The Wages of Desire Read Online Free Page A

woman—standard procedure insisted that you considered as a suspect whoever discovered the body and reported the crime.
    Wallace held up an identification card issued by the Women’s Land Army that he’d found in the bag. “Here we go,” he announced. “Ruth Aisquith.”
    He handed the card to Lamb, who studied it for a few seconds. The woman in the photo had dark hair; a sharp, prominent nose; and intense, dark eyes. Her face was unsmiling. The card listed her date of birth as June 7, 1905, making her thirty-six years old. Lamb recalled how he and Marjorie had sought, unsuccessfully, to convince Vera to join the Land Army. Mostly, the Land girls did farm work, difficult but healthy labor. More importantly, though, the work was safe, far from combat. And yet here was Ruth Aisquith, dead well before her time.
    â€œA Land girl, then,” Rivers said. “Probably from the prison camp. But where does a Land girl come by fifty quid?”
    â€œMaybe she comes from money,” Larkin said.
    â€œYes, but why bring it to the bloody cemetery?”
    â€œIf she does work at the prison camp, maybe she didn’t trust leaving it in her barrack. Too easy for someone to nick.”
    â€œOr she owed a debt,” Wallace said. He nodded at Mary Forrest’s grave. “Her grandmother, then?” he asked. “Or an elderly auntie?”
    â€œMaybe,” Lamb said. “Given that this was the grave she intended to visit. She might have been intending to visit someone else’s grave. Or she might not have intended to visit any particular grave at all. She might have picked the flowers for herself or someone living.”
    Lamb asked Wallace to check the other grave markers in the cemetery to see if any bore the name of Aisquith.

    As they spoke, the Rev. Gerald Wimberly fumbled in the kitchen of the vicarage as he endeavored to make a pot of tea for his wife, Wilhemina. He took the kettle from the boil and began to pour water from it into the pot; some of the hot water splashed onto the fingers of his left hand. He drew his hand quickly away from the pot and cursed. He went to the sink and put his fingers under a trickle of cold water, which only slightly eased the pain of the burn. He thought again of how thoroughly he despised Wilhemina. She’d always been a burden to him. All the same, he must make her bloody tea—must endeavor to calm her, especially now that the police had arrived. Using a pestle he’d crushed three sleeping tablets—more than he needed, really—in a small ceramic mortar, the contents of which he poured into the pot.

    Lamb and Rivers rolled the dead woman onto her back, exposing the ragged exit wound just beneath her heart.
    â€œLess than an arm’s length,” Rivers said, guessing at the range from which the killer had shot the woman.
    Lamb checked her hands, pockets—in which he found nothing—and shoes, including the soles. He stood, turned, and limped a couple of paces from the woman’s body toward the center of the cemetery. He gestured to Larkin.
    â€œCome around here, please, Mr. Larkin, and stand in front of me.” The forensics man did as instructed. Lamb turned to face the dead woman. “Raise your hand and pretend to shoot me in the back,” Lamb said. Larkin raised his finger and said, “Bang!” Lamb took a couple of steps forward, which brought him again to the woman’s feet.
    â€œSo she’s shot and stumbles forward from the impact before she dies and falls against the headstone of Mary Forrest,” Lamb said, thinking aloud.
    Lamb bent to look at the grass at the place where he calculated the woman had been shot. The grass still was moist from the predawn rain. “Here are the impressions left by her boots,” he said. He stood. “And what have we coming toward her, then?”
    He took another two steps forward, then went to a knee to examine a small bare spot in the