The Bronze Lady (Woodford Antiques Mystery Book 2) by Kathy Morgan Page B
Authors: Kathy Morgan
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hosting, the first in 2016 would not be her husband’s Wake. Mike Handley, landlord of The Ship Inn for nearly eleven years and her husband and the love of her life for almost twenty years had collapsed and died on New Year’s Eve at the age of fifty two years old from a heart attack.
The doctors had been warning him for several years that if he didn’t change his lifestyle, namely exercise more, eat less, and relax occasionally, that this tragic end would come sooner rather than later. His death had not come as a complete surprise, but that was no comfort to Sarah. The one area of the whole experience she could draw comfort from was that Mike had died very quickly, in a matter of seconds, behind the bar as usual; doing what he loved which was engaging in lively banter with the regulars. But she could find no consolation in that knowledge today when in approximately four hours time this room would be filled with people, and Sarah knew she would never feel lonelier in her life.
She turned as her best friend, Nicola Stacey, walked into the room.
‘Come on Sarah, time to get dressed,’ Nicola said gently, as she led Sarah out of the Garden Room and steered her in the direction of the stairs which went up to the first floor of the pub, and where Mike and Sarah’s living accommodation was situated.
Sarah slowly made her way up the stairs, her legs feeling as leaden as her spirits, with Nicola close behind following at Sarah’s chosen pace, careful not to hurry her friend, allowing her to take her own time.
At the top of the stairs Nicola could smell coffee, and knew that Sarah’s parents, who were staying at the pub along with Mike’s parents, were preparing breakfast for her. When Sarah’s mother appeared, Nicola turned and went back down the stairs, leaving the family to share their grief in relative privacy before the rest of the funeral guests started to arrive.
By eleven o’clock The Ship Inn’s bar was full of local people who had taken time off work, or former regulars and friends from other public houses the Handleys had run in previous years. All came to celebrate Mike Handley’s life, the noise forcing Sarah out of her depression as she heard loud male voices telling ‘Mike’ stories, and the inevitable laughter which followed. Her husband had been an excellent example of a good village landlord: stalwart of the local community, a typical publican with a warm and friendly personality which encouraged customers to come back time and time again, but tough as old boots with anyone who tried to upset the carefully cultivated ambience of his pub, and with a heart of gold for those in need.
The Ship Inn was their fifth business, the previous four had been run-down inner-city drugs and drinking dens which Mike and Sarah were sent into by the brewery to turn around with a two year deadline and limited budget. They succeeded with the first and third, leaving behind two family-friendly public houses firmly placed in the heart of the communities; but the second and fourth had too much against them, namely that the local communities were so badly fractured with no positive cohesive purpose to see the benefit of a centrally located place in which to socialise without wrecking either the fabric of the building or each other. Working at the fourth pub had been very tough for both Mike and Sarah, and several times they had been in fear of their lives, so when their two year tenure was up and the brewery offered them a fifth pub to turnaround, they declined. By that time they had been searching for a new venture, neither expecting to run another pub, but when Sarah’s former local in the town she grew up in became available for sale they were in full agreement that this would be their next adventure.
The Ship Inn had always been a popular meeting place for the locals since the nineteenth century when it was a coaching inn, going through a succession of transformations in the previous two centuries.
The previous
The doctors had been warning him for several years that if he didn’t change his lifestyle, namely exercise more, eat less, and relax occasionally, that this tragic end would come sooner rather than later. His death had not come as a complete surprise, but that was no comfort to Sarah. The one area of the whole experience she could draw comfort from was that Mike had died very quickly, in a matter of seconds, behind the bar as usual; doing what he loved which was engaging in lively banter with the regulars. But she could find no consolation in that knowledge today when in approximately four hours time this room would be filled with people, and Sarah knew she would never feel lonelier in her life.
She turned as her best friend, Nicola Stacey, walked into the room.
‘Come on Sarah, time to get dressed,’ Nicola said gently, as she led Sarah out of the Garden Room and steered her in the direction of the stairs which went up to the first floor of the pub, and where Mike and Sarah’s living accommodation was situated.
Sarah slowly made her way up the stairs, her legs feeling as leaden as her spirits, with Nicola close behind following at Sarah’s chosen pace, careful not to hurry her friend, allowing her to take her own time.
At the top of the stairs Nicola could smell coffee, and knew that Sarah’s parents, who were staying at the pub along with Mike’s parents, were preparing breakfast for her. When Sarah’s mother appeared, Nicola turned and went back down the stairs, leaving the family to share their grief in relative privacy before the rest of the funeral guests started to arrive.
By eleven o’clock The Ship Inn’s bar was full of local people who had taken time off work, or former regulars and friends from other public houses the Handleys had run in previous years. All came to celebrate Mike Handley’s life, the noise forcing Sarah out of her depression as she heard loud male voices telling ‘Mike’ stories, and the inevitable laughter which followed. Her husband had been an excellent example of a good village landlord: stalwart of the local community, a typical publican with a warm and friendly personality which encouraged customers to come back time and time again, but tough as old boots with anyone who tried to upset the carefully cultivated ambience of his pub, and with a heart of gold for those in need.
The Ship Inn was their fifth business, the previous four had been run-down inner-city drugs and drinking dens which Mike and Sarah were sent into by the brewery to turn around with a two year deadline and limited budget. They succeeded with the first and third, leaving behind two family-friendly public houses firmly placed in the heart of the communities; but the second and fourth had too much against them, namely that the local communities were so badly fractured with no positive cohesive purpose to see the benefit of a centrally located place in which to socialise without wrecking either the fabric of the building or each other. Working at the fourth pub had been very tough for both Mike and Sarah, and several times they had been in fear of their lives, so when their two year tenure was up and the brewery offered them a fifth pub to turnaround, they declined. By that time they had been searching for a new venture, neither expecting to run another pub, but when Sarah’s former local in the town she grew up in became available for sale they were in full agreement that this would be their next adventure.
The Ship Inn had always been a popular meeting place for the locals since the nineteenth century when it was a coaching inn, going through a succession of transformations in the previous two centuries.
The previous
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