Character Showcase -- Cuthbert Hotchkiss

 In A DEADLY SHADE OF NIGHT, Cuthbert Hotchkiss is an unhelpful solicitor with more interest in his dinner than in upholding the law. His grandfather was a founding partner in the York firm of Cumberbatch, Hotchkiss and Clapper, and his father continued the tradition. But the old man is now “not in his right mind” and Cuthbert the younger has stepped into his shoes, his office, and acquired all his old clients.

And quite a few of his father’s old problems too.

When Detective Inspector Deverell comes asking questions about Mrs. Alma Clemmons, one of his recently deceased clients, Cuthbert is evasive – when he isn’t being obstructive, that is. Things get even stickier when Alma’s grandson goes missing and her scandalous granddaughter, who they all thought was dead, returns to stir up trouble.

Does Cuthbert Hotchkiss know what happened to Alma’s missing maid, or to her grandson?

What secrets does the solicitor hold about the house called Furthermore and the folk who have lived in it for the past eighty years, or more?

Hotchkiss is described as grey and befuddled. Half the buttons of the fellow’s waistcoat are missing and the other half hanging by a thread. It is anybody’s guess when he last brushed the wisps of hair that meander about his shiny pate and there are buttery crumbs upon his cheek, as if he’s been interrupted mid-luncheon and only just removed the napkin from his collar.    

But is his appearance merely an act that conceals a cunning mind and deadly intentions? Or is he really just waiting for his next meal?

Three generations of Hotchkiss men have now served Alma Clemmons and her family. Rumor has it that they know where all the skeletons are buried.

But the thing about old bones is that they can be dug up at any time. And some of them, as Hotchkiss will learn, come back to life with a vengeance.

Uncover the secrets and the bones in A DEADLY SHADE OF NIGHT (A Bespoke Novel iii).

(Image: An Appetising Dish by Edwin Thomas Roberts 1898)