About this ebook
The master of the Golden Age detective novel displays his expertise in the historical whodunit with this Gothic tale of passion and bizarre murder, which Newsday hailed as “mystery fiction at its finest”
When headstrong young heiress Peg Ralston flees London for Versailles, her father sends dashing rake Jeffrey Wynne to bring her home from the court of England’s greatest enemy. But upon their return it appears that a mysterious portrait and a child’s nursery rhyme link vivacious Peg to a bawdy old seamstress who resided near London Bridge and was quite literally scared to death.
The old woman’s murder is but one thread in a web of conspiracy that includes blackmail, court intrigue, and an underground club that has made a hobby out of murder. With Peg’s life at stake, Wynne will do everything he can to trace the diabolical connection between the two women—and resist falling in love.
When headstrong young heiress Peg Ralston flees London for Versailles, her father sends dashing rake Jeffrey Wynne to bring her home from the court of England’s greatest enemy. But upon their return it appears that a mysterious portrait and a child’s nursery rhyme link vivacious Peg to a bawdy old seamstress who resided near London Bridge and was quite literally scared to death.
The old woman’s murder is but one thread in a web of conspiracy that includes blackmail, court intrigue, and an underground club that has made a hobby out of murder. With Peg’s life at stake, Wynne will do everything he can to trace the diabolical connection between the two women—and resist falling in love.
About the author
John Dickson Carr (1906–1977) was one of the most popular authors of Golden Age British-style detective novels. Born in Pennsylvania and the son of a US congressman, Carr graduated from Haverford College in 1929. Soon thereafter, he moved to England where he married an Englishwoman and began his mystery-writing career. In 1948, he returned to the US as an internationally known author. Carr received the Mystery Writers of America’s highest honor, the Grand Master Award, and was one of the few Americans ever admitted into the prestigious, but almost exclusively British, Detection Club.
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