It seems like the best of both worlds for Superintendent Robert Bone and his new bride, Grizel: a holiday that combines Bone's passion, a stately houses tour, with a visit to Grizel's friend, Jane, and her husband, Lord Benet Paisley Roke. Roke Castle is on the tour, and, with Roke's penchant for wicked practical jokes - an alligator in the swimming pool, a skeleton in the oubliette - it promises to give full entertainment value. But when an unpopular tour-party guest takes a fatal tumble, and Roke himself is brutally murdered, no one is laughing.For once on the scene of the crime as it happened, Bone - as a potential suspect - has no authority to investigate. He also must endure being grilled by the local Chief Inspector, a working-class boor who seems delighted by a nasty rumor that gives Bone motive as well as opportunity to shove the hapless tourist over the battlements.As Grizel helps Jane cope with the duties of a bereaved widow, Bone cannot resist carrying out a few discreet inquiries. And in the explosive aftermath of the reading of the will, Bone - in a flash of sudden, blinding clarity - must spring into action, racing to stop a bold and reckless killer who is poised to strike again. Read Less