The Duchess of Kesgrave already has enough on her plate, what with a houseful of guests she did not even invite. That was all Lady Abercrombie’s doing. The scheming countess took it upon herself to arrange the affair, compelling Beatrice to host a dozen visitors at her husband’s gargantuan ancestral estate in the country, where she herself still feels like a visitor. (Is that the blue drawing room or the east drawing room that happens to be blue?) She cannot conceive how she will entertain so many people for a full week!

The last thing she needs is another corpse to cross her path. Alas, that is exactly what happens when her neighbor, the dastardly Lord Tavistock, who once tried to destroy her reputation to secure the duke for his daughter, arrives at Haverill Hall to announce he has a murder for her to solve—his own!—and then promptly drops dead.

Well, at least that’s one activity.