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Cynthia E. Hurst
Category:
Mystery/Suspense
Publisher: Lilax Books
Type: Fiction
Pages: 202
Copyright: Dec. 6, 2018
Price: $3.99 (eBook)
Death gatecrashes a Christmas Eve party in Victorian Oxfordshire.
In a season of peace and goodwill, it was shocking for residents of the Cotswold town to learn a stranger had been murdered in their midst. It was even more shocking that he died on the doorstep of the town's police inspector's home as he was entertaining guests on Christmas Eve. It appeared Daniel Keegan's only failing had been to fall in love with the wrong person, something that sends a chilling message to two of the inspector's guests. Newlyweds Jacob Silver and Sarah Simm are used to criticism, but does Keegan's death mean their own lives may be in danger? 'Spirit of the Season' is the eighth book in the Silver and Simm Victorian Mysteries series.
Excerpt
By the time Jacob returned to the house, the pre-Christmas cleaning was well under way. Sarah was beating the dust out of the smaller rugs in the back garden, her breath making little puffs in the cold winter air as she wielded the bamboo beater. Mrs Tucker was dusting the parlor energetically, puffing just as much but with less cause.
Jacob smiled at that. Despite her sharp tongue and frequent criticisms of Sarah, he was rather fond of Mrs Tucker, not least because she had been brave enough to defy the critics and work for the town’s only Jewish resident. He knew she had persisted mostly because she needed the modest wages he paid her, but he still appreciated it.
It now occurred to him that she might be useful in another way, being an avid collector and disseminator of local rumors and more solid information.
“Mrs Tucker,” he said, “may I ask your advice? And possibly your help?”
She came to attention, chins quivering and the feather duster held upright like a scepter. “Yes, Mr Silver?”
“You’ve been working here since before Sarah arrived, so you know how things have changed between us over time.”
“Oh, arr.” She seemed about to add something, but stopped herself.
Jacob gave her his warmest smile. “Now I know you may not completely approve, but I’ve come to love Sarah very much, and I want to protect her from harm.”
“Natural enough, sir, but I’m not so sure it’s needed,” Mrs Tucker said. “She may not be very big, but she’s a scrappy one, she is, and with a quick tongue as well.”
That was true, Sarah being only a little over five feet and weighing less than eight stone, and Jacob had heard her retorts to insults often enough to know she could hold her own in any verbal battle.
“Be that as it may,” he said, “I’m sure you would let me know if you heard anything that might lead to more than just a few harsh words.”
There was nothing slow about Mrs Tucker’s thought processes, and she had scrubbed mud and eggs off his front door on occasion, too.
“You mean, sir, if someone wanted to hurt her?”
“Yes.”
“Course I would, sir. As you say, I may not think it’s entirely right, her and you, and you not bein’ a Christian, but I knows you care for her.” She hesitated, then added an admission he never thought he would hear. “And I knows full well you never took advantage of her, even when you could’ve done. Mr Silver?”
“Yes?”
“Are you and her really wed now, proper-like?”
He knew she wouldn’t have asked the question if Sarah had been present.
“Yes, we are. A civil ceremony, rather than in a church, but just as legal and just as proper.”
She nodded, as if that was the determining factor.
“That’s all right, then. I’ll tell them that think you’re doin’ wrong to hush up and look to their own sins.”
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