The dead of Jericho Read Online Free

car and stood in the rain awhile, looking up at the dirtyish yellow tower that dominated the streets. A quick look inside, perhaps? But the door was locked, and Morse was reading the notice explaining that the regrettable cause of it all was adolescent vandalism when he heard the voice behind him.
    'Is this your car?'
    A young, very wet traffic warden, the yellow band round her hat extremely new, was standing beside the Jaguar, trying bravely to write down something on a bedrenched page of her notebook.
    'All right, aren't I?' mumbled Morse defensively, as he walked down the shallow steps of the church towards her.
    'You're over the white line and you'll have to back it up a bit. You've plenty of room.'
    Morse dutifully manoeuvred the Jaguar until it stood more neatly within its white box, and then wound down the window. 'Better?'
    'You ought to lock your doors if you're going to stay here — two hours, remember. A lot of cars get stolen, you know.'
    'Yes, I always lock— '
    'It wasn't locked just now!'
    'I was only seeing if... '
    But the young lady had walked on, apparently unwilling to discuss her edicts further, and was writing out a sodden ticket for one of the hapless non-permit holders just a little way up the street when Morse called out to her.
    'Canal Reach? Do you know it?'
    She pointed back up to Canal Street. 'Round the corner. Third on the left.'
     
    In Canal Street itself, two parking tickets, folded in cellophane containers, and stuck beneath the windscreen wipers, bore witness to the conscientious young warden's devotion to her duties; and just across the road, on the corner of Victor Street, Morse thought he saw a similar ticket on the windscreen of an incongruously large, light-blue Rolls Royce. But his attention was no longer focused on the problems of parking. A sign to his left announced 'Canal Reach'; and he stopped and wondered. Wondered why exactly he was there and what (if anything) he had to say to her...
    The short, narrow street, with five terraced houses on either side, was rendered inaccessible to motor traffic by three concrete bollards across the entrance, and was sealed off at its far end by the gates of a boat-builder's yard, now standing open. Bicycles were propped beside three of the ten front doors, but there was little other sign of human habitation. Although it was now beginning to grow dark, no light shone behind any of the net-curtained windows, and the little street seemed drab and uninviting. These were doubtless some of the cheaper houses built for those who once had worked on the canal: two up, two down — and that was all. The first house on the left was number 1, and Morse walked down the narrow pavement, past number 3, past number 5 , past number 7 — and there he was, standing in front of the last house and feeling strangely nervous and undecided. Instinctively he patted the pocket of his raincoat for a packet of cigarettes, but found he must have left them in the car. Behind him, a car splashed its way along Canal Street, its side-lights already switched on.
    Morse knocked, but there was no answer. Just as well, perhaps? Yet he knocked again, a little louder this time, and stood back to look at the house. The door was painted a rust-red colour, and to its right was the one downstairs window, its crimson curtains drawn across; and just above it, the window of the first floor bedroom where — Just a minute! There was a light. There was a light here. It seemed to Morse that the bedroom door must be open, for he could see a dull glow of light coming from somewhere: coming from the other room across the landing, perhaps? Still he stood there in the drizzling rain and waited, noting as he did so the attractive brickwork of the terrace, with the red stretchers alternating in mottled effect with the grey-blue contrast of the headers.
    But no one answered at the rust-red door.
    Forget it? It was stupid, anyway. He'd swallowed rather too much beer at lunch time, and the slight