Reginald Hill: Fell of Dark

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.

Harper HarperCollins Publishers 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

First published in Great Britain by HarperCollins Publishers in 1971

Copyright © Reginald Hill 1971

Reginald Hill asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

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.

HarperCollins Publishers 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: 9780007334797

Ebook Edition © OCTOBER 2015 ISBN: 9780007389162

Version: 2015-09-16

For my mother

I wake and feel the fell of dark, not day.

What hours, O what black hours we have spent

This night! what sights you, heart, saw.

— G. M. Hopkins

Cover

Title Page REGINALD HILL FELL OF DARK

Copyright COPYRIGHT Copyright Dedication Epigraph One Two Three Four Five Six Seven Eight Nine Ten Eleven Twelve Thirteen Fourteen Keep Reading About the Author By Reginald Hill About the Publisher 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. Harper HarperCollins Publishers 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF www.harpercollins.co.uk First published in Great Britain by HarperCollins Publishers in 1971 Copyright © Reginald Hill 1971 Reginald Hill asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library 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. HarperCollins Publishers 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: 9780007334797 Ebook Edition © OCTOBER 2015 ISBN: 9780007389162 Version: 2015-09-16

Dedication DEDICATION Dedication Epigraph One Two Three Four Five Six Seven Eight Nine Ten Eleven Twelve Thirteen Fourteen Keep Reading About the Author By Reginald Hill About the Publisher For my mother

Epigraph EPIGRAPH Epigraph One Two Three Four Five Six Seven Eight Nine Ten Eleven Twelve Thirteen Fourteen Keep Reading About the Author By Reginald Hill About the Publisher I wake and feel the fell of dark, not day. What hours, O what black hours we have spent This night! what sights you, heart, saw. — G. M. Hopkins

One ONE I possess the Englishman’s usual ambivalent attitude to the police. They are at once protectors and persecutors. They tell you the way, but they make you feel guilty for asking. I watch, or I used to watch, most of the ‘realistic’ TV series based on police-work with that fascinated revulsion which makes them so compelling. But I had often wondered why innocent people allowed themselves so readily to be manipulated by the police, why invitations to proceed to the station were not more frequently refused. Now I knew. Or at least I knew in my case. From the moment we had been stopped, a terrible passivity had begun to settle on me. It was a feeling that the quickest and surest way of getting back to normal was to sit very quietly and do as I was requested. It was rather like a child with a visit to the dentist in the offing, sitting as small as possible, hoping to be unnoticed, trying desperately not to obtrude. There hadn’t been any suggestion that we were doing anything but ‘helping with enquiries’. No question of our guilt or innocence seemed to be involved. I didn’t see how it possibly could be involved. But I didn’t feel innocent. And with Peter it was worse. Sitting pushed up against the car door (locked, I suspected), his unseeing gaze fixed on the rain-spattered window-pane, he didn’t even look innocent. I was much more concerned about him than I was about myself. At least that was what I liked to think. That was what I had been telling myself for a long time now. It was true! I assured myself fiercely. Of course it was true! If I looked back into the past, I would be able to prove quite convincingly that what had brought me to this police car, boring steadily through the rain up into the Lakeland fells, was a combination of my own altruism and the accidents of fate. Convincingly to anyone other than Janet, my wife, perhaps. And perhaps the police. And myself, perhaps.

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Keep Reading

About the Author

By Reginald Hill

About the Publisher

I possess the Englishman’s usual ambivalent attitude to the police. They are at once protectors and persecutors. They tell you the way, but they make you feel guilty for asking.

I watch, or I used to watch, most of the ‘realistic’ TV series based on police-work with that fascinated revulsion which makes them so compelling. But I had often wondered why innocent people allowed themselves so readily to be manipulated by the police, why invitations to proceed to the station were not more frequently refused.

Now I knew. Or at least I knew in my case. From the moment we had been stopped, a terrible passivity had begun to settle on me. It was a feeling that the quickest and surest way of getting back to normal was to sit very quietly and do as I was requested. It was rather like a child with a visit to the dentist in the offing, sitting as small as possible, hoping to be unnoticed, trying desperately not to obtrude.