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Overview
When Dorothy Martin and her husband Alan meet the wealthy Ahmad family, they are charmed by their courtesy, their perfect English, their delightful children and their commitment to peace. Following a concert at Sherebury Cathedral, the Ahmads offer to host a party afterwards at the Rose and Crown pub.
But Mr and Mrs Ahmad don’t show up. Their children are asleep upstairs at the inn, but the parents are nowhere to be found . . .
With suspicions of kidnap and even murder being raised, Dorothy and Alan feel compelled to assist the police and MI5 in their efforts to find their new friends, a search that will take them to London and the murky world of big business, politics and even terrorism . . .
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9780727887641 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Severn House Publishers |
| Publication date: | 06/01/2018 |
| Series: | A Dorothy Martin Mystery , #20 |
| Edition description: | First World Publication |
| Pages: | 224 |
| Product dimensions: | 5.55(w) x 8.74(h) x (d) |
About the Author
Read an Excerpt
CHAPTER 1
'Greta, do come and sit down.' I patted the chair next to me. 'The rush is over; Rosemary can manage. Tell Peter to come, too, and have a glass of something with us.'
'Do you know, I think I will.' Greta and Peter Endicott, owners of the inn in Sherebury's Cathedral Close, had been busy all evening with a crowd of tourists. The Cathedral, one of England's loveliest, draws visitors from all over the world, and quite a few of them are drawn to the warm atmosphere and superb food of the Rose and Crown. Peter, a Dickensian Mine Host to the life, oversees the bar with genial hospitality (and a sharp eye for potential troublemakers), while Greta, a stunning woman originally from Germany, takes care of the hotel side of the business and keeps an eye on the dining room with the help of the manager, Rosemary, and a couple of students from Sherebury University.
I've known the Endicotts ever since a visit to Sherebury many years ago, with my first husband, Frank. When I moved from Indiana to Sherebury after Frank's death, Peter and Greta were kindness itself, and we've become fast friends. I live now in an early-seventeenth-century house just outside the Close with the dear man I married a while back, retired chief constable Alan Nesbitt, and we've formed the pleasant habit of dining at the Rose and Crown to celebrate any special occasion, or sometimes just because we feel like it. Tonight the perfect evening had seemed a good enough excuse.
Alan, that morning, had seen the expression on my face and begun to laugh. 'You're going to say it,' he said. 'I can see it just about to come out.'
'"What is so rare as a day in June?",' I said, obligingly. 'Well, all right, I was. So there. Laugh at me if you want, but it's one of my favourite lines. And you have to admit, a day like this in England, even in June, is indeed rare, and deserves accolades.'
After living in England for some years, I can no longer claim to believe it rains all the time, but this spring had been particularly raw and chilly, with few warm days to tempt one outside. I like to walk, but not in wellies and Burberry, with a gusty wind trying to turn my umbrella inside out. The past week had been moderate, though, and I'd gone out this morning to find that Bob Finch, my gardener, had worked with the weather to create magic. My spring flowers, the daffodils and iris and so on, had gone, but the early summer ones, the delphiniums and wallflowers and lupines and snapdragons, were all in bloom, as well as a lot more this Indiana native didn't know, but loved all the same. And the roses! I'm convinced that there is no place in the world that roses like better than England. Mine aren't fancy prizewinners, but under my gardener's loving care, they seem perfect to me. I called Alan away from his computer (the memoirs I don't think he'll ever finish) to bask in the glory.
Our two cats came out with us, of course. Samantha is only part Siamese, but it shows in her voice at times like this. She delivered a long oration to the effect that it was high time we'd done something about the weather and then went off to sharpen her claws on a tree I'm particularly fond of. Esmeralda simply yawned, stretched, and settled her grey bulk in a sunny spot on top of a young snapdragon, to its immediate peril.
'Sam's going to destroy that mulberry,' I said. 'Nothing I do keeps her away from it. And I wish Emmy would stay out of the flower beds. I keep thinking she'll get tired of getting all muddy.'
Alan looked up and then back at me. 'Didn't see a single pig flying around up there.'
I gave a half-laugh, half-sigh. 'Oh, well, they're cats, after all. Like the Rum-Tum-Tugger, they will do as they do do. You're much better behaved, aren't you, sweetheart?' I was addressing not my husband but our loveable mutt Watson, who had wandered out wondering where everybody'd gone. As he's grown older, he becomes anxious when his family isn't under his eye.
A peal of bells smote the ear. Living practically under the Cathedral tower, we're used to the bells, but in the clear air they seemed to ring out more urgently than usual. 'Matins?'
Alan checked the time on his phone. 'Indeed. Shall we?'
I was wearing jeans and an old sweatshirt; Alan had on his most threadbare corduroy pants and a plaid shirt that was missing a button. 'Should we change?' he asked.
'No time.' We closed the door to the house and headed through the gate into the Close and across to the Cathedral. Watson whined, but stayed behind when we ordered him; he knows the rules about church.
'We'll shock the tourists,' Alan said as we approached the nearest door.
