THE EVENTS OF THAT EVENING so long ago had condensed over the years into a single scene that he played over and over in his mind. But the passage of time had not caused the images to fade or the exquisite sensations to dim. Not at all. They were as vivid as ever. Exquisite. The word came close to capturing what he had experienced that day, but not quite. There had been so many layers, so many aspects to his ecstasy. Heaven. That’s what it was. Such a simple word, but the only one that would do. The second he had breathed into the depths of his lungs as the life left her eyes had been pure heaven. His blood had turned to light; his body had felt as if it were hovering: quivering and gravity-defying in mid-air.
And then he had done it again.
He could feel the stirrings already: the tension tightening the fibres of every muscle; the delicious anticipation like the first touch from his angel. His angel with the full red lips that tasted of honey and wine, his angel whose flesh was as soft as velvet and down. His precious angel: the beginning and now the end of all this.
Reaching the end of the roughly gravelled farm track, he struck out across a field frozen concrete-hard and carpeted with frost, the cold air sharpening his senses until they were as keen as a wild animal’s. The bony knuckles of a solitary, leafless oak clawed at the silver-bright sliver of moon and an infinity of stars sprayed over a tar-black sky. He looked up like a child in wonder. The universe was smiling on him.
At the hedgerow on the far side, he climbed over the stile and made his way along the rutted path that crossed the stretch of woodland sloping down towards the hamlet of Blackstone Ley. As the darkness of the trees closed in around him he caught occasional glimpses of the lights from the scattering of houses below. His fingers tightened around the smooth, polished butt of the shotgun. The only sounds were of his footsteps and the gentle sloshing of diesel coming from the rucksack strapped tightly across his back.
After a quarter of a mile the path dog-legged sharply through a dense stand of birch, widened slightly, then finally delivered him onto the narrow lane at the foot of the hill. He stood for a moment in the shadow of the hedgerow, safely outside the pool of hazy orange light cast by the single street lamp. He glanced left and right.
All was quiet and still.
It was time.