A Christmas Garland by Anne Perry is the tenth of her Christmas mystery novellas. All are set in the mid-1800s at the Christmas season, and enhance the “back stories” of characters from her Thomas & Charlotte Pitt or William Monk Victorian mystery series.It’s December 1857 in Cawnpore, India where the infamous mutiny began. Lieutenant Victor Narraway faces the first great challenge of his career. At 20 years old, he’s only a year out of college in England. He has served briefly in India, but now he’s posted to Cawnpore. It’s just months since the massacre, and fighting is still fierce. Sikh prisoner Dhuleep Singh escaped the garrison jail, murdered the guard, and alerted mutineers to the British patrol route. Only one man in the patrol survived the savage ambush. Tempers and fear are running high. But the British must follow their system of law, and conduct a just trial; otherwise they are no better than the mutineers. The jail locks from the outside, so someone must have opened the jail to let Dhuleep out. One man cannot prove his whereabouts at the time of the jailbreak: medical orderly John Tallis. He was organizing medical supplies, out of sight of the other officers at the critical time. He was held in high regard by all in the garrison, but all others have been ruled out. Narraway, as the newcomer, is assigned to defend Tallis in the trial. All consider it a thankless and impossible task, but necessary to demonstrate British justice. Tallis faces execution if Narraway cannot prove his innocence. Narraway’s faith in the power of the truth never wavers. He shows in this first critical assignment the brilliance that later led to his illustrious career (in the Thomas and Charlotte Pitt mystery series, he is the head of Special Branch). The Christmas Garland by Anne PerryIndia 1837-This story starts out with Lt. Narraway and he's been given an assignment-to be the lawyer for the soldier who's being charged with murder.He goes to visit him in jail and John Tallis claims he is not guilty of the crime and tells the lt. what happened the night in question.He then cycles it through his mind and tries to figure out different angles and how things could've been.He also questions the others and their story is pretty much the same, different words. At the end he goes back to the house where the father lived and meets the little girl and the blue chain she has made with her mother.He plays with her and has a meal and then must leave-he may have found the answer...
