waited for Edna to be left on her own after visiting hours.
    He glanced wildly around, trying to identify a place of concealment. The bathroom? Nowhere to hide. Then a flash of the dark corridor opposite Edna’s room, the one leading to the Diversional Therapy wing and boardroom, came to mind.
    A good place to hide.
    The flesh on his back crawled as he realised that he could have passed within centimetres of the killer, who might have been watching him run to the Code Blue emergency. But why on earth would someone want to murder gentle, inoffensive Edna?
    ‘Put that back where you found it, Cecily. Don’t handle it more than necessary and don’t touch anything else. Close this room and don’t let anybody in. I need to ring the police – and Mrs Eams.’ Hardgreaves’ voice came out high and squeaky. He made a determined effort to lower it. ‘I’ll have to phone her,’ he said, referring to the Director of the hospital. He handed the pillow to the nurse who took a corner and carefully placed it on the chair, trying to position it exactly as she’d found it.
    They scuttled from the room, death panting at their heels.
    Hardgreaves refused to turn the lights on in the corridor, fearing the patients would be alerted. Explanations were not something he considered himself equipped to go into right then. He fled in the direction of the office, leaving Cecily Braum alone in the dimly-lit corridor. She trembled, her gaze drawn inexorably to the dark reaches of the hallway opposite, as she waited outside the door to Edna’s room. Perhaps he–or she–was still there ...
    If he sat down he’d never want to get up again, so Hardgreaves wedged himself into a corner between the desk and chair, leaned against the wall and unclipped the mobile phone from his belt. Deep breaths couldn’t control the trembling which started in the very core of his being and distributed itself in cold, never-ending waves throughout his body. He dialled 000 and asked for the police. It took two attempts before he could keep his voice steady and advise a gravel-voiced officer of the situation, after which he dropped the mobile and slumped into a nearby chair.
    ‘Shit. Why didn’t it happen on someone else’s shift?’ Sighing, he initiated the second necessary contact. His call to the Superintendent went straight to voice mail, so he left a message, dreading the last one on his protocol list. Mrs Eams, a woman of somewhat masterful proportions, was not only the Director of the hospital, but also his fiancée’s stepmother.
    ‘What? Are you absolutely sure?’ she screamed. ‘You can’t be serious! Edna?’
    ‘Afraid so, Mrs Eams. I’ve notified the police and locked COW. They should be here soon.’
    ‘I’m coming in!’ she hissed.
    ‘Yes, Mrs Eams.’ He clipped his phone back on his belt and went to the tiny ‘cafe’ recess. He’d never craved a hot drink so badly. Drops of boiling water splashed over his trembling hands as he manoeuvred coffee mugs into position under the urn. Somehow he got the job done without inflicting more than minor scalds on his fingers and carried the steaming drinks to the corridor outside the Close Observation Ward.
    The two of them stood in the corridor outside the door as they sipped. ‘Libby and I only got engaged last weekend, so I’ve never met Edna’s side of the family,’ Hardgreaves explained.
    ‘I meet some family members at events around town, but I’ve never got to make close friends with any of them. I dated Peter Robinson, one of the cousins, for a few months, but he was a bit of a waste of space,’ said Cecily Braum. She took a slug of coffee. ‘They’re a pretty secretive bunch, actually. You never know what they’re thinking. Sir Arthur got the ‘sir’ years ago before the Government got rid of knighthoods, but I can’t remember what for. That idiot