the original opening to a novel I ghost wrote.Different title, so I don't get sued.
He lifted his arm, a little too high.
It was to be the last thing the stonemason ever
did, as both the man and his work crashed to the floor of Westminster Abbey.
With all the concern about safety regulations, this shouldn’t happen in the 21st
century; hadn’t there been enough deaths building the abbey in the thousand
years before?
As he fell, the stonemason had two quick
thoughts. One involved him not being able to sorry to his wife that evening, as
he’d planned. The other was the inevitability of it all, as if everything in
his life had led to this place and this action. He wasn’t sure what that meant
but then it all went dark.
The stone hit the ground first smashing
into a grave and then splitting into two. One sizable chunk of rock hit one of
the Polish workmen and killed him instantly; the other embedded itself in the
main door on the west side of the abbey.
The stone had smashed onto a piece of
black Belgian marble that covered a tomb and this had caused the marble to
split up the middle and fall into the grave below. That was the way it remained
when Detective Inspector James Barclay of London’s Metropolitan police force
ran in through West door and out of the rain.
“So what have we got apart from a dead
Pole and a broken door? Not much, so can I safely leave this one with you detective.”
“It’s this, that’s the real problem, sir”
said the young detective. “And we haven’t let anyone know apart from your
department.”
Barclay stared into the hole.
“What am I looking at...Detective
Spencer? I can’t see anything apart from a grave with no sign of a body in it.”
“Exactly sir.”
“So maybe some grave robber made off
with the body in the bad old days.” D.I. Barclay was beginning to get annoyed;
these people were wasting his time.
“That’s just what your lot said when I
spoke to them over the telephone.”
“So why did I have to travel over here,
so urgently?” Barclay was ready to leave.
“Scotland Yard is only across the
street, sir.”
“Are you being insubordinate?”
“Sorry........sir but it’s who was in
the grave which is the important fact.”
“Surprise me.”
“It’s the Tomb of The Unknown Soldier”
said Spencer sticking his chest out, as if he was getting one over on his boss.
“And, it’s empty,” said, Barclay with a
sudden revelation.
bobby stevenson 2013
thoughtcontrol ltd
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