[1] It was the twenty fifth in her long-running series featuring Chief Inspector MacDonald of Scotland Yard.

[2] Originally published by Collins Crime Club, it was reissued in 2020 by the British Library Publishing as part of a group of crime novels from the Golden Age of Detective Fiction.

On a foggy night during the London Blitz, a special constable arrests a young Canadian soldier standing over the dead body of his elderly great uncle in a rundown house in Hampstead.

The only other possible suspects are the inhabitants of the art studio next door, a celebrated painter, his sister and their various guests.

However as MacDonald and his assistant Inspector Reeves begin to investigate a number of other possible suspects and motives emerge, including the special constable himself.