Returning from their honeymoon, John and Lydia Savidge are offered an extraordinary challenge: they are given three days to discover who killed Sir Benedict Stanbury, master of Fallowfield. Could the hapless stable hand accused of the crime really be guilty? Perhaps it was Sir Benedict's hoydenish niece or her mercenary mama? Or could it have been the suspicious solicitor or the frightened governess? Almost everyone had a motive for murder, but nobody can provide an alibi. Lydia and John have the deuce of a time trying to unravel the tangled skein of perverse relationships and eccentric personalities before the startling truth is finally revealed.