In the absence of adult supervision, Flavia has taken on the mentorship of her “pestilent” younger cousin Undine. Undine too seems fascinated by mayhem. Flavia has nigglings of doubt about her motivations. Has Undine inherited her dead mother’s darkness? Or worse?

A mysterious villager, Major Goodinall, a virtual hermit and former public hangman with stomach-curdling deeds in his past, has been found dead,...

In the absence of adult supervision, Flavia has taken on the mentorship of her “pestilent” younger cousin Undine. Undine too seems fascinated by mayhem. Flavia has nigglings of doubt about her motivations. Has Undine inherited her dead mother’s darkness? Or worse?

A mysterious villager, Major Goodinall, a virtual hermit and former public hangman with stomach-curdling deeds in his past, has been found dead, killed by ingesting poisonous mushrooms.

In her search for the murderer, Flavia becomes entangled with the families of those who have lost relatives to the dead man, only to be led to the most unlikely of suspects.