CHAPTER NINE1
It was dusk before Macdonald reached home again on that Monday evening (and when he saw the lights gleaming from the windows of Fellcock, he realised how the solitary farmhouse indeed meant “home” to him, his own house, his own land). After leaving Mr. Staple to accompany Bord, Macdonald followed his own devices. He went to see Mrs. Brough, in the guise of sympathetic farming neighbour rather than of police officer, though in Macdonald’s case the two characters often merged into one. Mrs. Brough was a big stout old lady with a magnificent knot of white hair coiled above her plump rosy face. She was a fine upstanding woman, showing no tendency to weep or lament.
“I’m so very sorry about your husband’s accident,” said Macdonald. “I blame myself for it in a way. I sent him hur
