Restless Dead (Harry Grimm Book 5) David Gatward (reading strategies book txt) 📖

Harry could see that Matt very much was. He was beginning to wonder if the only reason they had been called out at all was so that Mr Fletcher could talk to Matt about gardening and sheds.

‘Gets really cosy,’ James said. ‘Lovely place for a nap! Helen loved it in there, too, you know. Had her own chair. I think her book is still there, the one she was reading before . . .’

‘So, this intruder, then,’ Harry said, keen to keep James focussed.

James was about to answer when the door to the lounge opened and Patricia walked in carrying a tray with a teapot, cups, and a plate of biscuits. Placing it down on a coffee table, she proceeded to pour.

‘I’ll let you add your own milk and sugar,’ she said. ‘People can be so particular about how they take it, can’t they?’

As Harry leaned over to add milk to his tea, a little nervous about handling the dainty and clearly very fragile and expensive tea set, he became aware of another presence behind him. He turned round to see another man standing in the doorway. He was probably around five foot ten, Harry guessed, and had the narrow bearing of a man with either a ferocious metabolism or a stressful life. Perhaps both.

‘Daniel Hurst,’ the man said, introducing himself with a broad smile. ‘Patricia’s husband. Call me Dan, though. Kind of you to come out. Though, like Patricia, I don’t think it was really necessary.’

‘Not kind at all,’ Harry said. ‘A report of an intruder has to be taken seriously.’

‘Even an imaginary one?’ Patricia said, standing up.

Harry didn’t need any of his detective experience to sense the unease in the room.

‘I didn’t imagine it,’ James said. ‘I saw her, out there on the lawn! Why won’t anyone believe me?’

‘Because it sounds crazy, that’s why!’ Patricia said. ‘And to phone the police . . . What were you thinking?’

Harry stood up, if only to draw attention to something else other than the argument that was clearly brewing.

‘So, Mr Fletcher,’ he said, ‘James . . . Perhaps you could tell us what it was, exactly, that you saw?’

At this, James stared hard at Patricia, then eased back into his seat.

‘It was my wife, Detective,’ James said, turning his attention back to Harry. ‘I’m sure of it. And there’s nothing anyone one can do or say to convince me otherwise.’

Chapter Eight

‘Probably best if you start from the beginning,’ Harry said.

‘You’re not seriously going to listen to this, are you?’ Patricia huffed. ‘He’s tired, he’s upset, we all are, but this, what he said he saw, it’s not real, is it? And we shouldn’t be encouraging it either.’

‘Your dad says he saw something,’ Dan said, stepping round to his wife, and Harry heard just the faintest of tension in the man’s voice. ‘Whatever it was, we have to give him a chance to explain, don’t we?’

‘Well, I’m not going to stand around and listen to it!’ Patricia said, then with a sharp turn, whipped away from her husband’s side and strode out of the room.’

‘Apologies about that,’ Dan said.

‘Don’t be,’ Harry said. ‘I understand that this has been a pretty terrible week for the whole family. So, it’s fine, I promise you.’

‘If you don’t mind, I’ll go and see how she is,’ Dan said.

Harry gave a nod and watched the man leave. Then he rested his gaze back on James. ‘So, in your own time, if that’s okay. There’s no rush here. You just tell us what you saw and we’ll see what we’ve got.’

James Fletcher stood up, then walked over to the large bay windows, staring out into the thick darkness beyond.

‘I know that everyone thinks I’m mad,’ he said, ‘and I understand that, but I’m telling you, it was Helen.’

‘Where, exactly?’ Harry asked.

‘Probably easier if I show you,’ James said. ‘Come on.’

James led Harry and Matt back out of the lounge, down the hall, and to the door at the back of the house, grabbing a torch from a shelf to the left of the door. He tried it and the beam which came out was little more than the death throes of whatever battery was powering it.

‘Use mine,’ said a voice from down the hall and Harry saw Dan looking over at them. ‘It’s pitch black out there. I brought my own with us because I’ve experienced using James’ torches before, and they’re always a little bit, shall we say, temperamental.’

‘There’s nothing wrong with any of them!’ James said, lifting up the one he was holding. ‘And this one has done me well for years!’

‘Exactly.’ Dan smiled. ‘It’s ancient. Anyway, be careful. We don’t want to have to call an ambulance next, do we?’

James replaced his torch and grabbed Dan’s, switching it on as they stepped outside. The light flared out, bright and clear, and as James cast it around in front of him, Harry watched the beam cut through the dark up onto the fells beyond the garden.

‘My shed’s over there,’ James said, bringing the beam over to shine on a cabin, which to Harry looked more like somewhere you’d spend a week or two on holiday, rather than a place in which to do a bit of gardening.

‘This is certainly a bit grander than mine, I have to say,’ Matt said, as they entered the cabin.

Inside, the space was laid out in a very ordered fashion, with bespoke shelving and a workbench, a small stove in the corner, an armchair on which rested a book, and Harry remembered then what James had said earlier about Helen. Along one wall hung the most beautifully maintained garden tools Harry had ever seen. Which wasn’t saying much, seeing as he’d never actually owned any himself.

‘I was in my chair,’ James said, walking over to stand beside it. ‘I was reading and a movement caught my eye, out of that window there.’

Harry glanced at the window but couldn’t see anything through it, the night seemingly growing darker