Page 1 of Misery Hates Company

P ROLOGUE

Where there is no imagination there is no horror.

—Arthur Conan Doyle

The first thing Marigold Manners noticed was the scarecrow’s hat, battered and torn but still somehow familiar, tilted at a rakish angle as if the wearer had some style or panache—but panache was what gave one style, if you asked Marigold.

But no one asked.

Because Marigold was alone, staring in dawning horror at the hat, which was set at that angle not because of panache or style or any such thing. The hat was set at that angle because the neck it was attached to—the neck that should have been stuffed with straw—was unnaturally bent.

Because it wasn’t straw.

Because the person under the hat was dead. Quite dead.

Marigold opened her mouth but couldn’t scream. She was too astonished to find that someone else seemed to have been murdered instead of her.