title: Bloodlines of Shackleford Banks: A Mystery
author:  B. J. Mountford 
description: BJ Mountford has worked as a National Park Service volunteer on North Carolina's Outer Banks as well as at parks in Georgia, Hawaii, and Idaho. She lives in Emerald Isle, North Carolina. <br />
zlib_text: The Sittaford Mystery
  
  The Sittaford Mystery
  The Sittaford Mystery
  
  The Sittaford Mystery
  
  Chapter 1
  SITTAFORD HOUSE
  Major Burnaby drew on his gum boots, buttoned his overcoat collar round his neck, took from a
  shelf near the door a hurricane lantern, and cautiously opened the front door of his little bungalow and
  peered out. The scene that met his eyes was typical of the English countryside as depicted on Xmas
  cards and in old-fashioned melodramas. Everywhere was snow, deep drifts of it - no mere powdering
  an inch or two thick. Snow had fallen all over England for the last four days, and up here on the fringe
  of Dartmoor it had attained a depth of several feet. All over England householders were groaning
  over burst pipes, and to have a plumber friend (or even a plumber's mate) was the most coveted of all
  distinctions.
  Up here, in the tiny village of Sittaford, at all times remote from the world, and now almost
  completely cut off, the rigors of winter were a very real problem.
  Major Bu