Goat Parva Murders – 4

This excerpt is from the book entitled The Goat Parva Murders an English Murder Mystery book set in the countryside, starring two policemen who have been working together for a few years and get along really well. There’s lots of dialogue and banter with some humour thrown in amongst the murders and suspects.

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Colin Knowles was eating his breakfast of black pudding, baked beans, and two fried eggs when his mobile phone rang on the kitchen counter. Knowles hauled his overweight frame to an upright position and having run his fingers through what remained of his brown hair, he answered the ringing summons.

“’Allo, Barnesy, what have you got for me?”

Rod Barnes, his assistant, replied in his normal clipped tones.

“Dead bird-watcher, sir, up by Doggett’s Field. Lots of blood and the body has been interfered with after death by the looks of it.”

“Charming, Barnesy, I was just having my breakfast as well – these people have no sense of timing, no respect for people’s eating habits. I will be there when I have finished eating.”

Knowles rang off and returned to the table but decided not to have more ketchup on his black pudding after all – why did people get bludgeoned to death so much – he couldn’t eat breakfast any more without thinking of previous cases. He moved the black pudding to his cat’s bowl – Gemma would love that after hunting in the garden and catching nothing as usual. Poor cat.

Knowles belched and lit a cigarette before remembering what his doctor had advised and put the noxious weed out by burying it with the others in the rubber plant by the door. Gemma came in through the cat flap looking upset and Knowles rubbed her head, before Gemma smelled the black pudding, rushed to her bowl and tucked into the food. No murders for her to remember, thought Knowles, other than the mice of course. And that rabbit. He was brought out of his reverie by the phone – it was Barnes again.

“Bring some wellies, sir, it’s muddy around here.”

Knowles had them in his hand already; somehow Doggett’s Field was always wet even in the height of summer. He got into his Land Rover and set off to Goat Parva, a place he’d always regarded as strange and immoral.