'Tough. They ought to be thinking about the service, not looking at the congregation. We're both clean, just a trifle shabby.'
The verger on duty at that door knew us too well to be concerned. 'There's still room in the choir, if you put on a bit of speed,' he said with a friendly smile, handing us the order of service. 'Even on an ordinary Tuesday morning, it's amazing how they pile in.' So we went around the quickest way and found two seats at the east end of the choir, in the top row, right next to the bishop's throne. The bishop wasn't there, though, so he wouldn't see us looking like a couple of farm hands.
The daily services of morning and evening prayer display to their full glory the unique qualities of the Cathedral choir, which is what draws the tourists, and both Alan and I love the music. But the quiet sequence of readings and Psalms, prayers and thanksgivings, is what keeps us coming back several times a week. At the beginning of a day, it sets a pattern of serenity for the duties that follow. At the end of a trying day, it soothes and comforts. Always it takes us out of the worries and annoyances of twenty-first-century life into the timelessness of the ancient church, the ancient ritual. I often think of the medieval monks who used to pray here at least eight times a day. The choir where they gathered, built in 1220 or so, was destroyed by fire in the fifteenth century, but the space where I sat now was rebuilt quite soon – in cathedral terms – so I could imagine an almost unbroken thread of prayer and praise here, in this very place, for something like eight hundred years. The idea puts my annoyance over a malfunctioning dishwasher into perspective.
'Coffee?' Alan suggested when the service was over. Margaret Allenby, the dean's wife, had followed us out of the choir, and he included her in the invitation. So we began to walk across the Close to Alderney's, my favourite tea shop.
When I first visited England, I was taken aback by the idea of commercial establishments actually within the precinct of many cathedrals. My mind flirted with images of tables being overturned at the temple. But the more I thought about it, the more I could see the sense of it. The great medieval cathedrals were, after all, places of pilgrimage for centuries, and though the abbey foundations could offer bed and board to a limited number of pilgrims, when they came in droves they had to have some place to eat and sleep, and the nearer the church, the better. Hence the inn.
The tea shop, on the other hand, was a much more modern institution, since tea wasn't introduced to England until the mid-seventeenth century. By that time Sherebury's monastery, along with all the rest in England, had been dissolved, and the Cathedral had fallen into disuse, but tea was fast becoming a mania among the English, so establishments serving tea and coffee and pastries sprang up all over. A wealthy wool merchant had built a fine half-timbered house near the erstwhile Cathedral, but when he became less wealthy he prudently sold it to a tea merchant, one Matthew Alderney, who turned the ground floor into a shop and the first floor (second, in American terms) into a café. In fine old English tradition, the business has remained in the hands of the same family over the centuries and has become one of the most popular attractions of Sherebury.
Margaret was happy to accept Alan's invitation, but she looked with dismay at the crowd of tourists streaming out of the Cathedral. 'Alan, you're wearing sensible shoes, and have good knees. Do you think you can sprint ahead and find us a table? Will your ankle stand the strain?'
For Alan had broken an ankle rather badly last year, and although it had healed well, he is, after all, not a young man. 'I'm sure it would,' he said, 'but I've a better idea.' He pulled out his phone and made a quick call. 'There. Now we can stroll with dignity. I asked for a corner table, Dorothy, in case you're still worried about our clothes.'
'You were the one who worried. I think we're perfectly respectable, although Margaret may not want to be seen with us.'
'Caesar's wife, you know. I have to dress up a bit, even for the daily office, but I don't impose a dress code on my friends.'
So we had our coffee, and I couldn't resist a toasted teacake. Alderney's has their own special recipe, which includes raisins and cinnamon, and they're served drenched in butter. I've never been able to resist them, and regularly thank the Lord that my arteries are still in good shape. Though I can't say the same for my waist! I'm sure I had one, once.
We didn't linger. Our table was needed, and the lovely day was beckoning. We took our time strolling home, fed the animals (all of whom complained bitterly about our wanton neglect), thought about taking a little drive to the seaside, and took a nap instead.
After a late salad lunch, Alan went back to his computer while I did a little very mild gardening. Bob Finch doesn't appreciate my interference with his creation, but he allows me to pull the odd weed now and then. He has carefully (and not too patiently) taught me which ones are weeds, after I pulled up some violas he'd just planted.
Bob and his mother Ada are two more of my treasured friends here. Ada is one of a dying breed, a true Cockney char transplanted from London, whom I met over a very odd case of murder. Probably in her eighties, she works harder than anyone I've ever known, can talk the hind leg off a donkey, and is a treasure of integrity. She helps me keep my house clean, no easy task when a place is over 400 years old. She also keeps house for her son Bob, who works nearly as hard and is just as trustworthy, though far more taciturn, but who has an unfortunate drinking problem. When he's sober he can get through an amazing amount of back-breaking work, and when he goes on one of his periodic benders those of us who employ him just muddle along with our gardens until he comes back full of remorse and, usually, with peace offerings in the form of rare plants for our borders.
