Scarlet Widow (45 page)
Authors: Graham Masterton
“God Almighty. These must have been here for a pretty long time. There isn’t a scrap of flesh left on any of them.”
“An unmarked grave, I’d say,” put in Gabriel. “A bunch of fellows who got on the wrong side of the IRA.”
“Scared the shite out of me,” said Finbar, wiping his nose on his sleeve. “I was digging away and all of a sudden there was this skull grinning up at me like my old uncle Billy.”
John picked up a long iron spike and prodded amongst the bones. He saw a jawbone, and part of a ribcage, and another skull. That made at least five bodies. There was only one thing to do, and that was to call the Garda.
“You don’t think your dad knew about this?” asked Gabriel, as John walked back to the house.
“What do you mean? Of course he didn’t know.”
“Well, he was a great republican, your dad.”
John stopped and stared at him. “What are you trying to say?”
“I’m not trying to say nothing, but if certain people wanted a place to hide certain remains that they didn’t want nobody to find, your dad might have possibly obliged them, if you see what I mean.”
“Oh, come on, Gabriel. My dad wouldn’t have allowed bodies to be buried on his property.”
“I wouldn’t be too sure, John. There was certain stuff buried here once, under the cowshed, for a while.”
“You mean guns?”
“I’m just saying that it might be better for all concerned if we forgot what we found here. They’re dead and buried already, these fellows, why disturb them? Your dad’s dead and buried, too, you don’t want people raking over his reputation now, do you?”
John said, “Gabe, these are human beings, for Christ’s sake. If we just cover them up, there are going to be five families who will never know where their sons or their husbands went. Can you imagine anything worse than that?”
“Well, I suppose you’re right. But it still strikes me as stirring up trouble when there’s no particular call to.”
John went into the house. It was gloomy inside, and it always smelled of damp at this time of year. He took off his boots and washed his hands in the small cloakroom at the side of the hall. Then he went into the large quarry-tiled kitchen where his mother was baking. She seemed so small these days, with her white hair and her stooped back and her eyes as pale as milk. She was sieving out flour for tea brack.
“Did you finish the plowing, John?” she asked him.
“Not quite. I have to use the telephone.”
He hesitated. She looked up and frowned at him. “Is everything all right?”
“Of course, mam. I have to make a phone call, that’s all.”
“You were going to ask me something.” Oh, she was cute, his mother.
“Ask you something? No. Don’t worry about it.” If his father really had allowed the IRA to bury bodies on his land, he very much doubted that he would have confided in his mother. What you don’t know can’t knock on your door in the middle of the night.
He went into the living-room with its tapestry-covered furniture and its big red-brick fireplace, where three huge logs were crackling and Lucifer the black Labrador was stretched out on the rug with his legs indecently wide apart. He picked up the old-fashioned black telephone and dialed 112.
“Hallo? I want the Garda. I need to speak to somebody in charge. Yes. Well, this is John Meagher up at Meagher’s Farm in Knocknadeenly. We’ve dug up some bodies.”
The Scarlet Widow
London, 1750
Beatrice Scarlet is the apothecary’s daughter. She can mix medicines and herbs to save the lives of her neighbours - but, try as she might, she can’t save the lives of her parents. An orphan at just sixteen, Beatrice marries a preacher and emigrates to America.
New Hampshire, 1756
In the farming community where Beatrice now lives, six pigs are found viciously slaughtered; slices of looking-glass embedded in their mouths. According to scripture, this is the work of Satan – but Beatrice Scarlet suspects the hands of men. As she closes in on the killer, she must act quickly to unmask him – or become the next victim herself…
‘One of the most original and frightening storytellers of our time.’
Peter James
‘One of the few true masters.’
James Herbert
‘Graham Masterton’s best book yet, and that’s as good as they come!’
John Farris
‘His setting is unique, his killer is gruesomely fascinating, and his storyteller is visceral and graphic.’
Booklist
‘A superlative writer.’
Philadelphia Inquirer
‘The living inheritor to the realm of Edgar
Allen Poe.’
San Francisco Chronicle
‘[Masterton] moves from the familiar and credible to the fanciful and disturbing. The drama is tense, the writing superb.’
Sunday Times
‘Multifaceted and fascinating.’
Los Angeles Times
‘A mesmerizing storyteller whose fascination with the finer points of human weakness and deft touch keep the pages turning.’
Publishers Weekly
G
RAHAM
M
ASTERTON
was a bestselling horror and thriller writer for many years before he turned his talent to crimewriting. He lived in Cork for five years, an experience that inspired the Katie Maguire series. Scarlet Widow came out of his many visits to New England, and introduces his new heroine Beatrice Scarlet
Find out more on Graham’s website,
www.grahammasterton.co.uk
or connect with him on Twitter,
@GrahamMasterton
London, 1750
Beatrice Scarlet is the apothecary’s daughter. She can mix medicines and herbs to save the lives of her neighbours - but, try as she might, she can’t save the lives of her parents. An orphan at just sixteen, Beatrice marries a preacher and emigrates to America.
New Hampshire, 1756
In the farming community where Beatrice now lives, six pigs are found viciously slaughtered; slices of looking-glass embedded in their mouths. According to scripture, this is the work of Satan – but Beatrice Scarlet suspects the hands of men. As she closes in on the killer, she must act quickly to unmask him – or become the next victim herself...
The next gripping instalment in The Scarlet Widow series will be released in autumn 2017
Katie Maguire was one of seven sisters born to a police Inspector in Cork, but the only sister who decided to follow her father and join An Garda Siochana. With her bright green eyes and short red hair, she looks like an Irish pixie, but she is no soft touch. To the dismay of some of her male subordinates, she rose quickly through the ranks, gaining a reputation for catching Cork’s killers, often at great personal cost. Katie spent seven years in a turbulent marriage with builder Paul Maguire, with whom she bore, and lost, a son. She is now in a long-distance relationship with Irish-American John Meagher.
One wet, windswept November morning, a field on Meagher’s farm gives up the dismembered bones of eleven women...
Their skeletons bear the marks of a meticulous butcher. The bodies date back to 1915. All were likely skinned alive.
But then a young woman goes missing, and her remains, the bones carefully stripped and arranged in an arcane pattern, are discovered on the same farm.
With the crimes of the past echoing in the present, D.S. Katie Maguire must solve a decades-old murder steeped in ancient legend... before this terrifying killer strikes again.
White Bones
is available
here
.
As they came nearer, the black-clad body came into view, lying on its side in the shallows…
One cold spring morning in County Cork, two fishermen find a body floating in the Blackwater River: the mutilated corpse of a retired music teacher. His hands and feet are bound, and his neck bears the mark of a garrotting wire.
The Garda want to wrap this case up before the press get hold of it. But when a second man is found murdered, the body bears all the same marks as the first. And Detective Superintendent Katie Maguire fears this case carries the hallmark of a serial murderer…