A Violent End. Emma Page

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COPYRIGHT

      Harper An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF

       www.harpercollins.co.uk

      First published in Great Britain in 1990 by Collins Crime

      Copyright © Emma Page 1990

      Emma Page asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

      A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

      This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

      All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

      HarperCollinsPublishers has made every reasonable effort to ensure that any picture content and written content in this ebook has been included or removed in accordance with the contractual and technological constraints in operation at the time of publication.

      Source ISBN: 9780008175801

      Ebook Edition © MARCH 2016 ISBN: 9780008175818

      Version [2016-02-18]

DEDICATION

      FOR CHRISTOPHER

      with much love

      (To say: Well done!)

      CONTENTS

       Cover

       Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

       Chapter 7

       Chapter 8

       Chapter 9

       Chapter 10

       Chapter 11

       Chapter 12

       Chapter 13

       Chapter 14

       Chapter 15

       Chapter 16

       Chapter 17

       Chapter 18

       Chapter 19

       Chapter 20

       Chapter 21

       Chapter 22

       About the Author

       By Emma Page

       About the Publisher

CHAPTER 1

      On this Friday morning in mid-November the long spell of golden autumn weather showed signs of coming to an end. Swirls of cloud, gunmetal grey, slipped along through the lower sky, the freshening wind held a threat of rain.

      In the scattered hamlet of Overmead, a mile or two to the east of Cannonbridge, lights shone out from isolated homesteads. Three-quarters of a mile beyond the silent, shadowy expanses of Overmead Wood, a neglected stretch of open woodland, a side road, scarcely more than a glorified lane, branched northwards from the main thoroughfare running out of Cannonbridge. Some five hundred yards along the side road stood Jubilee Cottage, the home of Ian and Christine Wilmot, in a sizable garden still bright with Michaelmas daisies, chrysanthemums, yellow poppies.

      The cottage had been converted a few years ago from a pair of semi-detached Edwardian dwellings set at right-angles to each other. It was now a handsome, substantial, many-gabled residence with ornamental windows and or­nate chimneystacks, its mellow, rosy brick elegantly set off by cream-coloured paintwork, brilliant swags of scarlet pyracantha berries round the doors and windows.