A Spider on the Stairs Read Free Page A

here.”
    â€œI will,” said Gibbons, but Bethancourt had already rung off.
    He closed his phone and leaned back in his seat, shaking his head over his friend’s many problems, and reflected that for some people the holiday season was simply rife with peril, a time to tread carefully rather than celebrate with abandon.
    On occasion, he envied Bethancourt his wealth—it was only natural, after all—but moments like these reminded him that nobody’s life was trouble-free, and if you had it easy in one way, there was always something else that you had to struggle with. Gibbons definitely did not envy Bethancourt his family, nor, despite her beauty, did he envy him his relationship with Marla Tate. Like any other man, Gibbons had daydreamed of bedding a woman like Marla, and of showing her off on his arm, but in reality he did not like her much better than she liked him, and months of watching his friend deal with her had convinced him that coping with her mercurial temper could not possibly be worth it. In that regard, he supposed, any difficulties could be said to be Bethancourt’s own fault: he had chosen to have such a girlfriend.
    â€œPoor Phillip,” he said.

2
In Which Gibbons Gets a Christmas Surprise
    York was decked out for Christmas and awash with holiday makers, of both the local and tourist variety. On Christmas Eve morning, the shops were filled to bursting with last-minute shoppers, and carols sounded from every doorway. It was in very strange contrast, thought Gibbons, to the scene in the small accessory boutique, where he was examining bloodstains on the carpet. It made him feel that the sordid aspects of humanity should not intrude themselves during the Christmas season.
    That made him think of Superintendent Brumby, whom he suspected had studied the baser side of human nature for so many years that he no longer could wholly free himself of it, even at Christmas. The superintendent did a very necessary job—and did it well—but the price he paid was high, and Gibbons hoped he himself would be spared that.
    The bloodstains in question were soaked into the carpet of Accessorize, and Gibbons was comparing them to the crime-scenephotos taken while the body was still present. With a sigh, he dragged his mind back to the subject at hand.
    â€œSo the body was disturbed before you ever arrived at the scene,” he said.
    Detective Constable Redfern, who had been appointed to escort Gibbons around, answered, “That’s right. The shop supervisor who opened yesterday morning rather lost her head. She tried to give the corpse CPR. She seemed to feel she had been quite heroic,” he added with a grim smile.
    Gibbons laughed. “No doubt your superintendent disabused her of that notion.”
    â€œHe did that,” agreed Redfern, grinning. “Anyway, we sent along the crime-scene photos to your people, but then Superintendent MacDonald reconstructed what the scene had originally looked like as best he could, going by what the witnesses said. We took pictures of that, too, and then had our sketch artist come down and do a couple of representations. That’s what you’re looking at now.”
    Gibbons nodded, returning his attention to the folder he held and flipping past the glossy photos until he came to the artist’s rendering of the scene. He studied it for a moment as a sinking feeling grew in the pit of his stomach, then raised his eyes to compare the drawing with the reality before him.
    â€œI can see why you rang us,” he said at last.
    Redfern nodded. “It was Superintendent MacDonald twigged it,” he said. “None of the rest of us realized what we were looking at, but something about the whole setup rang a bell in his mind.”
    Gibbons turned back to the crime scene. The shop had a small raised dais at the back where there had been a display of scarves and hats. These had been tossed aside for the most part in order to