Front Page Murder by Peter Bartram

Author:Peter Bartram [Bartram, Peter]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781785356483
Publisher: John Hunt Publishing
Published: 2017-11-24T05:00:00+00:00

I met Henrietta in Prinny’s Pleasure half an hour later.

I’d left Shirley with Tammy at Elsie’s house. “Try to keep Tammy’s spirits up,” I’d said. “The news about Archie’s cross-dressing will give her a lot to think about. But she needs to keep focused on the main problem – finding evidence to save him.”

“Elsie can provide the tea and I’ll dole out the sympathy,” Shirley had said.

Henrietta and I took our drinks to the corner table at the back of the bar.

Henrietta sipped her Guinness and surveyed the place. She sniffed in that way she did when something wasn’t quite right.

“This grey wallpaper doesn’t do much for the room,” she said.

“Actually, I believe it started life as green. But that was before my time, of course.”

Henrietta took another sip of her Guinness and sighed appreciatively. “Anyway, I’ve got something for you to go with that gin and tonic,” she said. “And it’s not a packet of crisps.”

She reached into a large bag she’d put on the seat beside her. Took out a book and handed it to me.

“The Art of Sussex Churches by the Reverend Horace Crockhurst, MA,” she said.

“You found a copy.”

“I borrowed a copy. From Miss Fox in Brighton’s reference library. Normally, she wouldn’t let one of her volumes cross the threshold. But I explained it might be a matter of life or death.”

“It certainly seemed connected to Dirty Dick Stubbs’s death. I couldn’t understand why he had a copy in his room when his usual reading matter peaked at Wild and Wobbly magazine.”

Henrietta sniffed again. “Anyway, you’re to keep the book in perfect condition. Apparently, it’s long been out of print.”

“Makes it even more peculiar that Stubbs should have a copy, then.”

“Perhaps he picked up one in Brighton. I bet you could still find copies in one of those second-hand bookshops in The Lanes.”

“Maybe.” I wasn’t convinced.

Henrietta downed her Guinness in a couple of impressive swallows. She looked around again, had another sniff and said: “I’d love to stay but I’ve promised myself an early night.”

I waved her off, then opened the book.

It was handsomely produced with two sets of colour plates. I turned to the verso page and found the book had originally been published in 1947, two years after the war. I sampled the text on a couple of random pages. The Reverend Crockhurst was no doubt a worthy cleric, but his writing was as dry as a Sunday sermon. It wasn’t going to set the literary world on fire.

I wished I’d been able to take a closer look at the book in Stubbs’s room. Perhaps a bookmark or turned-down page corner might have given a clue as to which section of the book had attracted his attention. Instead, I took a look at the contents page. Helpfully, the book was written as a kind of guide. So each chapter covered a different part of Sussex. There was a separate chapter on Brighton about halfway through. I turned to it straight away.

Most of the churches in Brighton were listed separately.

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