Free The Song Never Dies by Neil Richards Page B

Serious Business
    Jack leaned forward across the still-warm hood of the Sprite and focussed his binoculars.
    Kingfishers appeared bright and clear in the twin lens of his Swarovski special. Purchased for his new hobby of bird-watching, he realised he’d now used them more often for spying on suspects than catching glimpses of the elusive Red Footed Falcon.
    And from up here on the hill — where he’d met with Sarah just days ago — he could see the whole estate: roads in and out, and even a hidden route down to the house, following the tree-lined edges of the fields.
    The perfect vantage point.
    Slowly he scanned the house, gardens and outbuildings.
    A couple of cars — a Mercedes and an old Ford — were parked on the gravel out front, and he could see figures moving occasionally in the downstairs windows of the house.
    Jack guessed that the Mercedes belonged to Gail King.
    The Ford — that must be the housekeeper’s. Some discrete questioning at the Ploughman’s last night had revealed that — right now, with only Gail to look after — Kingfishers was being run by a skeleton staff.
    Which suited Jack just fine.
    He checked his watch, then took out his phone and dialled Sarah.
    “Jack.”
    “Nothing moving. So far …”
    “She must be running late.”
    “You don’t think the vicar changed the time of the meeting?”
    “No, he would have phoned me. Does it look like anyone else is in the house?”
    “Just the housekeeper.”
    “Not much we can do about her.”
    “I’ll just have to keep my head down. Ah, wait a minute …”
    Jack slipped the binoculars back up to his face: the front door of the house opened and Gail King hurried out, and climbed into the Mercedes.
    “Gail’s out. On her way.”
    “Great.”
    “Gives you a couple of hours, Jack. That’s the best we could do.”
    “It’ll be enough. By the way — what do I owe the good Reverend Hewitt?”
    “He said your occasional presence in church would be payment enough. And if not that, then a donation to the roof fund.”
    “The roof it is then,” said Jack. “Text me the second she heads back here, okay?”
    “Will do. Oh, and Jack, I found a couple of interesting things online …”
    “Sounds good — meet for lunch, huh?”
    “Usual place. See you there.”
    Sarah hung up.
    Jack put the phone away, then raised the binoculars again and trained them on the house.
    Sarah’s plan — to suggest a joint meeting with her, the vicar and Gail to finalise the publicity for the memorial service tomorrow — had worked. The vicar was an old friend of Sarah’s father, and knew what she and Jack did in their spare time.
    More than once he’d helped them out — as long as his role didn’t require any dishonesty or anything remotely immoral.
    Heaven forbid.
    Luckily, the vicar had seen the benefit of setting up such a meeting with Sarah and Gail at short notice — and given the delicate reasons for it, had agreed to suggest that he only had space in his diary for a ten o’clock start.
    The question was — would the housekeeper now do her regular shop in the village?
    Sarah felt she would. Jack was not so sure.
    But then …
    Jack saw the door open again, and the young woman who had served them coffee appeared clutching empty shopping bags. He watched her climb in the car, start it up, and head off.
    He checked his watch and set its alarm.
    To be safe — one hour.
    He’d need be quick.
    He put the binoculars back in their case, and headed across the track and into the field that sloped down towards the house.
    *
    Ten minutes later, Jack was standing against the pool house wall, carefully scanning the formal garden and the back of Kingfishers.
    No sign of movement in the house. And no sound coming from any of the outbuildings.
    Were there alarms? He couldn’t see any tell-tale cables or boxes on the wall of the studio.
    Funny. There must be a lot of expensive gear in there. Why not install an alarm?
    Then again — if the studio users had