The Antique Hunter’s Guide to Murder by C.L. Miller EPUB & PDF – eBook Details Online
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- Author: C.L. Miller
- Language: English
- Genre: British & Irish Literary Fiction
- Format: PDF / EPUB
- Size: 4 MB
- Price: Free
“All hunts begin with something that has been lost… or taken.”
—Arthur Crockleford
Freya
Outside the Victoria and Albert Museum in London I brushed my ngertips
over a shrapnel dent in the building’s wall. It had seen a lot, that wall, and had
survived whatever had been thrown at it since being built in 1909. No war or
hurricane had taken it down. I wished I were as strong.
Early that morning I’d left my house before the real estate agent arrived and
fought the commuter’s hustle, bus after bus, to get to South Kensington. I’d
waited in a café nearby until the museum opened. The V&A was the place I
always escaped to, my very own safe haven.
A smiling man opened the museum’s main entrance. I was one of the rst
inside—the tourists were probably still having their buet breakfast.
The familiar smell of polish hit me, then the echo of my boots tapping on the
tiles in the cavernous hall. I smiled. It was almost enough to make me forget the
“For Sale” sign being nailed to my gate.
Ever since my ex-husband, James, moved out almost nine years ago he had
insisted the house be sold. Apparently, a large Victorian house in an expensive
suburb was wasted on me. James had nally agreed I could live in the house until
our daughter, Jade, was eighteen, and now that she had left for university in
America there was little I could do to stop the sale. I couldn’t aord the
mortgage alone when the child support stopped—Jade wasn’t a child any longer.
I was almost on autopilot when I reached the beginning of the British
Galleries on the rst oor. I passed the Great Bed of Ware, an enormous bed so
large it could sleep two families and so famous it was mentioned in Shakespeare’s
Twelfth Night. Farther along on my right was a freestanding bookcase like the
one Samuel Pepys once owned. Eventually I reached the stone stairway to the
third oor and the Chippendale furniture. I hadn’t been part of the antiques
world for over twenty years, but I still adored a nely crafted chair or a
beautifully gilded mirror.
I knew each item in the Chippendale furniture section by heart, and
something about the Chippendale Garrick Bed (named after the once-famed
actor David Garrick) looked wrong. I leaned as close as I dared and studied every
inch of the ornate fabric. A couple of moments later I saw it. A very slight indent
on the cover. A visitor had decided to check the comfort level of the mattress and
left their mark.
Annoyance bubbled inside me and I looked around for a gallery assistant.
My phone rang with Aunt Carole’s ringtone. Jade had put that jingly
ringtone on before she left for LA and I’d never gotten around to changing it. I
pulled out my phone and silenced it. I desperately wanted to hear my aunt’s
voice, but now wasn’t the time.
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