Dimensions
111 x 179 x 33mm
Richard Jury is supposed to be on holiday when the telephone call comes. And in any case, what has sudden death on American soil to do with an English police superintendent? But when the victim turns out to be British by birth, and to have a distant connection with Jury's old acquaintance, Lady Cray, he reluctantly acknowledges that his marker is being called in. Enlisting the aid of the aristocratic Melrose Plant, and accompanied by the irrepressibly lugubrious Sergeant Wiggins, Jury crosses the Atlantic to see what he can find out.
Baltimore turns out to have many attractions - not least that it is the home of avant garde novelist Ellen Taylor, last encountered at The Old Silent Inn. Ellen is painfully engaged upon finishing her new book, but takes time out to introduce the trio to the delights of the city - football, Edgar Allen Poe, Bromo-Seltzer and a bar called The Horse You Came In On.
A case of plagiarism, a blind and deaf street-dweller, an engaging child who bears a strong resemblance to Scarlett O'Hara - these are just some of the elements in a complex puzzle whose solution looks set to defy the combined talents of the visiting team and put an end to a very promising writing career . . .
