Unti Lucy Black Novel #3 Read Online Free PDF Page A

wrong?” The man set the can on the ground and laid the paintbrush across the opening of the top. He straightened and pulled a rag from his back pocket on which to wipe his hands.
    â€œWe’d like to talk to you about your uncle. Stuart Carlisle?”
    â€œGreat-­uncle,” Henderson said. “What about him?”
    â€œWe believe we pulled his body from the river last night,” Lucy said.
    The man laughed with relief, then realized it was not the appropriate reaction to the news of a recovery from the river. He raised a paint-­stained wrist in front of his mouth. “Sorry,” he said. “You’ve got the wrong man. My uncle’s already dead; he died last week.”
    â€œWe know,” Lucy said. “Maybe we could go inside.”
    H ENDERSON’S LIVING ROOM was narrow, one side dominated by an old china cabinet, the other by two armchairs. There was no sofa. Lucy sat on one seat, Henderson on the other, while Fleming moved across to the window, as if to lean against the sill.
    â€œI wouldn’t do that,” Henderson said. “I’ve just painted the woodwork.”
    Instinctively, Fleming stepped away, wiping at the back of his legs lest some paint had transferred on to it.
    Henderson stared from him to Lucy. “If you know my uncle’s already dead, why do you think he was the one you pulled from the Foyle?”
    â€œWould you mind taking a look at this?” Lucy said, offering the man a photograph, a headshot of the body they had recovered. “Is that your great-­uncle?”
    Henderson studied the image, angling it toward the light entering the room through the one narrow window to the front, across which hung a lace curtain. “I’ve smudged it,” he said and pulled one tacky thumb from the picture before handing it back to Lucy. “Sorry. That looks like him all right, but—­”
    â€œHe was wearing a City of Derry Golf Club blazer?”
    â€œAye, that’s right. I don’t understand, though. We had his funeral.”
    â€œWhen?”
    â€œMonday. He was waked in the funeral parlor, then they had the ser­vice for him at one. They took him off to be cremated in All Hallows in Belfast.”
    â€œCremated?” Fleming asked. Generally, Irish ­people tended not to cremate the dead, suitable land for burial plots not being an issue in the country. It was the exception rather than the rule. So much so, the only crematoriums in the North were in Belfast.
    â€œDid you take the body up to All Hallows yourself?”
    The man shook his head. “I’d an appointment in the hospital in the afternoon,” he explained. “The undertakers handled it all. I’ve to call for his ashes at some stage.”
    â€œI see,” Lucy said.
    Henderson clearly sensed something in her voice for he continued. “I never knew him. He wasn’t close to us. He was my granny’s brother. He never bothered with our family. It was the home help contacted me to say he was dead. Going to the funeral ser­vice was as much as I figured he needed. What difference would it make seeing his coffin going into an oven, eh?” The man stared at Lucy, willing her to respond.
    â€œThat’s understandable,” Fleming said, instead. “Look, you’re certain it was your great-­uncle in the coffin at the ser­vice? Did you see him?”
    â€œAye. It was an open coffin at the wake. All his golfing buddies were there.”
    â€œDid anyone accompany the body to All Hallows?”
    â€œThe undertakers, just,” Henderson said. “All his golfing friends were the same age as him; they weren’t going to start driving nearly two hours to see him being burned.”
    â€œWhen did you last see him in the coffin?”
    â€œAt the start of the ser­vice. They closed the lid and sealed it, then we had the ser­vice, then they took the body out to take him to