Where the Dead Lie by C. S. Harris EPUB & PDF – eBook Details Online
- Author: C. S. Harris
- Language: English
- Genre: Historical Mystery, Thriller & Suspense Fiction
- Format: PDF / EPUB
- Size: 2 MB
- Price: Free
Monday, 13 September 1813, the hours before dawn
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The boy hated this part. Hated the eerie way the pale, waxen faces of the
dead seemed to glow in the faintest moonlight. Hated being left alone with
a stiffening body while he dug its grave.
He kicked the shovel deep into the ground and felt his heart leap
painfully in his chest when the scrape of dirt against metal sounded
dangerously loud in the stillness of the night. He sucked in a quick breath,
the musty smell of damp earth thick in his nostrils, his fingers tightening on
the smooth wooden handle as he paused to cast a panicked glance over one
shoulder.
A mist was drifted up from the Fleet to curl around the base of the
nearby shot tower and creep along the crumbling brick walls of the
abandoned warehouses beyond it. He heard a dog bark somewhere in the
distance and, nearer, a soft thump.
What was that?
The boy waited, his mouth dry, his body tense and trembling. But the
sound was not repeated. He swiped a ragged sleeve across his sweaty face,
swallowed hard, and bent into his work. He was uncomfortably aware of
the cloaked gentleman watching from the seat of the cart that waited at the
edge of the field. The gentleman had helped drag Benji’s body over to the
looming shot tower. But he never helped dig. Gentlemen didn’t dig graves,
although they could and did kill with a vicious delight that made the boy
shiver as he threw another shovelful of dirt onto the growing pile.
The hole was beginning to take shape. Another six inches or so and
he’d—
“Hey!”
The boy’s head snapped around, and he froze.
A ragged, skeletally thin figure lurched from the gaping doorway of one
of the tumbledown warehouses. “Wot ye doin’ there?”
The shovel hit the ground with a clatter as the boy bolted. He fell into
the newly dug grave and went down, floundering in the loose dirt. Feet
flailing, he reared up on splayed hands, found solid ground, and pushed off.
“Oye!” shouted the ghostly specter.
The boy tore across the uneven field, his breath soughing in and out, his
feet pounding. He saw the gentleman in the cart jerk, saw him gather the
reins and spank them hard against his horse’s rump.
“Wait for me!” screamed the boy as the cart lurched forward, its ironrimmed wheels rattling over the rutted lane. “Stop!”
The gentleman urged the horse into a wild canter. He did not look back.
The boy leapt a low, broken stretch of the stone wall that edged the
field. “Come back!”
The cart careened around the corner and out of sight, but the boy tore
after it anyway. Surely the gentleman would stop for him? He wouldn’t
simply leave him, would he?
Would he?
The boy was sobbing now, his nose running, his chest aching as he
fought to draw air into his lungs.
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