Nightfall: The First Jack Nightingale Supernatural Thriller by Stephen Leather Read Free Book Online

from the ceiling. He looked around for a burglar-alarm console but couldn’t see one and there was no beeping to suggest that a system was working. There was no furniture and no pictures or mirrors on the wall. The house had been cleared but he had no way of knowing if professional burglars or a removal firm had taken everything away. There was a light switch by the door but nothing happened when Nightingale flicked it. He walked across the hallway, his black leather shoes squeaking on the marble, and tried another switch but that didn’t work either.
    Three oak doors led off the hallway. Nightingale pushed one open and stepped into a room the size of a basketball court with a vaulted ceiling and a massive white marble fireplace. The room was also devoid of furniture and the carpets had been taken up to reveal oak floorboards. Patches of underlay were stuck to them, like flaking skin, and around the edge, close to the skirting-board, he noted the metal tacks that had been used to keep the carpet in place. Whoever had lifted the carpets had simply ripped them up.
    Along one wall a line of windows looked over ornamental gardens with bushes that had been trained into the shapes of exotic animals. Nightingale saw a giraffe, an elephant and a line of horses, and beyond them what looked like a hedge maze. The curtains had been removed but the brass rods from which they had hung were still in place. Nightingale frowned when he saw a small CCTV camera in one corner of the room, aimed at the windows. He could understand the need for security on the exterior of the building but having them inside seemed like overkill.
    He saw something on the mantelpiece and walked over to it, the floorboards creaking underfoot. It was an envelope, with his name printed on it in slightly uneven typing. As he reached for it he heard a bang upstairs and flinched. He listened intently but heard nothing. He picked up the envelope. Something shifted inside it. He was about to open it when he heard another noise from the upper floor, this time a scratching sound that lasted a second or two. He put the envelope into his jacket pocket and walked on tiptoe to the door. He listened, but heard nothing.
    The staircase that curved upwards was marble and he made no sound as he crept up it. He put his hand on the wooden banister as he craned his neck to look around the curve. The wall to the left was panelled and there were brass picture hooks from which large paintings had once hung.
    The stairway opened onto a landing that ran the length of the building. There were small chandeliers hanging every twelve feet or so, miniature replicas of the one in the downstairs hallway. To the left the landing would be above the large room he had been into so that was where he headed, still on tiptoe. There were CCTV cameras at either end and doors to left and right. He eased open the first on the left. The room was empty and, as in the room downstairs, the curtains had been removed. He closed the door quietly and opened the one opposite. That room, too, was empty.
    He pulled the door closed and moved silently down the corridor. He listened carefully at the next door before he put his hand on the brass handle and turned it. Inside this room there was furniture: a large four-poster bed and a green leather winged armchair. Dark green curtains were tied back with gold ropes. The bed was made, and didn’t appear to have been slept in, and the bathroom was spotless.
    He checked another nine bedrooms, all of which were empty, then went back downstairs. There was a large dining room, a study, another reception room, a huge kitchen, from which all the appliances had been removed, and a walk-in larder with bare shelves. Even the conservatory had been stripped. Nightingale looked out across a sweeping lawn to a small lake and a stable beside a large paddock. He shivered. There were cast-iron radiators dotted around the house but the heating system wasn’t working.
    He tried opening the