Set in 1961, this third tale in the Southwold trilogy takes London florist Felix Smythe and close friend Professor Cedric Dillworthy to Suffolk once more. Their hopes of a trouble-free visit are sorely dashed by the gruesome murder of a highly respectable resident - an event which seems to be sinisterly linked with the bizarre killing in Cambridge of a cleric with murky proclivities.
Holidaying in Southwold is the ancient and nosy Cambridge don, Professor Aldous Phipps; and both he and Cedric and Felix become increasingly entangled in both murders - an involvement that the wily Aldous relishes, but which terrifies the nervous Felix.
An earlier death further complicates matters; and all three disturb the peace of not only Cedric and Felix but also the Cambridge police and Southwold's Inspector Jennings, who, being newly promoted is anxious to prove himself. His task of sifting truth from falsehood is complicated by a bevy of local eccentrics - Horace Dagwood a brusque and hectoring property tycoon, the fey and earnest Reverend Furblow, and a cranky pair of twins, Joy and Gaye Goodhart, whose brand of moral crusading may or may not be harmless.
The shadow over Southwold looms far, menacing visitor and resident alike and leads to an alarming result