In the spring of 1942, with the war in Europe raging, a gruesome murder shocks the rural community of Marbury, where a once-grand estate called Elton House has been transformed into a hospital for shell-shocked officers sent back from the front lines. When Detective Chief Inspector Lamb arrives to solve the case, he quickly learns that the victim, Elton House’s gardener Joseph Lee, had plenty of enemies in Marbury – and so he and his team have plenty of suspects