Coronation--A House of Windsor Mystery

CORONATION Eileen Enwright Hodgetts This majority of characters in this novel are fictitious. Certain long-standing institutions, public figures and documented facts are mentioned, but the story itself is purely imaginary Published by Emerge Publishing ISBN: 978-1-7376070-4-5 ©2023 Eileen Enwright Hodgetts All rights reserved. Table of Contents Title Page Copyright Page Coronation - A House of Windsor Mystery CHAPTER ONE CHAPTER TWO CHAPTER THREE CHAPTER FOUR CHAPTER FIVE CHAPTER SIX CHAPTER SEVEN CHAPTER EIGHT CHAPTER NINE CHAPTER TEN CHAPTER eleven CHAPTER twelve CHAPTER Thirteen CHAPTER fourteen CHAPTER Fifteen CHAPTER sixteen CHAPTER Seventeen CHAPTER eighteen CHAPTER nineteen CHAPTER twenty CHAPTER TWENTY one CHAPTER TWENTY two EPILOGUE Author’s Notes Sign up for Eileen Enwright Hodgetts's Mailing List Also By Eileen Enwright Hodgetts About the Author About the Publisher The Hidden Jewels No human eye had seen their birth. They had been formed before the coming of man, when all the world was new and life could not survive amid the crushing chaos of creation. Trapped in the cooling rocks of the newborn planet, they waited for the coming of the light that would reveal their beauty, and the hands that would shape and polish them into objects of wonder. The stones, two sapphires, a ruby, and a diamond, had each traveled a long road to come at last to this place of ignominy, packed carelessly together in a crude container and hidden in the damp, wormy earth. They had in turn been spoils of war, gifts of love, and symbols of power, but for the moment, they were nothing, just stones packed away in a biscuit tin, their hiding place known only to one man. CHAPTER ONE February 12 1952 Redbridge Library Surrey, England Valerie Chaplin Valerie Chaplin held her breath and shrank back into the shadows. She could hear the intruder’s footsteps as he prowled among the stacks. He was currently in the sprawling adult fiction section of the library, but she doubted he was looking for some light bedtime reading. The library was closed. She had already locked the front door and extinguished the lights, and now the room was lit only by the twilight seeping in through the window in the children’s section. She had been about to leave by the back door when she caught sight of a bulky shadow lurking beside the reference desk. She called out, of course. “We’re closed.” He moved, and she caught a quick glimpse of his face as he lunged toward her. He was a big man, pale-faced and unshaven. She had no time to read his expression, but his voice, a hissing whisper, told her all she needed to know. “Valerie.” He spoke only her name, and yet he spoke with such menace that she bolted away from him, back into the labyrinth of shelves that she knew well and he knew not at all. She moved silently, but he blundered, and the noise of his blundering concealed her movement until she was able to retreat into the shadows in the far corner, where the shelves held the scatter of books by authors X, Y, and Z. He called her name again. “Just a few questions, Valerie. Won’t take long.” Did he have an accent? Was he German? No, that was her imagination. The war had been over for more than six years, and she knew as well as anyone else that not all villains were German and not all Germans were villains. He spoke again. “Just tell me where to find him.” Definitely not German. In fact, he sounded like a Londoner. She almost spoke her question aloud. Who do you want to find? She did not speak, but he told her anyway. “Come on, love, just tell me where to find Jeremy Paxton, and I’ll leave you alone. There’s no need for any of this.” Jeremy Paxton! She had not heard his name in eleven years. She had thought of him so often over the years, and always with a mixture of anger and regret and a fierce desire to know what had happened to him. Her body reacted to the name with a physical twinge of remembered pain. She fought down the desire to respond. I don’t know. No one knows. He’s gone. She crept around the end of the fiction shelves, into the reference section, and slipped past the glass-fronted cabinets. The rear exit was just a short distance away now. He would hear her when she opened the back door, but she would be free to run from him. The old medieval town was laced with narrow alleys and lanes, and all she had to do was work her way into the center of town, where she would be among bright lights and Friday-evening shoppers. “Valerie.” She froze. She had moved silently, but so had he, and now he was at the back door, and she could make out his movements. His arm was extended, his hand searching along the wall. Any moment now, he would encounter the light switch, and then it would be over. She would be caught like a moth in torchlight. What did he want with her? How did he know her name? She was not the librarian, only the clerk. Her name was not on the noticeboard outside. He had not come here to accost just any librarian; he had come for her and to ask about Jeremy. Click! The light blazed. She saw his dark eyes searching in the bright spaces between the stacks. She ducked behind a card catalog cabinet but not in time. His eyes had caught her movement. He took a step forward, but as he moved, she heard the sound of someone pounding on the back door. He turned at once, taking his eyes from her and reaching into his pocket. Her heart seemed to rise into her throat. He had a weapon. It was all over in a fraction of a second, with the muzzle flashes searing her eyes and the sharp double crack of pistol