The File on Devlin: The haunting romantic suspense thriller from the Queen of Storytellers by Catherine Gaskin

Author:Catherine Gaskin [Gaskin, Catherine]
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3
Tags: romantic suspense, romantic thriller, suspense romance, suspense thriller romance, women's fiction
Publisher: Wyndham Books (Romantic Suspense)
Published: 2022-07-29T04:00:00+00:00

Two

Sally wondered if it wasn’t a little too perfect; it would have cost, she thought, an immense amount of money. She knew little about medieval art and artifacts, but her senses told her that everything in this staircase hall was genuine, that a great deal of it was right in its period, and that the auction rooms of Europe must have been combed by a horde of buyers to have produced this show.

The massive stone stairway jutted into the hall and rose half its height before splitting into the classic Y to ascend to the second level; here a gallery of wonderfully sculptured stone surrounded the whole hall, passages opening from it to reach into the rest of the house.

Although Hans Raedler preceded them up the stairs, it was Hayward who had taken unto himself the duties of guide.

‘It will be, of course,’ he said, ‘recognised as one of the great private museums of Europe if Elizabeth ever permits it to be viewed or photographed. But she always said that she worked for too many years on the restoration, and when it was finished she felt like living in it, not just showing it to swarms of art experts to have them pick it to pieces. I’ve told her there was a great book in it ‒ something for Tyne and Townsend, wouldn’t you think, Sal? ‒ but I could never get her to agree.’

He paused on the final broad landing to survey the hall below him; Raedler was forced to turn, half-way up the next flight, and to wait. Hayward spread his arms in the same proprietorial gesture he had used on the terrace.

‘I think it looks best from here ‒ especially in the afternoon when the light is hitting those high west windows …’

The three of them lined up along the stone balustrade. ‘I think Mrs. Spence must have a splendid sense of humour,’ Josh said. ‘Imagine what it must have been like saying no to the suits of armour that the dealers must have wanted to foist on her.’

Hayward shot Josh a quick look, as if he suspected him of being amused. ‘I doubt,’ he said shortly, ‘that Elizabeth has had very much that she didn’t want foisted on her in her life. Not Elizabeth.’

‘She sounds a formidable lady,’ Josh replied. ‘I’m terrified ‒ aren’t you, Sally?’

Deliberately, Sally thought, he had said it loudly enough so that Raedler and anyone else who was listening could have heard. Immediately it broke the grip of her sense of isolation; it shouted aloud to everyone that there was something too theatrical in this whole setting, this atmosphere of silence and reserve. One was either awed or amused, and Josh was telling them that he was amused. She smiled faintly, and was rewarded by an answering smile from Josh. The waiting figure on the stairs stirred with a certain restiveness.

‘I shall be happy, Miss Devlin, to take you on a tour of the house whenever you wish it. You have only to

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