Free Scaring Crows by Priscilla Masters Page A

searched around the dim panorama, unable to pick out even that one neighbour’s light.
    â€˜They’ve all got something to do with it,’ she said, ‘until proved otherwise.’
    Mike mopped his forehead. ‘Why does it seem to get hotter at night?’ He slapped his arm. ‘And these bloody mosquitoes.’
    â€˜Well I’d rather have mosquitoes,’ Joanna said, ‘than those ghastly, repulsive flies. The way they buzzed around the bodies turned my stomach.’
    â€˜Trouble is,’ Mike said grumpily, ‘we just aren’t acclimatized to this sort of heat.’
    They left the two officers to their vigil and walked companionably for a few minutes before Joanna ventured to ask, ‘You don’t mind coming to interview Mr Mothershaw tonight, do you?’
    â€˜Well, I wasn’t going to go home anyway. Not until later. It’s my night at the gym.’
    â€˜Bit late for that, isn’t it?’
    â€˜It shuts late,’ he said shortly and she refrained from comment. But she had noticed Mike’s increased irritability, put it down to the weather. She had noticed something else too, something that could not be attributed to the hot weather. Detective Sergeant Mike Korpanski had recently been wearing some very flashy ties.
    They continued further in silence.
    And suddenly the night dropped down from the sky, like a navy, woollen blanket. The way forward was invisible. ‘Now from what Hannah Lockley was saying the Owl Hole is somewhere beyond the milking shed through the trees.’ Joanna flashed her torch ahead of them, lighting up a pair of frightened rabbit’s eyes and a narrow lane which curved ahead. Either side of the lane tall trees bowed into an archway. All was still. The entire night was holding its breath for the next development. The stillness was oppressive and not for the first time since she had come to Leek Joanna was glad of Mike’s bulky presence.
    One of the trees was filled with squawking rooks which started quarrelling as the two police officers passed and a few of them were ousted from their perches. They flapped their heavy black wings and croaked their objections before settling back. And all was still again.
    Quiet and still.
    Mike spoke at her elbow. ‘Can’t stand the damned rooks. Noisy bloody things, aren’t they? No wonder the farmers like aiming pot shots at them. Bloody carrion.’
    â€˜Well, it wasn’t a rook someone took a pot shot at this morning,’ she observed drily, “but the farmer himself. And it wasn’t the rooks that did it. Mike,’ she touched his arm, ‘do you think that’s the place?’
    Across the top of the thick trees they could vaguely make out a faint glimmer of light.
    â€˜I suppose it has to be. There isn’t exactly anywhere else, is there?’
    â€˜Nowhere.’
    The lane came to an abrupt end in a wooden stile. To the right a narrow path wound through the trees and out of sight.
    A round building was vaguely silhouetted through the branches, tall and tapering towards the top.
    â€˜It looks a bit like a windmill.’
    â€˜A windmill that’s lost its sails.’
    â€˜What did Miss Lockley say it was? A grain store. Well, let’s see what our sculptor has to reveal to us. I don’t fancy getting lost in these woods with our killer still on the loose.’
    â€˜The daughter.’ Mike said the words with difficulty and she knew her apprehension had communicated to him. ‘What if it’s her. What if she has flipped her lid and she’s hanging around here somewhere?’
    As far as we know she’ll be unarmed,’ Joanna said calmly. ‘Barra’s taken the gun.’ She couldn’t resist pulling his leg. ‘Not nervous, are you, Mike?’
    â€˜Not a hundred per cent happy,’ he admitted and she walked the next few yards reflecting on how much their relationship had changed in the five