It was in the early spring of 1938 in the township of St. Basil when Inspector Maxwell Hamilton was summoned to Hemstead Manor, the large estate of the Hemstead family. Squire Cyril Hemstead was found in his bed with multiple stab wounds. The ivory-handled carving knife was still protruding from the dead man’s back when he was discovered by the housekeeper.
The conversation in the homes and pubs took an abrupt turn from the fear of an upcoming war to the fear that someone was living among them who was a murderer. The good people of St. Basil all agreed: it had to a stranger. No one they knew would do such an evil thing.
Max Hamilton began his investigation with the unfortunate duty to find the killer even if it was one of them. It was as if the roof of Hemstead Manor was torn off causing the walls to collapse leaving everything exposed, all the scandals and secrets buried long ago were unearthed for all to see.
Miss Heloise Hemstead, the spinster daughter of the squire, Cora Brown, a distant cousin who was a constant companion of the middle-aged squire, Dorothy Hemstead, a.k.a. Kate Purcell, a successful businesswoman and the estranged wife of the deceased, Harry Morgan, proprietor of The George, a pub and inn, the center of social life in St. Basil, and lastly, Robbie Pitts, the gardener and handyman for the Hemsteads and Mrs. Brown are the characters in this tragedy. They play their roles while Inspector Max Hamilton tries to discover how he can put an end to the mystery.
