Spotlight: The Shadow of Memory by Connie Berry
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The Shadow of Memory follows Kate Hamilton as she makes a shocking connection between a sixty-year-old murder and the long-buried secrets of Netherfield Sanatorium. Kate must appraise a fifteenth-century painting and verify that its provenance is the Dutch master Jan Van Eyck. But when retired criminal inspector Will Parker is found dead, Kate learns that the halls of the sanatorium housed much more than priceless art.
Kate learns that Will had been the first boyfriend of her friend Vivian Bunn, who hasn’t seen him in fifty-eight years. At a seaside holiday camp over sixty years ago, Will, Vivian, and three other teens broke into an abandoned house where a doctor and his wife had died under bizarre circumstances two years earlier. Now, when a second member of the childhood gang dies unexpectedly—and then a third—it becomes clear that the teens had discovered more in the house than they had realized.
Had Will returned to warn his old love? When Kate makes a shocking connection between a sixty-year-old murder and the long-buried secrets of the sanatorium, she suddenly understands that time is running out for Vivian—and anyone connected to her.
Excerpt
Saturday, August 22
Miracle-on-Sea, Suffolk
I pulled my leased Mini Cooper up to the scrolled iron gates of Cliff House. A placard instructed visitors to wait, then follow signs for the visitors’ parking area. I’d given my plate number in advance, and it must have been recognized by some computer somewhere because the gates swept open, allowing us entrance into the luxury housing estate built in and around the old Victorian hospital.
I stifled a yawn. I’d lain awake most of the night, thinking about the body in the graveyard. If I’d gotten there a little sooner . . .
Ivor, having heard the news (I suspected Vivian had made a few late-night phone calls), phoned at seven, asking if I wanted to postpone the appointment. I assured him I was fine. Sad as it was, elderly people died all the time.
Except this one had died alone in a graveyard in a strange village. And I’d found him.
Cliff House rose before us, its public face angled toward the North Sea and the Deben estuary. The former Netherfield Sanatorium, a private lunatic asylum—yes, that’s what it was called in the nineteenth century—stood on a low rise. The impressive High Gothic structure had been constructed of red brick, with stone dressings and stepped gables over perpendicular traceried windows. Solid, institutional, slightly foreboding.
Would people actually choose to live there?
Ivor sat beside me in the passenger’s seat. Only three months ago he’d undergone bilateral hip replacement surgery, and almost lost his life in the process. But he was healing well—so well he’d given up using a cane, a decision I hoped he wouldn’t regret.
“Shall I drop you at the entrance?” I asked him.
“Certainly not.”
Leaving the gates behind us, we drove between lines of young oak trees, recently planted. Vast green lawns spread away from the main structure. We followed signs for visitor parking, claimed the first spot, and walked the quarter mile or so to the main entrance. The day was bright, with a thin scattering of clouds. A stiff breeze carried the tang of salt. Gulls shrieked and wheeled above us.
Since his surgery, Ivor’s old rolling gait, a product of the years he’d spent in Her Majesty’s Merchant Navy, had become more of a shuffle. I watched him out of the corner of my eye, ready to steady him if necessary. Overprotective? Probably. But I’d never forget the fall he’d taken—or the days I’d spent at his hospital bedside, not knowing if he’d recover.
Ivor’s period of recuperation had been difficult for him. Now he was back in top form, his near-encyclopedic knowledge of the antiques trade in the UK intact—who sold what and to whom, the price they got for it, and what it was really worth.
Cliff House was Ivor’s first important commission since spring. Several weeks earlier he’d received a letter from the board of directors, explaining that they wished to sell certain pieces of art that no longer represented “the fresh, contemporary ambiance” they were seeking to create. Among these items was a painting attributed to the fifteenth-century Netherlandish artist Jan van Eyck. That made our eyes pop.
We were instructed to arrive at one PM, join the board members for a light luncheon (not the usual procedure), and then take a preliminary look at the objects. Tony Currie, chairman of the board, was our contact.
“How did they come up with your name?” I asked Ivor, knowing he wouldn’t take offense. A painting as important as a Van Eyck would normally be handled by Sotheby’s or Christie’s. Still, not everyone wanted that publicity, as I’d recently learned.
“Interesting question.” He raised his eyebrows. “I assume they contacted one of the auction houses in London first. Perhaps my fractionally lower commission rate attracted them.”
Ivor was keeping up a good pace, but I could tell it was a chore.
“Why lunch?” I slowed down, but not so he’d notice. “Buttering us up?”
“Sizing us up, more like. Not that I blame them. If the Van Eyck’s genuine, it should fetch an enormous price at auction and”—his lips curled in a smile—“an enormous commission.”
We climbed the steps toward the entrance, tucked beneath a vaulted stone archway.
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About the Author
Connie Berry is the author of the Kate Hamilton Mysteries, set in the UK and featuring an American antiques dealer with a gift for solving crimes. Like her protagonist, Connie was raised by antiques dealers who instilled in her a passion for history, fine art, and travel. During college she studied at the University of Freiburg in Germany and St. Clare's College, Oxford, where she fell under the spell of the British Isles. Besides reading and writing mysteries, Connie loves history, foreign travel, cute animals, and all things British. She lives in Ohio with her husband and adorable Shih Tzu, Emmie
