The Seeds of Murder

A 50-year-old mystery surfaces in a contemporary investigation as solicitor Rosa Epton finds herself representing murder suspect Adrian Pickard, the new and much younger husband of her octogenarian godmother, Margaret. The victim, a petty criminal and a stranger in the village of Greenborough, where Adrian has signed on as postmaster, had been heard threatening Adrian; later that day he drowned on the property of nearby Warren Hall School. The crime stirs memories of the 1932 disappearance of 11-year-old Stephen Willett, whose blood-stained jersey was found on school grounds. Rosa and her lover, Peter Chen, begin an investigation that leads them to the unsolved mystery, which involved people still living in the area: Sir Denzil Cuckfield, a Warren Hall student at the time and now a highly disliked local squire, and handyman Joe Atherly. When Atherly is found murdered, Adrian's strange interest in Warren Hall and Stephen Willett's death strengthen the case against him, requiring Rosa to call upon her ingenuity to save her godmother's happiness. In each successive outing, Underwood ( Rosa's Dilemma ) has endowed his appealing detective with more humanity. (May)