The atmosphere in Howlett Hall, the crumbling country seat of the Aston family, is tense with expectancy when Rollo Saxby arrives bent on setting an old score with his childhood friend Edgar Aston. For the old man, now in his eighties, is laying upstairs felled by a massive stroke, and downstairs family and staff have gathered to await his death.

Barely twelve hours later two lives have expired and Detective Inspector Jack Finch has arrived to uncover the cat's cradle of avarice and deceit which had led to the suspicious demise of at least one elderly gentleman...