"Guy N. Smith - Sabat 4 - The Druid Connection" - читать интересную книгу автора (Smith Guy N)

true. At least, Owen always wore a signet ring.

'Well, we'll have to leave the CID chaps to scour this churchyard.' The police
officer stroked a neat pencil moustache and was only too willing to retire to
the local station and commence his written report. Anything to get away from
that!

'I suppose . . . * Boyce drew a deep breath and was well aware how his heart
was pounding inside his fleshy chest, 'I suppose you've no idea . . . I mean,
how could a body just become incinerated like that?'

'I've no idea,' Detective Inspector Groome spoke abruptly. 'There does not
appear to have been any fire except that which consumed the body. Although the
undergrowth and that adjoining tomb are scorched, they aren't burned.^

'Perhaps he was struck by lightning,' Boyce offered, habitually extending his
tongue and licking a small wart which grew on his thick lower lip.

'There was no storm last night.'

'A thunderbolt then.'

'Or the Hammer of Thor,' the policeman said sarcastically as he turned away.
'These boys will come up with the answer in due course, Bishop. In the
meantime I've got work to do. I'll be in touch with you.'

Bishop Boyce stood there in the lychgate and waited for his composure to
return. He was badly shaken but he hoped the others had not noticed it.
Certainly Mannering hadn't. If there had been foul play then it was beyond his
own ken. And that was what really worried him.

Bishop Boyce stood six feet, four-and-a-half inches in his stockinged feet.
He'd gained a Blue at Oxford for rugby and had boxed well in those far off
days when his huge body had been rippling muscle. Now, at fifty, that muscle
had turned to fat, and the small eyes which were almost buried in the fleshy
sockets demanded that glasses be worn; rimless ones that gave him a sort of
owlish appearance. His dark hair had silvered and was thinning outwards from
the crown. During his appearances at cathedral services his capacious robes
hid the full extent of his expanding stomach, and rarely was he to be seen
publicly except on diocesan business. He liked to think that people described
him as 'a big man'. Size was imposing, authoritative; it dominated lesser men.

Once back in his limousine, his chauffeur having been instructed to return to
the palace, Boyce pulled a cigar out of his leather case, expertly bit off the
end and spat it through the partly open window with no small degree of
accuracy. He drew the rich havana smoke down into his lungs and expelled it
slowly. He wouldn't throw up now. Owen was dispensable, as was any mediocre
curate. Young men were queuing up to join the Church, professing to having
received a 'calling' because jobs were scarce. So they kidded the Church to
let them kid the people. Bloody fools, it was a career just like industry or