Gunner Kelly by Anthony Price Read Free Book Online

that he was a foreigner who had strayed off the beaten track. But, although there was no room at the inn, that was something which needed contradicting.
    “Thank you.” He nodded again. “But this is … Duntisbury Royal—yes?”
    “Yes—” The landlord began to polish an already well-polished glass “—that’s right.”
    “And … there is here a Rrroman villa? The Duntisbury Rrroman villa?”
    “Yes.” The landlord stopped polishing the glass. “It’s just behind the church, down towards the stream.” He blinked at Benedikt suddenly. “But… it’s on private land … I mean … they’re not excavating it at the moment—they were in the middle of excavating it, but they’ve stopped for the time being.”
    Benedikt nodded. “The Wessex Archaeological Society—yes, I know. But I may look at it from the churchyard, perhaps?”
    “Yes …” Mention of the Wessex Archaeological Society threw the landlord for a moment, and they both knew that churchyards were public land, in practice if not in law.
    “So!” Benedikt nodded again. Nodding was standard practice for foreigners. Then, as though he had just remembered, he felt in his breast-pocket and produced his bit of paper. He adjusted his spectacles, which made the words difficult to read. “Miss Rebecca Maxwell-Smith—” he looked up at the landlord “—it is Miss Rebecca Maxwell-Smith, of the Duntisbury Manor, Duntisbury Royal, to whom I am addressed. Could you direct me to her, please?”
    If he had asked to be directed to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth, D.G., Fid. Def ., at Buckingham Palace, he could hardly have disconcerted the young landlord more. Or … perhaps if he had asked for David Audley —?
    “Yes.” Now the landlord was nodding. “Miss Becky … but she may not be in. I could phone her from here, if you like?”
    “That would be most kind.” If he nodded again, his head would fall off. But he must remember where he was. “I may have a drink, meanwhile?” He looked over the range of bottles behind the bar, and then at the beer pump-handles. “Lowenbrau—a halfpint, please.”
    As he watched the landlord draw the beer he realised suddenly what it was that Audley had won from Cecil. “You will join me, please?” He put a £5 note on the bar.
    “Thank you, but no.” The landlord set the glass down. “It’s only just gone twelve—too early for me. I’ll go and phone for you, though.”
    Benedikt drank some of the beer. He realised that Audley had been right—this was Low-en-brow, not Lowenbrau.
    A very pretty girl appeared from a door behind the bar, and smiled at him. “Are you being served?” she inquired.
    Benedikt lifted his Low-en-brow. “Thank you, yes. Do you serve lunch, please?”
    “Bar snacks—what would you like?” She handed him a menu.
    The bar snacks were very reasonably priced. And the Low-en-brow wasn’t at all bad, really. And the girl was pretty, and the landlord was being helpful—come to that, even Dr David Audley had been helpful in his equivocal way, just as Cecil had been polite after his fashion. And here he was, an innocent German scholar, abroad on a summer’s day in a tranquil English valley of the sort that few mere tourists ever discovered, since there wasn’t a single sign-post to direct them to it.
    “Thank you, but no.” He looked at his watch. “It is only ten minutes after twelve—that is too early for me.”
    The pretty girl gave him another sunny smile, and turned away to start re-arranging the glasses behind the bar.
    It was only instinct, of course … that prickling at the nape of the neck which came even against reason from some undiscovered part of the brain, although it always seemed to travel up the spine from the small of his back … or, if not instinct, then more simply his subjective reaction to the oil-and-water mixture of so much innocence here with what he knew about Audley and what lay somewhere in that quiet, tree-shaded churchyard.
    Then the landlord came