Peter Marklin, owner of a Toy Emporium, finds his quiet life harshly interrupted when a collection of antique toys, worth over £20,000, is stolen. Faced with threats from their owner, he sets out to recover them but finds himself up against far more than the greed of unscrupulous collectors. He’s in way over his head but at least the prospect of a countryside dig to excavate the remains of a crashed Spitfire can provide a little solace. Yet even this isn’t easy, and a growing resistance to the dig is being led by a local, indignant landlord. When rather more than the plane and its pilot are unearthed, Marklin finds himself up to his neck in skeletons from the past—skeletons that lead to attempts on his life …

Peter Marklin enjoys a quiet life on the tranquil Dorset coast with his beautiful girlfriend Arabella and his Toy Emporium to keep him busy. When Hollywood starlet Lana-Lee Claudell moves nearby and invites Arabella and Marklin to her home one evening, they are both looking forward to what promises to be an occasion tinged with glamour. But then Lana-Lee’s former lover Adam Longhurst arrives at the party in a drunken rage, and it seems the rich and famous have their problems too. Things take an even darker turn when Lana-Lee’s semi-estranged husband Ben Maxwell is found dead on the beach, and Longhurst is in the frame for his murder. Desperate to free Longhurst, Lana-Lee enlists the help of amateur sleuth Marklin to find the real murderer. His old friend from Scotland Yard, Inspector Blake, has turned up to offer encouragement, and Marklin’s investigations soon start to unearth a seedy tale of drugs and smuggling - a far cry from the superficial gloss of Hollywood. Can Marklin prove Longhurst’s innocence? Just what is the mysterious white ghostly apparition that everyone involved in the mystery starts to see? If Longhurst didn’t kill Maxwell, who did?

New York:: St Martin's,, (1988.). Fine in good dust jacket (tear to front cover of dj with associated creasing.). First US printing. The third mystery featuring antique toy trader and reluctant sleuth Peter Marklin. The first novel in the series won the John Creasey Award for Best First Crime Novel.

Peter Marklin is enjoying a quiet Indian Summer in Dorset, when sixteen-year-old wheeler-dealer Tony Thorn gets him involved in a case of murder and robbery at Tony's school

Peter Marklin winds up on the trail of a killer when the officious Inspector Whetstone asks him to appraise a collection of stolen toy cars connected with a murder case

Antique toy dealer and amateur detective Peter Marklin becomes involved in a murder investigation when, at an antique car auction, he opens the trunk of a car and discovers a dead boy inside