‘Unusual and interesting’ New York Times‘Extremely well-done’ Times Literary Supplement‘A first-rate mystery story… John Rhode at his best’ Somerset Standard‘A well-written story’ Yorkshire PostGolden Age of Crime writer John Rhode’s sixth Dr Priestley detective novel, republished here for the first time in almost a centuryThis 2025 Spitfire Publishers ebook and paperback edition includes a complete bibliography of John Rhode’s Dr Priestley detective novels The first queer death at the isolated mansion on Tollard Ridge is a brutal murder. Rich recluse, Samuel Barton, is found in his study with his skull caved in, his white hair and beard clotted with blood. Everyone in this quiet corner of the South Downs is stunned by the brutality of the whole affair, considering the general inoffensiveness of the victim’s life. However, his ward, Kitty, quickly gets on with the new life her large inheritance affords. A second death follows in a bedroom of the damned country house and appears even more inexplicable than the first. Superintendent King pursues the killer or killers, but it is only when Dr Lancelot Priestley and his private secretary Merefield take an interest that the truth behind the double murder begins to emerge... About the Author John Rhode was the pseudonym for the author Cecil Street, one of the best-selling and most popular British authors of the Golden Age of Crime. His most famous literary creation was Dr Lancelot Priestley, a forensic detective who featured in seventy-two novels written over forty years, solving many ingenious and misleading murders. Cecil Street was born in 1884 in Gibraltar to a military family. At sixteen he attended the Royal Military Academy at Woolwich. He served with distinction in the First World War and then in military intelligence before taking up writing full-time. He was a founding member of the Detection Club, the illustrious dining club of detective story writers, and created the famous ‘Eric the Skull’ used in the rituals of the organisation. He would write over 140 detective novels (writing also as Miles Burton and Cecil Waye) and died aged 80, in 1964. Praise for John Rhode ‘A Dr Priestley story is always an event for armchair sleuths’ New York Times ‘Scientific investigator, Dr Priestley, is one of the most satisfactory successors to Sherlock Holmes’ New York Times ‘Dr Priestley, a scientist with a flair for criminal investigation’ New York Times ‘Standing in the front rank of those who write detective fiction’ Times Literary Supplement ‘Any murder planned by John Rhode is bound to be ingenious’ The Observer ‘One always embarks on a John Rhode book with a great feeling of security. One knows that there will be a sound plot, a well-knit process of reasoning and a solidly satisfying solution with no loose ends or careless errors of fact’ Dorothy L Sayers