The New Policeman Read Online Free Page A

three powder boxes before he found one with some left in it. Another long-finger job—tidy up the utility room. He set the program, turned on the machine, and raced up the stairs for the fiddle. But even as he lifted it from the wall he heard the knock on the door and the voice in the little porch.
    “Hello?”
    He should have been expecting it. It was always the way, these days. Carve out a bit of time for something and what happened? Something, or someone, came along and stole it.

     
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ROLLING IN THE BARREL
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9
    The visitor was Anne Korff. She didn’t need to be shown the worn patches on the kitchen flags; she had come to the house many times before. Anne had been living in the area for more than twenty years, running a small publishing company producing books and maps based on the Burren. She knew the region better than many people who had lived there all their lives and was fiercely protective of anything that posed a threat to its delicate environmental balance.
    J.J. came downstairs, the fiddle in one hand, the bow and rosin in the other. Anne’s little terrier, Lottie, wagged her tail at him but didn’t venture out from behind Anne’s legs. From his bed beside the range, Bosco looked on with heroic restraint.
    “Ah, you are just going to play,” said Anne. “I’m disturbing you.”

    “Not at all,” said Helen, and meant it. The hospitality of generations ran through her veins. Nothing, not even music, was more important. “We’re just having a cup of tea. Sit yourself down, there.”
    Anne understood better than most the pressures of time. “No, really,” she said. “I was just passing your door and I thought I would pop in and get a bit of cheese.”
    Helen sold most of her cheese to a wholesaler who distributed it to delicatessens around the country, but there were a few people, like Anne, who liked to call in and buy it direct.
    “Of course,” said Helen. “But you may as well have a cup of tea while you’re here.”
    “No,” said Anne. “I would love to, but I’m way behind schedule with the new book. I’m up to my eyes in editing. There just aren’t enough hours in the day anymore.”
    “You don’t have to tell me,” said Helen wearily. “I’ll get you some cheese, then.” She moved toward the door. “A small one, is it?”
    “And how’s life with J.J.?” said Anne, when Helen was gone.
    “Good,” said J.J. automatically. “And yourself?”
    “Good, good,” said Anne Korff. “You’re getting sotall these days. I suppose you are going to clubs and everything now, eh?”
    Her words hit J.J. in the solar plexus. Helen was already returning with the cheese, wrapped in greaseproof paper. If she had heard Anne’s question, she gave no sign of it.
    “That all right?” she asked.
    “Perfect,” said Anne. She turned to J.J. “You know your mother makes the best cheese in the country?”
    “Ah, now,” said Helen. She put the cheese on top of the dresser beside the door.
    As Anne paid her for it, she said, “No, I was just out for a walk. Nosing around on your land. I hope you don’t mind?”
    “Why would I?” said Helen. “Walk where you like, Anne.”
    “I know that, of course,” said Anne. “But I was looking at that old ring fort up at the top of your grazing land. I never knew it was there. It’s not marked on any of the maps, as far as I know. Such a beautiful fort as well. So well preserved.”
    “I suppose it is,” said Helen.
    The terrier was getting bolder, venturing out from behind Anne’s feet and beginning to explore the kitchen.

    “No, it’s just…” said Anne. “I see the field there has been bulldozed.”
    J.J. saw a hint of suspicion creep into his mother’s face. The edges of the Burren contained a lot of rough, rocky land of very little use to farmers. In the past, some areas had been cleared by hand and, since the invention of bulldozers, a lot more had been mechanically cleared. It was illegal now, and had been for