The Art of Murder

Chapter 9

Stepney, Thursday 22 January Sally Burnside was an early-to-bed-early-to-rise type and she had a set routine. Up at 6.30 on the dot, out of the door by 6.40 and on her route around the Stepney streets. She rarely changed the course she followed: down Stepney Green, along the High Street, cut through the patch of lawn around St Dunstan's Church, and then west along Stepney Way before heading back east along Mile End Road.

This morning was no different, though she was annoyed with herself for leaving the flat five minutes later than usual, which meant she would either have to cut short the run or be late for the tube. The pavement along Stepney Green was completely clear of snow this morning. Rain in the night had washed away most of it and there had been no fresh falls. The roads were clear too, the traffic already building up.

St Dunstan's had looked unusually pretty twenty-four hours earlier, a patina of snow adding to the weathered beauty of its ancient stone. Now, the walls were rain-soaked, and puddles lay along the path from the gate. Sally sidestepped them; she was used to running whatever the weather.

She speeded up as she took the path around the side of the church. Ahead lay a short avenue of trees, set ten yards back from the road. She ran towards them, past a row of old gravestones. She had her head down for the first ten paces, but looked up as she approached a bend in the path. That was when she first saw something odd.

She kept up a steady pace but felt distracted, finding it hard to stay focused. What was that in the nearest tree? Five more strides and she was forced to pull up. She was not looking where she was going, it was getting dangerous. She slowed to a walk, hands on hips, trying to steady her breathing. She was ten metres from the tree now and the shape and size of the object were clearer.

A few moments later she was directly under the branches. She had stopped moving and was standing looking up at the thing above her head. It was an amorphous, flat object. For several seconds it looked something like a grey tarpaulin hanging over the lowest branch of the tree, about three metres above her head. Then Sally decided it looked like a giant pizza draped over the branch. It was largely grey, but there were streaks of red and white and random patches of black. She walked directly under the weird shape, looked up and moved her head to follow the leading edge of the thing to the point where it hung closest to the ground, a spot a couple of feet above the grass. Then she saw it, a thing so unexpected, she felt a sudden jolt in the pit of her stomach, a spasm that made her whole body tense for a second. Close to the edge of the object, embedded in the grey and red, was an eye staring straight at her.