The Stabbing in the Stables by Simon Brett Read Free Book Online

enormous coiled-up strength within. Softly, almost caressing, she moved her hand lower, down the straight ridge of bone until she began to feel the angularity of the knee. Chieftain stamped and skittered uneasily. She was getting near to the trouble.
    Sonia Dalrymple brought her head close to the horse’s, and murmured soft words of comfort to him. He was partially reassured, but the tension within his huge frame tightened a few more notches.
    So slowly that the movement could not be seen, Jude let her hand slide down over the irregularities of the knee. “This is where the trouble is, all right. It feels like it’s on fire.”
    â€œActually burning hot? So it’s infected?”
    â€œPossibly. But it’s not that kind of heat. It’s a heat I can sense rather than feel…from where the focus of the pain is.”
    â€œBut can you heal it?”
    Jude grinned ruefully. “I can try. I’m afraid any healer who guarantees to cure a problem is a healer I wouldn’t trust.”
    â€œWell, please do your best. Chieftain hates not being able to gallop around…don’t you, boy?”
    The horse let out a long shuddering breath of assent.
    â€œAll right,” said Jude, slowly bringing her other hand down till the two encircled the injured joint, “let’s see what we can do.”
    Â 
    Carole was feeling restless. The Times crossword, her daily anti-Alzheimer’s exercise, was proving particularly intractable. She had a feeling they’d got a new compiler, and his mind—she felt sure it was a he, with an illogical masculine mind—didn’t work the same way as hers did. Or the same way generations of other Times crossword compilers had trained hers to work.
    She knew, though, that the unyielding crossword was a symptom rather than a cause of her malaise. Partly she was frustrated by the knowledge that Jude was over at Sonia Dalrymple’s house, possibly getting vital inside information about the background to Walter Fleet’s murder.
    But Carole had another, more enduring, anxiety. It had been a long time since she’d heard from her son and daughter-in-law. September and the magical Fedborough wedding of Stephen and Gaby now seemed a long time ago. At the time, Carole had felt a rapprochement with the younger Seddons, even—in spite of the presence of her ex-husband David—a sense of family. And that had been maintained by frequent phone calls after their honeymoon and a surprisingly jolly visit to Fethering at Christmas. But through January and into February communication had become much less spontaneous and frequent. Carole, who, in spite of her forthright exterior, was always ready to put herself in the wrong, wondered what she had done.
    Stephen, she knew, was always busy, doing whatever it was he did. Their increasing closeness had not brought with it a greater understanding of his work; still all Carole knew was that it involved money and computers. Gaby too had a demanding job as a theatrical agent. No doubt they were just preoccupied with the frenetic lifestyle of a successful, newly married couple about London. No reason why they should think much about their parents’ generation.
    But this likely explanation did not allay Carole’s unease. There was another detail that troubled her. Stephen and Gaby were still living in his house in Fulham. At one stage—indeed when she was first introduced to Gaby—they had been down in West Sussex house hunting, with a view to moving out of London. Such plans had still been being discussed in the run-up to Christmas, but since then…no mention.
    Carole could not hide her disappointment from herself. Though, if ever the subject had come up in company, she had treated their potential move rather as an inconvenience, huffing about being quite all right on her own and not wanting her privacy invaded, she had secretly welcomed the idea. And she was surprised by how much the