The Coffin Tree

The Coffin Tree
Gwendoline Butler

Commander John Coffin investigates the deaths of two policemen, and the apparent suicide of a police officer’s wife. A darkly authentic crime novel from one of the most highly praised English mystery writers, perfect for fans of Agatha Christie.The Coffin Tree grew in a garden in London. It had been struck by lightning, which would have killed most trees – but not this one. Near it, a shrouded body has been burnt. Had the victim voluntarily climbed on to the fire, as one eyewitness reports?That same summer, two of Coffin's young detectives died – deaths that were said to be accidental. In Coffin's view, however, two accidents are two too many.Commander John Coffin is not a fanciful man, but somehow the half-dead tree, its top killed by lightning, standing in a sad patch of rough earth, seems to him to epitomise his problems. Why did the two policemen die? How did one dead police officer's wife come to die a grisly death herself at the foot of the coffin tree?Coffin can't believe that it was suicide, but in his efforts to solve the crimes, he is forced to question his own judgement, and to confront the mysteries of another human heart.

GWENDOLINE BUTLER

The Coffin Tree

Copyright (#ulink_446fda0d-6fb0-5ed1-a3b4-f2e36eafe9be)

HarperCollinsPublishers

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First published in Great Britain by

HarperCollinsPublishers 1994

Copyright © Gwendoline Butler 1994

Cover layout design © HarperCollinsPublishers 2014

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The Author asserts the moral right to

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Source ISBN: 9780006490289

Ebook Edition © JULY 2014 ISBN: 9780007545506

Version: 2014–07–04

Contents

Cover (#ucf0bff41-346a-5440-a3dd-48047381c833)

Title Page (#uf95c9727-e45e-574f-868b-6660d821c551)

Copyright (#ulink_b643b0ce-21ac-5515-a80f-840cc54f9548)

Prologue (#ulink_76ce4ca0-d45b-51ae-b394-ec20f2414b63)

Chapter 1 (#ulink_a0db8a65-477f-52d3-8400-cd93183d041c)

Chapter 2 (#ulink_d080b5c3-dd32-542a-ad61-01a67587e576)

Chapter 3 (#ulink_218f4a8a-d9b3-5e6a-8db6-9e01fdc37632)

Chapter 4 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 5 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 6 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 7 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 8 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 9 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 10 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 11 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 12 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 13 (#litres_trial_promo)

Keep Reading (#litres_trial_promo)

About the Author (#litres_trial_promo)

Author’s Note (#litres_trial_promo)

Also by the Author (#litres_trial_promo)

About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)

Prologue (#ulink_c4fd9907-82eb-56dc-9521-b820d6d92e6b)

The Coffin Tree grew in London’s Second City. The upper branches had been struck by lightning several years ago, a blow that would have killed some trees, but this one struggled on, putting its strength into its lower branches.

There were three great, thick, heavy branches, each one that could be cut down and made into planks.

No one owned the tree …

1 (#ulink_e6b8631b-65f6-5dde-9b60-e95bcc8b3a66)

That hot summer when the old Docklands of London sweltered in the great heat and drought was talked of and people made jokes about the saint who sat on the gridiron, this was the summer when John Coffin walked his Second City of London and felt that life was unravelling about him.