The Darke Chronicles Read Online Free PDF Page A

you damned fool!’ she screamed. ‘Don’t you know that whatever Laurence did to me, I loved him? I loved him with all my heart. He was my husband! And now you have taken him away.’She made a mad dash for the servant, but Jack Stavely stepped forward and held her back. She sank into his arms, sobbing.
    Boldwood looked in horror at his mistress. His features blanched at the sudden realisation that he had been both blind and foolish. He turned sharply, as if to make for the door.
    ‘Don’t bother with that, Boldwood. You will find there are two constables and my assistant Sergeant Grey waiting outside, ready to take you to the Yard,’ said Edward Thornton, stepping forward and clasping a pair of handcuffs on the man. He had visibly shrunk, and his eyes moistened with tears. ‘I did it for the best, sir. I did it for m’lady.’
    At this reference to her Beatrice Wilberforce pulled away from Jack Stavely. ‘Get out of my sight, you devil. I never want to see you again.’

    Luther Darke poured himself another large whisky. Thornton clapped his hands over his glass. One large nip was enough for him, but not for his triumphant friend.
    ‘I need this as an antidote to that tea with which I sullied my throat in Curzon Street,’ he said with solemnity.
    The two men were seated around the fire in Darke’s sitting room later that day. Persephone still lay like a wax image, curled in a foetal position, before the grate.
    Darke took a gulp from his glass and rolled the liquid around in his mouth before swallowing it slowly, allowing its warmth to burn his throat. He grinned. “‘Gie me ae spark ‘o Nature’s fire, That’s a’ learning I desire,” as Maester Burns has it. Well, Edward, a successful day: the solving of a murder and the release of an innocent man.’
    ‘Indeed, but it gave me no pleasure to lock up Boldwood. He is a sad creature whose intentions were for the best.’
    ‘Misplaced affection, passion as it was in Boldwood’s case, can drive a man to behave like the Devil. And it was a devilishly ingenious plan. He knew with the evidence of a stab wound, the poolof blood and the knife, that no one would think of poison as the real cause of death. The locked room was also an added subterfuge to fog the truth. A real November crime, eh? Remember, he was virtually making the rules of his murder plan up as he went along. He was determined to muddy the waters as much as possible. If Boldwood had not tried to be too clever by smearing Armstrong’s coat with blood, he might even have got away with it.’
    ‘Because then there would have been no definite suspect and nothing to prompt my unease which sent me running to you.’
    ‘I cannot believe that you came running. With a dignified policeman-like gait, surely.’
    Thornton laughed. The whisky was already going to his head. ‘I had better be on my way. There is work still to be done back at the Yard.’
    Luther Darke saw Edward Thornton to the door. Thick winter night, with its grey coils of fog, awaited the inspector beyond the threshold.
    ‘Thank you for your help, Luther. You are an amazing man.’
    For a moment, Darke’s face grew serious. ‘We are all amazing men in our own way, my friend. Come again soon.’
    With that, the two men shook hands and Thornton walked out into the darkness, which soon swallowed him up. Darke returned to his fireside, his cat and his whisky.

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4
THE RIDDLE OF THE VISITING ANGEL
    Who would have thought of it? he mused. Out of science came ethereal mysticism that paved the way to fortune. He smiled a self-satisfied smile. No one would have thought of it – except himself.

    Cornelius Horden sat up in bed, clasping a silver-framed photograph of his wife. His eyes misted as he gazed at the faded image, one which had been captured over twenty years before. To Cornelius, who loved his wife with an unstinting passion, she had