Читаем The Hallmarked Man полностью

The Hallmarked Man

**THE INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLING SERIES RETURNS THIS SEPTEMBER** A dismembered corpse is discovered in the vault of a silver shop. The police initially believe it to be that of a convicted armed robber - but not everyone agrees with that theory. One of them is Decima Mullins, who calls on the help of private detective Cormoran Strike as she's certain the body in the silver vault was that of her boyfriend - the father of her newborn baby - who suddenly and mysteriously disappeared. The more Strike and his business partner Robin Ellacott delve into the case, the more labyrinthine it gets. The silver shop is no ordinary one: it's located beside Freemasons' Hall and specializes in Masonic silverware. And in addition to the armed robber and Decima's boyfriend, it becomes clear that there are other missing men who could fit the profile of the body in the vault. As the case becomes ever more complicated and dangerous, Strike faces another quandary....

Robert Galbraith

Криминальный детектив18+

The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

Cover design by Duncan Spilling © Little, Brown Book Group Ltd 2025

Cover photographs: scene and woman © Duncan Spilling; man © iStock; texture © Shutterstock

Hachette Book Group supports the right to free expression and the value of copyright. The purpose of copyright is to encourage writers and artists to produce the creative works that enrich our culture.

The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book without permission is a theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like permission to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), please contact permissions@hbgusa.com. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.

Mulholland Books / Little, Brown and Company

Hachette Book Group

1290 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10104

mulhollandbooks.com

First North American Edition: September 2025

Published simultaneously in the United Kingdom by Sphere, September 2025

Mulholland Books is an imprint of Little, Brown and Company, a division of Hachette Book Group, Inc. The Mulholland Books name and logo are trademarks of Hachette Book Group, Inc.

The publisher is not responsible for websites (or their content) that are not owned by the publisher.

The Hachette Speakers Bureau provides a wide range of authors for speaking events. To find out more, go to hachettespeakersbureau.com or email hachettespeakers@hbgusa.com.

Little, Brown and Company books may be purchased in bulk for business, educational, or promotional use. For information, please contact your local bookseller or the Hachette Book Group Special Markets Department at special.markets@hbgusa.com.

ISBN 9780316586023 (ebook)

A Library of Congress Control Number is available for this title.

E3-20250730-JV-NF-ORI

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Dedication

Epigraph

Part One

Part Two

Part Three

Part Four

Part Five

Part Six

Part Seven

Part Eight

100

101

102

103

104

105

Part Nine

106

107

108

109

110

111

112

113

114

115

116

Part Ten

117

118

119

120

121

122

123

Epilogue

124

125

126

127

Acknowledgements

Discover More

Credits

Also by Robert Galbraith

Praise for Robert Galbraith

To Séan and Nadine Harris, who gave me back what I thought I’d lost forever.

Explore book giveaways, sneak peeks, deals, and more.

Tap here to learn more.

I had dipped in life’s struggle and, out again,

Bore specks of it here, there, easy to see,

When I found my swan and the cure was plain;

The dull turned bright as I caught your white

On my bosom: you saved me—saved in vain

If you ruined yourself, and all through me!

Robert Browning

The Worst of It

PART ONE

Concerning the mines themselves he was not called upon for an opinion… all he had to do was to follow the veins and win the ore in paying quantities…

John Oxenham

A Maid of the Silver Sea

Oh often have I washed and dressed

And what’s to show for all my pain?

Let me lie abed and rest:

Ten thousand times I’ve done my best

And all’s to do again.

A. E. Housman

XI, Last Poems

The windscreen wipers had been working their hardest ever since the BMW had entered the county of Kent, their soporific swish and clunk aggravating Cormoran Strike’s exhaustion as he stared out through thick rain, which had turned the deserted road ahead to gleaming jet.

Shortly after he’d boarded the sleeper train from Cornwall to London the previous evening, his detective partner’s boyfriend, who Strike always referred to inside his head as ‘Ryan Fucking Murphy’, had called to say that Robin had come down with a high fever and sore throat and would therefore be unable to accompany Strike on today’s visit to their newest prospective client.

Перейти на страницу: