When she was off-duty he was attended to by The Amazon, a goddess with arms She tossed mattresses around with the absent-minded grace of a plate spinner. Weights meant nothing, apparently, to The Midget. It was not only that she told him what he might or might not do, but she dealt with his six-feet-odd with an off-hand ease that Grant found humiliating. Grant called her The Midget to compensate himself for being bossed around by a piece of Dresden china which he could pick up in one hand. The Midget was Nurse Ingham, and she was in sober fact a very nice five- feet two, with everything in just proportion. It's a horrible thought.' 'You sound constipated,' said The Midget. Millions and millions of them pouring from the presses every minute. 'There are far too many people born into the world, and far too many words written. Why didn't he go on reading some of those expensive brand-new novels that his friends kept on bringing him. Anything out of the parallel was hospital profanity. But it seemed that that would spoil the symmetry of the room, and in hospitals symmetry ranked just a short head behind cleanliness and a whole length in front of Godliness. He had suggested to The Midget that she might turn his bed round a little so that he could have a new patch of ceiling to explore. There was practically nothing else he could do but look at it. He had made mathematical calculations of it and re-discovered his childhood theorems, angles, triangles. He had made guessing games of it and discovered hidden objects faces, birds, and fishes. He had made maps of the ceiling and gone exploring on them rivers, islands, and continents.

He knew by heart every last minute crack on its nice clean surface. She brings him a collection of pictures, portraits of faces from history, and Grant begins his journey to resolve.Grant lay on his high white cot and stared at the ceiling.

Marta suggests he try solving an age-old mystery no one has ever been able to solve. Having rejected several books supplied to him by his actress friend, Marta Hallard, Grant spends numerous hours studying the ceiling, and becoming thoroughly familiar with the comings, goings and idiosyncrasies of his appointed nurses. Grant's mishap involved plunging through a trap door and leaves him incapacitated, not to mention extremely bored as he recovers from his considerable injuries.

Alan Grant, an inspector for England's famous Scotland Yard, finds himself confined to a hospital bed after taking an unfortunate fall in the line of duty. Josephine Tey's Daughter of Time is a good, old fashioned detective story with a twist.

The daughter of time by josephine tey