I can't really do a lot of gardening, since my titanium knees don't allow me to kneel for very long, and I can't sit back on my heels at all. There's a limit to what I can do bending over or sitting on my little gardening bench. Besides, the sun was really almost hot. So I went in, washed up, and sat with a favourite Dorothy Sayers novel, the animals disposed around me, until Alan gave up on his writing and came into the parlour, yawning and stretching.
'Were you planning on doing something about a meal?' he asked.
I looked at the clock on the mantel. 'Oh, good grief, look at the time! No wonder I was beginning to feel a little empty inside. It stays light so late in midsummer.'
'Nevertheless, it's nearly nine, and my inside has been complaining for some time.'
'And I truly don't feel like cooking. It's been such a perfect, lazy day, I don't want to spoil it.'
'Then why don't we celebrate the day at the Rose and Crown?'
'Won't it be overrun with tourists?'
'Probably not this late. I'm sure Greta can find a corner for us somewhere.'
So it was that we ended the day happily with a superb meal. The Endicotts have a chef any Parisian restaurant would love to steal – several have tried, in fact – but he loves what he does and where he does it, and continues to produce perfect food, both French and English, with his own special touches. We finished with a crème brûlée just tinged with a hint of hazelnut flavour and, sated, invited our host and hostess to join us for an after-dinner drink.
'Whew,' said Peter, putting down a tray of glasses and assorted bottles, and sinking into a chair. 'What a day! The weather brought them out in force. It's all good for business, of course, but we're both getting too old to work this hard. The drinks are on us, by the way. Whatever you like.'
'After that meal, I should abstain, but I'm not going to,' I said. 'A small cognac, please.'
'I thought you might like to sample the Calvados. It's a new one, to me, anyway. Only just available here.'
Alan and I had learned to enjoy Calvados, the famous apple brandy of Normandy, during our recent stay there, but I shook my head. 'Not for me. Some other time. This has been a perfect day, and I want to end it the perfect way.' The others made their choices, and I raised my glass in a toast. 'If there is a paradise on earth, it's in Sherebury. Here's to the Cathedral, and the Rose and Crown, and the gardens, and lovely, lovely friends!'
I would have been happy to sit for a while, basking, but Greta saw a party appear at the front desk and went to make sure Rosemary was coping. 'Shall we, my dear?' said Alan, and offered me his arm to get out of the chair.
I was a bit bemused by Greta's new guests. Sherebury attracts tourists of all sorts and nationalities, especially in summer, but I didn't somehow expect a Muslim family to book into an inn so near the Cathedral. A tall, imposing man in a tunic and cap, with a full beard, a woman in a long tunic and lovely, embroidered hijab, and two children in more conventional Western dress, looking tired, but behaving beautifully; these would have been a common sight almost anywhere in England, except perhaps just here. The father ruffled his son's hair and gave his daughter, who was leaning against him, a hug, saying something quietly in Arabic (I presumed) to both of them. I noted that he spoke to Greta in perfect English and seemed entirely at ease both with the language and his surroundings.
'The world is growing smaller by the moment,' I said as we started for home.
'And more interesting,' Alan agreed. 'And what interests me most right now is my bed.'
CHAPTER 2
What with one thing and another, it was Friday morning before I made it back to the Cathedral. I had slept too late for Matins, but I wanted to buy a book I'd seen in the Cathedral shop as a gift for a friend in America. She's a great admirer of stained glass, so a lavishly illustrated guide to some of the finest glass in England was perfect for her birthday. As usual, I couldn't simply make my purchase and leave. The shop carries an amazing variety of beautiful things, at prices to match, of course. I was trying to decide, in fantasy, between a small crystal model of the Cathedral, meant as a paperweight (£200) and a sterling silver bud vase (£110), when Margaret Allenby appeared at my side. With her were the couple we'd seen at the Rose and Crown.
'Dorothy, I'm so glad I saw you. I'd like you to meet some visitors. Mr and Mrs Ahmad are visiting here from Iraq, with their two children. This is my friend and neighbour, Dorothy Martin.'
'Oh, yes, I saw you checking in at the Rose and Crown a few days ago. How nice to meet you!'
'But – you are surely American?' said the man, his voice questioning. 'Forgive me, but your accent ...'
I laughed. 'I am indeed American by birth. I've lived here in Sherebury for quite a long time, but I never seem to lose the accent. And I hope you don't mind my saying so, but you seem to have no accent whatever.'
It was his wife who answered, smiling. 'We have what I believe is known as an international accent. My husband does a great deal of travelling for his business, and as the children and I often go with him, the edges have got a bit smoothed out.'
'The thing is, Dorothy, these two lovely people are most interested in our Cathedral and would like to attend a service. Unfortunately neither Kenneth nor I will be able to take in evensong today, so I wondered if you and Alan were planning to be here.'
(Continues…)
Excerpted from "Crisis At The Cathedral"
by .
Copyright © 2018 Jeanne M. Dams.
Excerpted by permission of Severn House Publishers Limited.
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