The Drowners Read Online Free PDF Page A

path. The wind was getting up again and it was cold out on the bank. He glanced sideways at the dark water rolling slowly past, thick and brown with mud from the early winter storms and suppressed a shudder at the thought of drowning in that foul soup. As he turned his attention back to the path he saw something glint in the last fragments of sunlight. Just a flash but enough to reveal a metal object lying in the longer grass a few yards from his starting point. Stepping carefully so he didn’t damage any of the immediate area he peered down at the object, parting the surrounding growth with a stick.
    ‘Sarge,’ he called, ‘come and have a look at this.’
    The two men stood and stared at it for a moment. ‘Well, what do you make of that then?’ said the sergeant finally.
    PC Brown shook his head. ‘Damned if I know, Sir,’ he said.
    The sergeant moved away down the path towards the main search area and signalled to the photographer who was hanging around looking bored.
    ‘What the hell is that doing here?’ he muttered as he began to record the scene, working hurriedly as the light faded.
    ‘No footprints so maybe it was thrown here,’ commented PC Brown.
    ‘Reckon you may be right,’ said the sergeant, ‘but what the hell is an old brass candlestick doing all the way out here?’

    Although it had been a week since the onset of her illness, Sue didn’t like leaving Alex on her own. The office was only five minutes’ walk away and once her temperature came down there was nothing she could do to make her friend more comfortable or speed her recovery, and Garry, who had beenhalf-way decent about the whole thing, as she had to admit, had decided he could no longer spare her.
    ‘I’ll be back around lunch time,’ she said, fussing around the room and tweaking curtains and pillows. ‘You just stay in bed and bloody behave yourself all right?’
    Alex was reaching the bored and impatient stage of illness, the time where she really felt she should be getting better and was confounded by her own weakness when she tried to do the slightest thing.
    ‘I’ll be fine,’ she muttered. ‘Just go will you? Stop mucking about with stuff. At least the Carnival’s moved off to Glastonbury so I might get some sleep at night.’
    Sue pulled a face at Alex’s back and went downstairs. She had some sympathy with the last sentiment. The Carnival carts based in town went out to the surrounding towns and villages at night to replay the whole thing over several weeks. Despite the lateness of the hour they returned with lights on and music blaring deep into the night, especially if they’d emerged winners in one of the smaller regional shows. The Iron Beehive seemed to have been particularly successful this year and the whole thing was beginning to seriously get on her nerves. Stepping out of the house she hesitated, then pulled the front door shut behind her. It would be fine, she thought. Of course it would.

    PC Brown stood at the side of the autopsy room, hands behind him and back straight as he watched the pathologist begin work on Michael Franks. From the outside he was the picture of professionalism. Inside he wanted to bolt from the room and hang over the nearest available sink, but one of the younger sergeants had already left at the first sign of intestines and he felt the eyes of the Taunton police on him, appraising, measuring, testing his resolve. Dave Brown was ambitious as well as clever and he clenched his teeth, tightened the muscles around his stomach and refused to show the slightest discomfort . He recalled the words of his mentor at Hendon, a tough and often foul-mouthed sergeant with a full twenty-fiveyears experience behind him. He’d pushed Dave hard, testing his determination, questioning his choice of career and coming close on occasions to driving him from the course. As his time at the college was coming to a close, the man changed from enemy to valued teacher and Police Cadet Brown understood he