Inspector Colbeck and Sergeant Leeming are summoned by the Master of the college to investigate Pomeroy’s untimely demise. With the Boat Race on the horizon, the president of the Cambridge Boat Club believes their Oxford rivals are responsible for the death of their talented cox. Yet it seems Pomeroy had ruffled many feathers during his short time at the university.

With academic disputes, sporting rivalry and a clandestine romance in play, the Railway Detective will have to disentangle the many threads of Pomeroy’s life in order to answer the truth about his death.