The Dying of the Light: A Mystery Read Online Free PDF

building, which meant it got no sun and had a much less attractive view over the former kitchen garden, stables and other outbuildings. To make matters worse, the original room had been divided to accommodate extra guests, back in the far-off days when Eventide Lodge had been a flourishing enterprise under the energetic direction of old Mrs Anderson.
    Since her son had taken over, death had steadily reduced the number of residents, but the partitions remained in place, strips of flimsy plasterboard through which you could hear everything that happened in the neighbouring room. This was particularly unfortunate in Dorothy’s case since her neighbour, George Channing, snored loudly. Rosemary had tried to have her friend transferred to Mr Purvey’s room, next door to her own, but Mr Anderson had told her that ‘to avoid any suspicion of favouritism’ residents must retain the room they had been allocated on arrival.
    The doorway to the two adjoining rooms gave into a cramped plasterboard cubicle from which plywood fire-retardant doors led off on either side. Rosemary was about to open the door into Dorothy’s room when she heard a loud groan from behind the walling to her right. After a moment’s hesitation she grasped the handle of the other door, stepped inside and stood open-mouthed and staring, struck dumb by the sight which met her eyes.
    The room was in chaos. Blood-stained clothes lay strewn about. There was more blood on the walls, as well as on the overturned chest of drawers and the broken chair. The floor was littered with shards of glass. A cold draught swept in through the smashed window, making the curtains flap wildly. But Rosemary barely noticed any of this. All she could see was the body outstretched on the bed, roped to the frame at wrist and ankle, covered in gashes and abrasions, the skin deathly pale, the torn clothing blotched with blood.
    The man’s mouth was bound with sticking tape, but his eyes were fixed on Rosemary’s with manic intensity, and his whole body seemed to resonate with the eerie moaning. But before Rosemary could think what to do, let alone do it, she heard voices nearing along the corridor outside. With a helpless glance at the man she hurried out, closing the door quietly behind her, and slipped into Dorothy’s room just before the two speakers reached the doorway.
    ‘Shame he didn’t break his damned neck while he was at it,’ Anderson was saying. ‘Injured’s no good to me, Jim. I need them dead.’
    ‘You want the police called in?’ replied a man Rosemary recognized as Dr Morel. ‘They die in bed is one thing, but I can’t just rubber-stamp something like that. Should have put bars on the windows.’
    ‘It all costs money, you know. Besides, it doesn’t look good.’
    ‘And how good do you think this looks? An ex-Battle of Britain ace trying a stunt like this at eighty something. People are going to wonder why he bothered.’
    ‘No they aren’t, Jim. Because they aren’t going to find out, as long as you keep your mouth shut.’
    ‘And then to set the dog on him …’
    The voices became muffled as the two men entered the next room and closed the door behind them. Rosemary walked slowly over to the window, hugging the green cardigan to her chest. The walled kitchen garden below was now overgrown with brambles whose long tendrils had matted together to form an impenetrable mass of spiny undergrowth. A narrow path of concrete slabs had been kept open, leading from the back door to a doorway in the wall. Halfway along it was a rough clearing where Anderson’s Doberman was normally kept tethered. Now its orange nylon cord lay limp on the ground amid the dog’s massive droppings.
    The murmur of voices was still audible next door, although only the occasional word was intelligible from where Rosemary was standing. She tiptoed over to the bed, crouched up on it and put her ear to the wall.
    ‘Jesus Christ almighty!’ Morel exclaimed. ‘Do you file that