The September Society (Charles Lenox Mysteries #2)

A number of long, shallow punts were covered and locked on the banks of the river, past their season until spring, and the famous willow trees had begun to scatter their leaves across the water. The yellowish light of morning appeared over the dreaming spires that Lenox knew so well—Tom Tower at Christ Church, the shining dome of the Radcliffe Camera, the ridged flutes rising from the towers of All Souls. (29)

It was a low-ceilinged place that dated to the 1300s. (Still leaving it a few hundred years shy of being the city's oldest continuous drinking establishment.) Once it had been a strong-cider bar, and then briefly a pub called the Spotted Cow, but even to the oldest gents at the stile it had always been and would always be the Turf, hidden away from all but those who really knew Oxford. The wood on the walls was darkened by smoke and time, though the beams holding the roof up were freshly painted white. There was a bar in the front room—above it was the famous first menu of the Turf, a wooden plank with DUCK OR GROUSE written on it—and another in the back room, just by a staircase leading to the rooms above. (31)