In Hoggatt's forensic science laboratory stood two unclothed tailor's dummies, their jointed arms flexed in a parody of benediction. And at their feet, a white-clad sacrificial victim, was the body of the Senior Biologist, his skull smashed in.
The scientists who work at Hoggatt's laboratory are all experts in violent death, accustomed to the sweet-sour smell of the mortuary. Now the brutal murder of one of their own brings Adam Dalgliesh hurrying from Scotland Yark to the bleak, sinister fens of East Anglia, where a murderer is waiting to strike again.
