The Cuckoo's Child by Marjorie Eccles

The Cuckoo's Child is a historical mystery set in 1909.  When Laura Harcourt is offered a position cataloging a library in a small Yorkshire village, she accepts partly because she needs some time to consider what her own direction in life is to be.  Laura comes from a wealthy family, but longs for a life of independence and purpose; a removal from her current life might give her time to determine her own path.

When Ainsley Beaumont, the elderly man who hired her, is murdered, Laura discovers that he has left her a small fortune in his will.  Laura realizes that her employment was much more deliberate than she had imagined and sets out to discover why Ainsley Beaumont hired her in the first place.  (Well, of course, we have a definite clue from the title, but Laura must discover the truth of her situation for herself.)

Some history must be unraveled for Laura to find the answers she needs, and she already has one clue in a partial manuscript that she had discovered in Beaumont's library.  At first it was a matter of general curiosity, but after Beaumont's death, Laura recognizes that the  manuscript has personal significance.

Fiction.  Historical Mystery.  2012. 240 pages.