The Red Hand of Fury (Silas Quinn Mystery, Band 4) - Hardcover

Morris, R. N.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0727887858 ISBN 13: 9780727887856

Verlag: Severn House Publishers Ltd, 2018

Inhaltsangabe

A series of bizarre suicides leads Detective Inspector Silas Quinn to revisit his own troubled past …

June, 1914. A young man is mauled to death by a polar bear at London Zoo. Shortly afterwards, another young man leaps to his death from a notorious Suicide Bridge. Two seemingly unconnected deaths – and yet there are similarities.

Following a third attempted suicide, DI Silas Quinn knows he must uncover the link between the three men if he is to discover what caused them to take their own lives. The one tangible piece of evidence is a card found in each of the victims’ possession, depicting a crudely-drawn red hand. What does it signify? To find the answers, Quinn must revisit his own dark past. But can he keep his sanity in the process?

Über diesen Titel

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

R.N. Morris is the author of three previous Silas Quinn mysteries as well as the acclaimed St Petersburg historical crime series featuring detective Porfiry Petrovich from Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment. He lives in north London with his wife and two children.

Auszug. © Genehmigter Nachdruck. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.

The Red Hand Of Fury

A Silas Quinn mystery

By R. N. Morris

Severn House Publishers Limited

Copyright © 2018 R. N. Morris
All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-0-7278-8785-6

CHAPTER 1

10 July, 1914.

Stanley Ince looked out of a first-floor window, down on to No. 2 Airing Court. A group of about twenty or so male lunatics occupied themselves in various forms of activity, or, in the case of most of them, inactivity.

One stood talking to a tree. His head cocked intermittently to listen to the tree's responses. Stanley recognized him as one of the syphilitic patients.

A number of the men paced their own small patches of earth, wearing the lawn brown with their incessant steps. Round and round they went, in ever-diminishing circles, until each reached a point where they came to a stop, turned around and began the pacing again, gradually widening the spiral of their exercise. It was strange how this obsessive practice had recently spread among them, both the males and the females, despite the strict segregation of the sexes.

Two men occupied a bench, each staring straight out in front. He had seen them together before. Stanley didn't like it when they formed bonds like this. A single, isolated madman was bad enough. But when they started to conspire, well, there was no saying where that would end. He made a mental note to keep them apart in the future.

One of the younger attendants tried to engage three of them in a game of badminton, over a makeshift net strung between two trees. It was a fruitless task. The lunatics seemed to delight more in throwing their racquets as high as they could into the air.

Stanley shook his head disdainfully. He was about to open the window and shout a warning to his less experienced colleague when he caught sight of a solitary figure dressed in a gardener's smock, working patiently among the shrubs at the edge of the court. He could not see the man's face but he knew immediately who he was. Timon Medway cut a very distinct figure. It was almost as if there was a line drawn around him, a fine black border that marked him out as ... as being Timon Medway. Or perhaps it was more accurate to say that Medway emanated some special quality of his own. A kind of dark charisma.

Stanley had never admitted it to anyone. Hardly even to himself. But he could no longer deny the truth. He was afraid of them.

And he was afraid of Timon Medway most of all.

But whenever he was in the presence of any of them, he felt it. His scalp tingled. A cold sweat broke out over his back, trickling down his skin. He could taste the fear on his own breath.

There was only one way to get past that moment. A thump thrown out in passing. A chair leg driven down with force on to a bare foot. A twist and tug of hair. Or a lit match tossed casually into one of their faces.

Then he would be able to go on. To face them with equanimity. With a jaunty laugh even. To lay hands upon them in whatever way was required.

Of course you had to be careful.

Not everyone on the staff shared his approach. Some of the doctors were particularly fastidious.

You could test the water with a harmless jest at the lunatic's expense. If you got an appreciative laugh, you knew that here was someone you could get along with. You could risk a light slap around the chops. Nothing too heavy handed. Delivered with a brisk, jolly quip, to show that it's all meant in fun.

But if, at mere words, the other fellow tenses up, if his eyes challenge you with silent rebuke, then best to leave it at that. And be on your guard with him in the future.

Store up the slaps for later, when you're alone with one of them.

For you will need to buy your peace of mind somehow.

Of all the occupations in the world that he could have chosen, it was strange that he had ended up here, at Colney Hatch, working among them.

What was even stranger was how long he had stayed here. It was almost as if, however much he hated to be in their presence, he hated even more the thought of letting them out of his sight.

He could still remember the day he arrived at the asylum, even though it was over twenty years ago now.

It was a beautiful spring day. The trepidation that he had felt on the train turned to wonder at his first sight of the building. It was such a fine, grand edifice, a broad palace of a place, stretching out to possess the gentle slope upon which it had been built.

At that first glance, it was impossible to think of it as the home of madness and despair. The sunlight winked along the rows of windows. A sense of rational optimism seemed to emanate from the place. As if all that was needed to cure its inmates of whatever ailed them was a sunny day.

As he had approached the main entrance, walking through the well-kept gardens, breathing the floral scents, his ears pleasantly assailed by birdsong (and not the screams of the mad that he had expected), he almost felt that he would be turned back. That they would tell him there was no longer any need for his services. All the lunatics had been cured and sent home.

He had felt so hopeful that first day. Whatever was contained within that splendid building was not to be feared. This was the modern way to deal with a problem such as madness. To build a fine and well-appointed palace around it. Airy rooms, high ceilings, plenty of illumination. A pleasant aspect, good drainage, fresh air far from the smoke and grime of the city.

Nor had he entered there with any intent to harm the poor wretches who were to be given into his care. Indeed, he was drawn to the work by vaguely philanthropic sentiments. And by a strange and almost overpowering curiosity.

The truth is, he had no experience in administering to the mentally afflicted before that day, having previously worked as a porter in the freight yard at King's Cross. The idea of madness both appalled and fascinated him. He thought too that it would be easier work – physically, that is – than lugging crates about.

If he thought about the type of individual he would be called upon to look after, he imagined a weak and docile imbecile, who could be persuaded and directed by subtle guidance, the application of the gentlest pressure at the elbow perhaps.

All this was before he had clapped eyes on his first lunatic.

He had not counted on the calamitous effect that that would have upon his morale.

For in that encounter, madness ceased to be an abstract idea. It became real, dangerously personal, and frighteningly close.

He remembered the case well.

It was a young man, apparently of good family. His father, who was recently deceased, had been a doctor. It was said that the patient was studying medicine too. His father's death (the rumour was that he'd committed suicide) seemed to have precipitated some kind of crisis in the young man's mental equilibrium. A breakdown. His behaviour had become erratic, frightening to those who knew him. He had been making a nuisance of himself to his landlady's daughter and had threatened a fellow lodger with violence. A delusion had taken root in his mind that he had killed the other man, whom he saw as a rival for the girl's affections. There was no evidence that this was the case.

Some might consider it remarkable that Stanley could recollect so many details of the case. But this was his first exposure to an insane individual. It cannot be surprising that it made an impression upon him.

What struck him most about the young man – what shook him – was how, well, ordinary he looked. If you didn't know, you would never...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: Severn House Publishers Ltd
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2018
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 0727887858
• ISBN 13: 9780727887856
• Einband: Gebundene Ausgabe
• Anzahl der Seiten: 240
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: Nicht verfügbar