Free The Messiah Secret by James Becker Page B

That’s why we can’t park any closer. The building’s losing bricks and masonry like a snake shedding its skin. We reckon it’ll be bulldozed inside a year.’
    ‘That’s a shame. I suppose it’s just deteriorated too much to save.’
    ‘That, plus the fact that the ungrateful relative who’s actually inherited the place – he’s a second cousin twice removed or something like that, according to Richard Mayhew – has already applied for planning permission to build houses in the parkland.’
    The front door was locked, so Angela rang the bell. ‘This is just a precaution,’ she said, ‘until we – or, to be exact, you – tell us we’re all imagining things.’
    The heavy door swung open and Richard Mayhew peered out at them, looking the image of a museum curator, Bronson thought.
    ‘Oh, it’s you, Angela,’ he said, testily. ‘Hello, Chris. This is completely unnecessary, you know. Angela’s reading far too much into things.’
    ‘If you don’t mind, Richard, I’ll be the judge of that. In my experience, Angela rarely overreacts.’
    Mayhew grunted, pulled the door wide open and stepped aside to let them enter the hall.
    ‘Thanks,’ Angela said, leading Bronson around the base of the main staircase and down a corridor towards theback of the house. ‘Thanks for backing me up like that. Richard’s one of those annoying people who always think they’re right.’
    Bronson smiled at her. ‘If you say there’s a problem, there’s a problem, and I’m here to fix it for you. Or at least I’ll try to.’
    Angela pushed open the door at the end of the short corridor and stepped through into the kitchen. ‘This is where I’ve been working,’ she said, indicating the old table partially covered in assorted china and ceramics.
    ‘You make coffee and tea for the chaps in here, do you?’ Bronson asked.
    ‘In their dreams.’ Angela put her bag at the end of the table. ‘If they want drinks, they make their own. But I am prepared to make you a coffee, if you’d like one.’
    Bronson nodded. ‘While you’re doing that, let me take a quick look at that window.’
    Angela plugged in the kettle and pointed towards a door on one side of the kitchen. ‘Down there,’ she said. ‘That corridor runs along the back of the house. The window we found unlocked was at the far end.’
    Bronson strode out of the room. He wasn’t gone for long. Angela had only just finished making two mugs of coffee when he walked back into the kitchen.
    ‘Did one of you jam the catch with a screw?’ he asked.
    ‘Yes. I did. It seemed very loose, so I thought it was a good idea.’
    ‘I’ve found what look like fresh scratch marks on thatcatch. I think they’re recent because there are a couple of flakes of paint still attached to one of the scratches. It looks to me like somebody has tried slipping the catch with something like a Slim Jim – you know, a thin length of steel?’
    Angela looked alarmed.
    ‘Well, someone’s been using something similar to try to get that window open,’ Bronson continued. ‘He’s been sliding a steel tool between the two parts of the sash window and trying to undo the catch. The marks are quite unmistakable. The good news is that the screw you jammed into the mechanism stopped him from doing it. The bad news is that I found similar marks on the catches of all the windows along that corridor, so it was obviously a very determined attempt to break in.’
    ‘Are you sure? I mean, couldn’t those marks have been there for some time?’
    Bronson picked up his mug of coffee. ‘Not really, no. I reckon your intruder tried really hard to open the window with the loose catch, because there are more scratches on that than any of the others. He didn’t get anywhere, because you’d jammed it, so he tried all the other windows at the back of the house, then he gave up.’
    Angela shivered and rubbed her arms.
    ‘Come and take a look at this,’ Bronson said, moving to the kitchen