On a foggy night in Hampstead, a curious party has gathered in an artist's studio to weather the wartime blackout: the artist himself, a civil servant and a scientist. In the kitchen, the artist's sister is hosting the charlady of the miser next door. When the murder of said miser is discovered by his infantryman nephew, it's not long before Inspector Macdonald is at the scene, faced with perplexing alibis and with the fate of the young soldier in his hands. A British Library Crime Classic