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Further Information
Maurice William Cranston, born
1920 - 1993 created Inspector Mortimer Blunt who appeared in his two
mystery novels. He was primarily known as a scholar and non-fiction
writer. As well as appearing in numerous publications he also wrote
scripts for the BBC.
First Page of Philosophers Hemlock
MISCHIEF IS COMING AND IN STORMS MUST FALL
BAEDEKER might have written of Sevenelms, had he visited that little Sussex market town, that it dated from the fourteenth century and that it owed its name to a cluster of trees which was felled in 1700. It was a parish with a long history and, though nobody would have thought so from reading the published records, an interesting one. The public generally was aware, in a cosy English sort of way, that Sevenelms was 'historical,* if only because of the many timbered buildings in and around the High Street. Besides the dwelling which was known to the faithful as Anne of Cleves' House, there were theTudor Rose Hotel, the Queen Bess Guest House, the quaintly gabled edifice where the Lionheart Assurance Company had their offices, not to mention the antique dealers* premises and half a dozen teashops: all, in everything but age, Tudor. Only the most peevish pedant could fail to sense in such an atmosphere the embodied heritage of Elizabethan England. Even the proprietors of a multiple bazaar had been so influenced by the traditions of Sevenelms as to paint oak beams across the ceiling of their soda fountain. For the ordinary, unlettered and moneyed middle-classes these antiquities were considerable attractions. Sevenelms had become in recent years a popular resort.
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