Through a Narrow Door Read Online Free

Jean just got a mortgage on a small semi out that way?’ And when Tommy nodded, she turned back to the passing scenery and said placidly, ‘Well then, it looks like you’ve finally got things sorted.’
    Tommy sighed a little wistfully, but was smiling nevertheless . ‘I guess so. But they don’t expect me to start for another two weeks, so I won’t be leaving you short-handed. At least, not yet.’
    Hillary nodded and wondered who her next green and eager newly promoted detective constable would be. Mel and Donleavy, she knew, rated her in-house training, and a clerk in records had once admitted that Hillary had gained something of a rep for being a safe pair of hands for ‘problem’ children. Not that Tommy had ever been a problem, but being big and black and ambitious, he’d no doubt worried somebody in the higher ranks, and she hadn’t been surprised when she’d been appointed his senior officer. She only hoped whoever she got next would turn out to be as quick a learner as Tommy, and, if she was really lucky,would be as easy to get along with. She was going to be sorry to see him go, but he deserved the promotion.
    Seven miles later, she nodded towards the crossroads up ahead and said, ‘Keep going past the lights at Hopcrofts Halt, then take the next turning on the right.’
    The road to the hamlet turned out to be single-car access only, with the odd passing spot carved out on the grass verge. Out of her window, towering ranks of white cow parsley – or ladies’ needlework as her grandmother had always insisted on calling it – flashed by, then Tommy slowed the car to a crawl as first one bungalow and then, on the opposite side of the lane, another bungalow, hove into view. ‘Is this it?’ he muttered doubtfully. Down the road he could see the roofs of maybe one or two more houses, and that was it.
    ‘See any patrol cars?’ Hillary asked, just as doubtfully.
    ‘No, Guv.’
    Hell, perhaps this wasn’t the place, Hillary mused, and was reaching for the glove compartment again when a uniformed constable suddenly popped up out of a hedge to take a look at them. Tommy pulled over, and when Hillary opened the car door and got out, she could see that there was, in fact, a concealed entrance in the flowering hawthorn bushes. As Tommy parked up on the grass verge, Janine’s Mini pulling in behind him, Hillary walked towards the uniform. A traditional five-barred country gate of rather rickety parentage gave way to a surprisingly thriving set of single-chain allotments.
    ‘You can’t park here, madame,’ he began, and Hillary reached instinctively for her badge. The constable was probably new, or maybe from Bicester or Banbury, since most of the Kidlington rank-and-file knew her by sight. ‘Sorry ma’am,’ he added respectfully as he read her name on the card. It still, she noticed with a brief and short-lived shaft of fury, listed her as an acting chief inspector.
    ‘Where’s the crime scene?’ she asked, glancing back at the bungalows on either side of the road. They looked liketypical members of their species, with good paintwork, neat walling, and lavishly flowering gardens. Probably both occupied by retired people. She hoped the murder victim wasn’t old. There was something particularly harrowing about murdered seventy or eighty year olds.
    ‘Through here ma’am,’ the constable said, pointing past the gate and taking her by surprise. At first glance, she’d seen nothing out of place on the productive allotments. The constable was a fairly fit, forty-something, with the weathered skin of a dedicated outdoorsman. ‘A young lad found dead in his father’s allotment shed,’ he added, guessing from her start of surprise that she hadn’t been briefed yet. ‘He was found by his younger sister at roughly 2.45 p.m. She ran home to tell her parents, and her father came and confirmed it. He phoned us. He’s in the car now,’ he added, pushing the gate open and standing aside to let her pass.