Free Tainted Ground by Margaret Duffy Page B

close to Hinton Mill. It had not been fully redeveloped as the builder of the bungalows, which were rightly regarded as ‘cheap and nasty’, had gone bankrupt.
    Stonelake’s rented home was on the right-hand corner as one turned into the small estate and I drove by, turned in the cul-de-sac at the end and then approached it again, slowing right down, switching off the headlights. But for the sickly glow from one of the orange street lamps that had so exercised some of the residents in this heritage area the bungalow was in darkness.
    â€˜Stop, would you?’ Patrick requested.
    I pulled up and turned everything off, opened my window and there was silence but for a breeze rustling the leaves in the adjacent beech hedge. We sat there for a while – in this game you have to possess the patience of a cat – and then heard the distinct sound of a nearby dustbin lid clattering, a thump and, a couple of seconds later, the slam of a door.
    â€˜Down!’ Patrick hissed.
    On his side of the car footsteps approached and went by. As soon as they had gone past we sat up again and cautiously looked round. It was Stonelake, his dog with him on a lead, a shotgun crooked over his arm, walking quickly in the direction of where we had just turned the car.
    Then, man and dog some thirty yards from us, Patrick quietly got out and disappeared down the sideway from where the man had just emerged. Almost immediately he was back.
    â€˜I had an idea it was something like a whisky bottle that just went in the bin and I was right,’ he reported. ‘Shall we break all the rules and have a look round this place?’
    â€˜No, I think we should follow him,’ I said.
    There was a short silence and then he said, ‘It’s a real opportunity to see if he’s got anything illegal in there. We might even find the murder weapon!’
    â€˜Patrick, you
can’t
poke around in this man’s house without a search warrant,’ I said through my teeth.
    â€˜Ingrid—’
    â€˜You’ve had rather a lot to drink this evening and you’ve stopped
thinking
!’ I was really angry now.
    I could tell, even in the dark, that he was offended by this for, in truth, he had not overindulged. But it seemed better to use that as an excuse than to throw in his face the real reason for his bad judgement, which was that he had not yet adjusted to what I shall call the new rules of engagement.
    â€˜It’s been a long day,’ was all he muttered before shutting the car door and setting off in the direction Stonelake had gone. I went to follow, remembered the tracksuit again, changed into it in the street and caught up with him.
    When we reached the cul-de-sac we saw there was a wide gap between the bungalows where, presumably, it had been planned that the road would continue for the second phase of the development. A couple of yards of concrete petered out into churned-up mud and last year’s dead weeds. There was no moon and after leaving the street lights behind we were walking in almost total darkness. Neither of us was suitably shod, or dressed, for silent tracking, our only aid Patrick’s tiny ‘burglar’s’ torch, which he now switched on briefly to examine the ground.
    â€˜He has the dog with him,’ he whispered. ‘It’ll hear us and keep looking round.’
    â€˜He might be too drunk to notice unless it barks,’ I whispered back.
    We maintained silence after this and kept going almost blindly but seeming to be following a meandering path of sorts. I was expecting at every second to be challenged by Stonelake or even fired on by him.
    Then, up ahead, some hundred and fifty yards away, Stonelake switched on a torch. We instinctively crouched down but the beam was not being shone in our direction: he was merely using it to light his own way. Which, of course, was exceedingly useful to us. We watched the light jump around as man and dog negotiated a