Third in the Mistress
Jaffrey Mystery series comes a fine
old puzzle. We likes our ales in Cornwall, we does, and we
don't hold with strangers poking their nose in, which is
like to lead to MURDER IN A CORNISH ALEHOUSE. Oh, excuse
me, I slipped into dialect there, very hard to avoid when
you are reading such a finely characterised account.
I first met the redoubtable Mistress Rosamond Jaffrey as
she investigated MURDER IN
THE QUEEN'S WARDROBE and by
now, 1584, she has been reunited with her husband Rob who
is a travelling merchant. As they are well off but not of
the noble class, they can move around without anyone paying
attention. Rosamund has previously been called upon to spy
for the Crown. Now she receives news that her stepfather
who was a Justice of the Peace in Cornwall has died. She
decides to travel to Cornwall to see that her younger
brother Benet is properly cared for and to pay her respects
to the widow, her mother Lady Pendennis.
I enjoyed the look at wearing a cumbersome lady's outfit of
the day, and using throwing knives concealed in its
pockets. Hoops, stays, head-dresses and cloaks, with long
coiffed hair, all weighed down the wearer while attesting
to her station, so it's no wonder that Elizabethan women
were thought of as helpless. While Lady Pendennis is
disgruntled when her daughter arrives, she requests aid in
finding out whether someone murdered her husband.
The rocky Cornish peninsula is known for caves, smugglers
and pirates. Queen Elizabeth has been ordering pirates to
be caught and killed, even as she organises colonisation in
the New World. Trade means wealth, after all, and piracy on
the high seas would interfere with shipping. Boscastle is a
small town where Rosamond rides in search of answers. The
witness she needed to question has just been murdered
himself, in the alehouse. Luckily Rosamond speaks the
Cornish language, because many of the locals know nothing
else, or English except in dialect. The alehouse turns out
to be stocked with smuggled goods; the plot thickens and
danger draws near. Even a ship-board battle is in the
offing.
Hard to beat for concentrated detail and realism, MURDER IN
A CORNISH ALEHOUSE will delight all Kathy Lynn Emerson's
fans and make her some new friends. Pour me some more ale,
wench!
Mistress Rosamond Jaffrey is summoned to Cornwall and
finds herself embroiled in an investigation involving
smugglers, piracy – and rumours of treason.
June, 1584. On hearing news of the sudden death of her
stepfather, Sir Walter Pendennis, Rosamond Jaffrey must
leave London for Cornwall to look after the interests of her
young half-brother and try to mend her strained relationship
with their mother. However, on arriving in Cornwall,
Rosamond makes the shocking discovery that Sir Walter was in
fact murdered – and reluctantly she agrees to work with an
agent of the queen’s spymaster, Sir Francis Walsingham, in
order to unmask the killer.
Rosamond’s investigations will lead her into a dangerous
maelstrom of smuggling, piracy – and rumours of treason.
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