EL CAPITÁN ROSER POYNINGS, AUTOR DE NOVELAS Policiales menos conspicuas que su barba (la más famosa del condado de Sussex), que sus vastos anteojos de carey y que su fatigada bicicleta, recibe una carta desesperada y efusiva, enigmáticamente firmada con una B. La escritura es de mujer; al capitán lo citan para el día siguiente, a las doce, en la posada The King of Sussex. Perplejo y halagado concurre; al rato llega una muchacha de pelo rojo, cuyos ojos verdes le traen una vieja nostalgia. Muy pronto esos ojos hablan de una amenaza de muerte.

Literate, witty and involved detective novel about Roger Poynton, a mystery writer, who is contacted by his former lover’s daughter, Bryony Hurst. Bryony tells Poynton that she will be killed by unknown assailants in several days and wants his help. Poynton enlists the aid of a police inspector and his cousin to concoct a plan to hide and watch over the girl. But her enemies are in hot pursuit. They manage to find her, outwit the protectors, and kidnap the girl. She is later found brutally killed on a hillside several miles away from the inn where she had been hiding. Poynton, his cousin and the inspector all come to the same conclusion: that Bryony was involved with a secret cult that involved human sacrifice. As it turns out the secret society was actually a group devoted to the ancient rituals and orgiastic pleasures practiced on the Greek island of Naxos headed by an eccentric poetess who calls herself Xanthippe Gnoss (an excellent villainess!) and within this group was a subcult of decadent Satanists. First in a series of three novels with Roger Poynton as the detective. All three books feature crimes involving supernatural or occult plots. Australian writer.