Chapter and Hearse by Catherine Aird

Author:Catherine Aird [Aird, Catherine]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Mystery
ISBN: 9780312290849
Google: 1yScPwAACAAJ
Amazon: 0330419536
Goodreads: 1490185
Publisher: Pan Books
Published: 2003-01-01T05:00:00+00:00

Child’s Play

Henry Tyler wouldn’t admit it, even to himself, but he was – there was no doubt about it – panting ever so slightly as he approached the Beacon Hotel. But he wasn’t disappointed with what he found. He’d been drawn to the place in the first instance by its address – the sound of Tea Garden Lane had an attractive ring to any walker. So did the name of the area where it was situated – Happy Valley.

And then he’d spotted the building itself from halfway across the opposite hillside and immediately realized that the view from its terrace would be well worth the climb up. In theory, visiting High Rocks had been next on his agenda, but the hotel and luncheon called. High Rocks would have to wait.

He paused on the hill just below the hotel itself, ostensibly to admire that selfsame view but actually to get his breath back properly before he presented himself at the bar. A walking tour was all very well in its way, but it came hard to a civil servant who normally spent his working days at a desk in Whitehall.

Henry had passed the weekend before with his married sister, her husband and their two children in the small market town of Berebury, in rural Calleshire, by way of both winding down from the cares of state and limbering up for his break from routine. This plan had worked up to a point, even though the children had clamoured for his attention almost all the time they were awake. But meeting their demands had not exactly been preparation for striding through the steep lanes of the delightful border country of Kent and Sussex round Tunbridge Wells in high summer.

His nephew and niece, after all, had only required him to play pen and paper games with them. As far as more active pastimes were concerned, they were united in being against them, smacking as they did, they insisted, of compulsory games at school. Their doting uncle had ruefully concluded that the children of today were totally opposed to any activity that involved them in making any move that required more physical effort than tearing open a packet of crisps.

His breath recovered, Henry clambered up onto the hotel terrace and acknowledged that the view was memorable. He stood looking south until a more urgent need made itself felt. After all, even Goethe had said that no man could enjoy a view for more than fifteen minutes. As far as Henry was concerned at this moment, the bodily requirement of a long cold drink displaced the soul’s drinking in of beauty in less than five.

He made his way inside what must have once served as the ground floor of a rather grand private house and was now a welcoming bar. A Foreign Office man himself, he was naturally interested in architecture. The place must be late Victorian, he decided, but nicely shorn of Victorian excess. There was already the feel of forthcoming Edwardian comfort and amplitude about it.

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