"Gill, B.M. - Death Drop" - читать интересную книгу автора (Gill B M)

Was it an accident? Or suicide? Or murder?

When 12-year-old David is found blindfolded and dead at the bottom of a ship's hold while on a school outing, the headmaster claims the tragedy was due to an accident. But the boy's father begins his own investigation and very quickly he uncovers a tawdry and messy web of secrecy, jealousy and cover-up.




B.M. Gill

Death Drop



One

THE MORTUARY WAS in the hospital grounds. Fleming had imagined a cement building lurking down one of Marristone's side streets. This place stood high on the Kent cliffs and had been weathered by salt winds. The smell -- out here, at least -- was the almond of gorse and the tang of seaweed. Gulls swooped in the breeze and the cold sun lay in splashes on his hands. He was perpetually cold as if he walked in heavy breakers through an icy sea. The coldness had started permeating him during the headmaster's longdistance phone call to the Bombay office. In the heat of an Indian afternoon it had crept through his pores with each word spoken.

"David has had an accident. A fall down the hold of a ship at the Maritime Museum."

"Dear sweet Christ! How badly hurt is he?"

A silence for a couple of minutes and then Brannigan's appalled voice had faltered on, "In all my time at Marnstone Grange I've never before had to tell a parent that his son ..." He hadn't been able to get it out. The death of a twelve-year-old was an obscenity.

Fleming had caught the first flight to England. Brannigan had met him at Heathrow and he had spent last night at the school house. Through a miasma of anger rather than grief -- as yet the wound was too anaesthetised by shock for him to feel -- he had listened to Brannigan's explanation. The boys had been in the care of Hammond, one of the housemasters. They were working on a project on maritime history and were given separate assignments on board ship. David's assignment had been on the poop deck. For some reason best known to himself he had gone to the lower deck where the open hatch was. At this point Brannigan had looked away from him. "He had blindfolded himself--an imaginative twelve-year-old playing out an adventure film, perhaps. His hands were free. I have questioned everyone concerned very closely -- there was no-one near him at the time."

Fleming, who had until then visualised a rubber-soled shoe slipping on a companionway, felt the new shock like a sword thrust in the gut. If negligence -- or worse -- could be proved, he had told Brannigan, he would take the school apart brick by brick.

Brannigan, grey-faced, had deferred argument. His tolerance and understanding coupled with Mrs. Brannigan's nervous and highly emotional hospitality were more than he could take. This morning, after one night at the school, he had arranged accommodation at The Lantern, one of the inns at Marristone Port. Brannigan's offer to accompany him to the mortuary he had crisply declined.

"Then let Dr. Preston go with you. It's too much of an ordeal to face on your own. I had arranged for the three of us to be there at eleven."

It was necessary to see the doctor. He had agreed to that.

It had already gone eleven. He began walking restlessly along the cliff path. The doctor was late. God damn them all in this place. And then he heard a car coming and retraced his steps.

There were two cars drawing up in the parking area by the mortuary. The first was a sleek, maroon Dolomite. The second a rusty black Morris Minor. Whoever was in it stayed in it. The owner of the Dolomite came to meet him -- a big, balding man in a grey tweed suit.

He thrust out his hand. "Mr. Fleming? I'm sorry you had to wait. I assumed you'd be at the school house."

"Under the circumstances?"

"Both Brannigan and his wife are deeply distressed."

"Naturally ... the reputation of the school . . ." It was vicious.

"That, too -- but not just that. They're caring people. You malign them."

"Let's get on with it, shall we?"

Preston walked with him towards the mortuary. "There aren't any adequate phrases of sympathy. I'm sorry. We all are. The only consolation I can offer is that David died instantly and without pain. The fall broke his neck. I know that without a post-mortem, but the post-mortem will confirm it. I don't expect the pathologist to find anything else."