Cley by Carey Harrison (Heinemann, 1991) 1st. edition. VG

The year is 1968, and Jack Thurgo is about to plunge into marriage.\n\nBefore he finally commits himself, he takes a last holiday on his own, cycling to the Norfolk coast. To a young man alone for the first time in years, life seems full of enjoyable temptations.\n\nThen Jack comes across a fatal car crash in a country lane and recognizes his former boarding school mentor, John Bromley, as the comatose survivor. Bromley had been a father figure to Jack, replacing the father he lost during World War Two. But at the hospital, a woman identifies him as Mr. Sindacombe.\n\nUnable to let this go, Jack starts to investigate the matter with a feverish determination bordering on the obsessive. As his search deepens, he is transported back to his school days when he faced the fearsome Mr. Bromley, at times tempestuous, and yet so often the father Jack never knew. At the heart of the English countryside, the summer days blur into one while the truth reveals itself...\n\nCley is a haunting .