John Hawkes - The Lime Twig

They stopped together at the stall door. They wiped their faces. They watched the water coming down the crevices in the wood, they inspected the hinges, the type of nail used, made note of a dead wasp caught on a green splinter. Then one pulled open the door and they stepped inside, looked up at the rafters, down at the straw, touched the wall planking with the very ends of their fingers, prodded the straw with their black shoes. And squatted and carefully took away the straw until Hencher’s legs were uncovered to the knees. One fetched a black rubber ground sheet from his car; they rolled and sealed up the body. The straw would have to be sifted through a screen.

They posted one of the drivers to guard the stall until the laboratory boys could take the body and the straw. The driver stood at attention, a lonely man in an empty stable with his shoulders black with rain and his chin pulled into his collar. He smelled the burden on the other side of the wood. It was darker now and the rain heavier.

Between the two gently rocking cars — machines heavy with the sounds of their engines and streaming black — the Violet Lane detectives faced each other, stood close together and stared into each other’s eyes. The mortuary bells were ringing and the water was coming off the brims of the bowlers.

“It’s never nice to find these fellows in the rain.”

“Well, I expect we’d best get on with it.”

“We could trace him through the laundries.”

“And there are always the tobacco shops, of course.”

“Right. I’ve made out well before with the laundries.”

“Go to it then. I’ll try the shops. …”

And in gloom, with the bells stroking and the wipers establishing the uncomfortable rhythm of the hour, the two wet men withdrew to the cars and in slow procession quit the sooty stables in Highland Green, drove separately through vacant city streets to uncover the particulars of this crime.