Staplewood Park

About the Book

Mystery and Romance in Victorian England The County of Kent 1838 Mistress of Mairsford Manor, Rosalie, Lady Benedict St Maure, a lovely, but reclusive, 40-year-old widow, and Charles Hargreaves, 48, a small-town solicitor, who has unexpectedly inherited the title and the estate of Staplewood Park, seem unlikely detectives, but together with Rosalie’s sister-in-law, Amanda. Lady Coverdale, they set about trying to discover the identity of a young man, found collapsed and injured, on Rosalie’s drive. He gradually recovers his health, but not his memory, either of the events that brought him to Mairsford, or even of his own name! A gold signet ring engraved with the letters MS, his only possession. decides Rosalie to call him Matthew. Meanwhile a Bristol solicitor, Steven Pettigrew, is endeavouring to ascertain the whereabouts of a Matthew Stuart, who apparently arrived on a ship from New York, but has not been heard of since. The discovery of his gold watch at a pawnbroker’s shop, makes Pettigrew fear the worst. In a book on English castles and great houses, found in Mr Stuart’s cabin trunk, Pettigrew discovers a folded paper, marking the page for “Coverdale Hall”, and writes to the marquis in the hope of acquiring more information. Events at Staplewood have taken another turn, when an accident to Lady Julia, Rosalie’s niece, leads to the discovery of an underground chamber. Could this be the key to the first Lord Hargreaves rumoured, but missing, fortune? Rosalie and Charles are drawn together, but he knows that his financial circumstances, he run-down state of the house and land and the predations of the previous owner, including the loss of the famous Hargreaves silver ship, makes it impossible for him to declare his feelings. And neither can Matthew follow his, for Lady Julia, but she is a determined young female, and takes matters into her own hands, causing concern for her reputation, and a consequent pursuit. Will everyone’s expectations come to nothing, when a man arrives at Staplewood Park, claiming that he is the rightful heir to the title and estate? And does the “fortune” still exist?

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