The Canal Murders (A Yorkshire Murder Mystery) by J. R. Ellis

Author:J. R. Ellis [Ellis, J. R.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Thomas & Mercer
Published: 2024-04-29T00:00:00+00:00

Janice Wallace was suspicious of her son’s behaviour recently. He had been out late the previous night and had come home in a strange state. It was mid-morning, and he was still in bed, which was unlike him, even on a Saturday when he wasn’t working. Something was going on and she didn’t like the feel of it.

She decided to investigate, and quietly ascended the narrow and steep flight of stairs. She would have been happier if he’d smuggled a girlfriend into his room. Not that he really needed to do that as she was broad-minded about such things. But this secretive stuff worried her, especially after what had happened to him before with the police.

She entered Sam’s dark room stealthily. It had the usual young man’s smell of sweat and unwashed clothes, but he kept it reasonably neat. She peered over him in his bed; there was no movement, just the sound of a gentle snore. She crept round the bed and picked up his clothes, which had been abandoned on the floor. She felt carefully in the pockets of his jeans and took out keys, money and a small plastic bag.

The bag contained some white powder. She frowned. It was what she had suspected: drugs.

She knew very little about drugs but knew that bags of white powder were rarely innocent.

‘Sam! Sam!’ she said loudly and shook him.

‘What? Aw, Mum, get out! I’m trying to sleep.’ He turned over and pulled the duvet around himself.

She grabbed it and yanked it off him.

‘Mum! What the hell are you doing?!’

‘Waking you up. It’s not far off dinner time. But no wonder you have to sleep if you’ve been taking this stuff.’

He sat up and looked at her with bleary eyes. ‘What? Have you been going through my bloody things?’

‘Yes, and I don’t want this in my house, thank you very much.’ She held up the bag of powder.

He made a grab for it. ‘That’s mine. Give it me.’

She held it behind her back. ‘Not until you tell me what it is and what you’re up to messing about with this stuff.’

‘Why should I? It’s nowt to do with you.’

‘Oh, isn’t it? So if the police suspect something and they search here and find this, who’s going to be in trouble then?’

Sam hung his head.

She raised her voice. ‘What is it?!’

‘It’s just coke,’ he mumbled.

‘“Just coke.” That’s all right then. Just an illegal class A drug that you’ve brought into my house.’

He looked at her. ‘How do you know about coke?’

She laughed scornfully. ‘You think because I’m over forty I don’t know anything. People were taking this before you were born.’

He peered at her more closely with eyelids still droopy from drug-induced sleep. ‘Did you ever do drugs, then?’

She swatted him over the head. ‘No, you cheeky bugger. If you want to know, we used to smoke weed. But that’s as far as it went.’

Sam now regarded her with some admiration and curiosity. ‘Who’s we?’ he asked.

‘Never you mind. It’s a long time ago.

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