MAGPIE
MURDERS
ANTHONY HOROWITZ
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Contents
Cover
Title Page
Crouch End, London
MAGPIE MURDERS
About the author
The Atticus Pünd series
Praise for Atticus Pünd
PART ONE
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
PART TWO
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
PART THREE
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
PART FOUR
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
PART FIVE
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
PART SIX
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Crouch End, London
Cloverleaf Books
Alan Conway
Abbey Grange, Framlingham
Wesley & Khan, Framlingham
Extract from The Slide by Alan Conway
Orford, Suffolk
Woodbridge
The letter
The grandson
The road to Framlingham
The Atticus Adventures
After the funeral
St Michael’s
Dinner at the Crown
‘He used to hide things …’
Starbucks, Ipswich
Crouch End
Cloverleaf Books
Detective work
Bradford-on-Avon
Paddington Station
Cloverleaf Books
Endgame
Intensive care
PART SEVEN
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Agios Nikolaos, Crete
Anthony Horowitz interviews Alan Conway
Also by Anthony Horowitz
Copyright
Crouch End, London
A bottle of wine. A family-sized packet of Nacho Cheese Flavoured Tortilla Chips and a jar of hot salsa dip. A packet of cigarettes on the side (I know, I know). The rain hammering against the windows. And a book.
What could have been lovelier?
Magpie Murders was number nine in the much-loved and world-bestselling Atticus Pünd series. When I first opened it on that wet August evening, it existed only as a typescript and it would be my job to edit it before it was published. First, I intended to enjoy it. I remember going straight into the kitchen when I came in, plucking a few things out of the fridge and putting everything on a tray. I undressed, leaving my clothes where they fell. The whole flat was a tip anyway. I showered, dried and pulled on a giant Maisie Mouse T-shirt that someone had given me at the Bologna Book Fair. It was too early to get into bed but I was going to read the book lying on top of it, the sheets still crumpled and unmade from the night before. I don’t always live like this, but my boyfriend had been away for six weeks and while I was on my own I’d deliberately allowed standards to slip. There’s something quite comforting about mess, especially when there’s no one else there to complain.
Actually, I hate that word. Boyfriend. Especially when it’s used to describe a fifty-two-year-old, twice-divorced man. The trouble is, the English language doesn’t provide much in the way of an alternative. Andreas was not my partner. We didn’t see each other regularly enough for that. My lover? My other half? Both made me wince for different reasons. He was from Crete. He taught Ancient Greek at Westminster School and he rented a flat in Maida Vale, not so far from me. We’d talked about moving in together but we were afraid it would kill the relationship, so although I had a full wardrobe of his clothes, there were frequently times when I didn’t have him. This was one of them. Andreas had flown home during the school holidays to be with his family: his parents, his widowed grandmother, his two teenaged sons and his ex-wife’s brother all lived in the same house in one of those complicated sorts of arrangements that the Greeks seem to enjoy. He wouldn’t be back until Tuesday, the day before school began, and I wouldn’t see him until the following weekend.
