Read No Stone Unturned for Free Online

summed up by the nickname he chose for him: Pugin was his Comet.
    The shared stresses and strains of the Westminster project had cemented the two men’s friendship, but what Barry loved most about Pugin—his attention to detail and quest for impossible perfection—had been the poor chap’s undoing. Achieving perfection on the interiors of a building as large as the Houses of Parliament had proved impossible. Pugin’s vision had been compromised all too often and the project had driven his sensitive soul quite mad. In a state of high stress and fragile health, Pugin had finally been admitted to Bedlam, the huge asylum for the insane in Southwark, and had died there before the month was out. Grief at the loss of his friend, and the fact that he felt partly to blame, lay heavily on Barry’s mind.
    Barry bent over his desk and studied the latest drawings for the Members’ Lobby on which he had pencilled some of the most recent amendments. His eyes were scratchy and sore and, in the gloomy evening light, he struggled to read the tiny notes that he had scribbled all over the margins during his last site visit.
    â€˜Come in,’ he croaked, as he heard a gentle knocking on the door. It was his wife, carrying a glass of brandy on a silver tray.
    â€˜I thought you might like a little refreshment, my love,’ she said softly as she put the tray down on the end of her husband’s desk. ‘Do you have much more to do? It’s getting so late.’
    â€˜Oh my dear, I could work through the night and still not complete everything.’
    â€˜Well, I simply won’t allow it.’ Sarah placed her hand tenderly on top of her husband’s. ‘Tomorrow is a day to celebrate what you have achieved. You should enjoy it and be proud, and to do that you need a good night’s sleep.’
    Barry had aged at a frightening rate since the construction of the Palace began and Sarah had nursed him through long bouts of illness. Although she tried to keep his home life free from worry and stress, she could not protect him from events beyond their door. The rush to prepare for the state opening, Pugin’s death, and even his recent knighthood had added layer upon layer of pressure upon him.
    â€˜The work doesn’t stop when the building is officially opened, Sarah,’ snapped Barry, then immediately felt bad for taking his frustration out on his wife. Sarah flinched at his abrupt tone but did not move from his side.
    â€˜It became necessary to change the dimensions of the Members’ Lobby,’ Barry explained, pointing to his drawings. ‘So we have had to alter the size of the floor slabs also. Each one needs to be a few inches smaller or we won’t be able to lay them without cutting them. Normally that wouldn’t matter, but on a project like this, everything has to be just so. Only whole slabs will do. It might sound like an insignificant change but it has resulted in a delay at the quarry in Wilmcote—and their deliveries are still coming by canal, which means a further wait. I need the new slabs right away.’
    â€˜But did you not say that there was to be a new railway line through Wilmcote? I thought that was all part of the original agreement?’ Sarah enquired.
    â€˜It was indeed,’ said Barry. He looked his wife directly in the eye. ‘Sarah, I apologise, but there is something I have not shared with you. I invested some money in the railway company too—our money—to speed the whole thing along. They needed £150,000 for a charter, and I gave them a significant sum towards it. Our friend Sir Francis invested too—as did the quarry owner, Richard Greenslade, so I can’t hold him responsible for the delay. But we all underestimated how the waterways company would respond to the threat from the new railway. Holding the keys to the quarry’s only existing transport route, the owners of the Stratford-upon-Avon canal had