Mostrando resultados por autor "Patricia Wentworth" en Todas las categorías

The citizens of Melling are perfectly ordinary—exactly the sort one finds in just about every cozy English village—and to a certain person they might even appear boring. But to Miss Silver, people are always interesting. It has been some years since she gave up work as a governess to become a detective, and her interest in people has served her well. She comes to Melling on vacation—a long postponed visit to an old school chum—but Miss Silver’s business is murder, and her vacations never last long.

Jenny has never been one to feel sorry for herself. The illegitimate child of a wealthy man and a statureless woman, she has been an orphan since before she can remember. It is a hard life made bearable only by the kindness of her guardian, an old woman named Miss Garstone, who has always treated Jenny as her own. Struck down by a motorist, "Garsty" dies, whispering to Jenny that her parents were actually married, and she is the rightful heir to the Alington fortune.

Hugo Ross is perfect for the job as irascible inventor Ambrose Minstrel’s new secretary: young, completely inexperienced, and with an occasional stutter that makes him seem somewhat dim—a mug, in fact. But from his first day, odd things begin to happen. A stranger offers him an absurd amount for an ordinary pair of field glasses; soon, the written offer is stolen from his room. A lovely girl he runs into in the dark one night outside his new employer’s house warns him not to take the job.

Rachel Traherne does not want to meet Maud Silver. She does not want to tell her that someone has threatened her life, because she does not want that dreadful fact to be true. But see Miss Silver she must, for the stout, old-fashioned detective is the only person in London who may be able to keep her safe. Rachel has been receiving threatening letters about her deceased father's fortune. The first two letters were vague; the third said simply, "Get ready to die."

As a mute, burly German peasant is helping British soldiers move a fallen tree, he's struck on the head. When he regains consciousness he calls out to the astonished Major Manning, using his nickname "Monkey"—in perfect English.

Edward Random returns to Deeping a forgotten man. Although raised in the village's manor house, he is no longer wealthy - the result of a quarrel with an uncle, which left him out of the old man's will. For years Edward's name has not been spoken in the town, save for wild rumors that he had gone to prison for dueling, decamped to the Orient, or simply died of mysterious circumstances. In fact he is in good health, ready to start life where he left off, money or no money.

When her fiancé, Giles Armitage, is lost at sea in the middle of the Second World War, Meade Underwood is left in the company of a middle-aged aunt with nothing but a monotonous round of bridge parties and war work to fill her days. A chance encounter restores Giles to Meade but he has lost his memory, and their rediscovered happiness is threatened by the machinations of the scheming Carola Roland, a figure from Giles' forgotten past. So when Carola is viciously murdered, Giles becomes the chief suspect....

Althea Graham's hypochondriac mother seldom visits the gazebo - yet she is found dead in it one morning. The Graham estate had once enjoyed a rural view, but now the grounds are part of suburban London and the gazebo is an anachronistic summerhouse. Scotland Yard becomes suspicious of Althea and her fiancé, the dashing foreign correspondent Nicholas Carey, because the death of her mother frees them to be married at last.

Mary Stokes was walking through Dead Man's Copse one evening when she saw, in the beam of a torch, the corpse of a young woman dressed in a black coat, black gloves, no hat and an eternity ring set with diamonds in her ear. But when she and Detective Sergeant Frank Abbott went back to the wood the body had vanished.

The two Miss Pilgrims, Columba and Janette, think its unwise to leave their fine ancestral home, Pilgrim's Rest. When their brother suffers a fatal fall only days after talking about selling it, and his son barely escapes two near-fatal accidents, they suspect it's deadly to leave. Surely Miss Silver can determine why the house hates to be empty.

She awakes in a dark place. A young woman with a shattered memory, she knows neither who she is nor how she came to be in this abandoned house. All she possesses is a faint sense that someone is lying dead at the foot of the stairs. Horrifyingly, she is correct. In the cellar lies a young woman, her body broken, her head split, her life undone by a revolver’s shell. The amnesiac flees and finally has a stroke of luck: She meets Maud Silver.

James and Carmona Hardwick are spending the summer playing host to numerous friends and relatives in an old Hardwick family residence by the sea. The arrival of Alan Field, a devastatingly handsome though shady figure from Carmona's past, destroys the holiday atmosphere in the old house and replaces it with a mounting tension, culminating in murder. Fortunately, Miss Silver is present to unravel the complex mystery and seek out the murderer amongst them.

It's nearing the end of WWII, and Michael Harsh has been working for the government on a secret project for years. Finally he is ready to hand over the formula. But the next morning he is dead. It looks like suicide. Only Miss Silver knows it's murder.

Tanis Lyle was one of those passionate women who always get their own way. Her cousin Laura hated her. Most women did. But men found her irresistible and she used them mercilessly. So when Tanis was found murdered there seemed to be any number of suspects on hand. But Miss Silver had her own suspicions…

There was a certain heavy air of intrigue and mystery emanating from the old inn high on the cliff top. The Catherine-Wheel had once been a home for pirates and smugglers, but now it looked like it was harbouring a murderer. It had begun with an advertisement in the paper requesting descendants of the late innkeeper, Jeremiah Taverner, to stay for a weekend at the inn. They had arrived, a mixed assortment, to the family reunion eager to discover the secrets of their ancestry. But one of them had been hideously murdered, bringing the inn's stormy past into frightening focus.

Who was William Smith? And why was Mavis Jones so horrified to see him? For seven years William had worked as a woodcarver for the local toyshop, ignorant of his true identity. The war had robbed him of his memory, and no one expected him to ever find the answer. So when he took his work to Evesleys Ltd, why was his life instantly in danger? When William makes the frightening discovery that there are people determined not to let his memory return whatever the cost, Miss Silver is called in to investigate.

Amabel Grey, a widow with a modest income, needs money. Fast. Her spoiled daughter Daphne has an opportunity to go with friends on holiday, and she's convinced it will end with a lucrative marriage proposal. But where to find 200 pounds? She overhears a client requesting the lawyer find someone to live in his Dower House for six months. The stipend is 200 pounds! And she knows the house, having visited 20 years before. The catch? Previous tenants have been driven away by strange happenings, and the village is convinced the place is haunted. The owner wants the rumors to stop.

Bill Waring went to America with a bright future ahead of him. In London, he had a promising career and the love of a young beauty, Lila Dryden, and there were plans for marriage when he returned from overseas. But then a freak train accident puts their happiness on hold. Bill spends a month in the hospital, and when he finally makes it back to London, there is a still bigger shock awaiting him. Under pressure from a domineering aunt, Lila has become engaged to another.

Miss Silver joins a friend from Scotland Yard to investigate a suspicious suicide. Frank Abbott’s vacations never last very long, and his trip to Field End is no exception. He has hardly enjoyed a moment of Jonathan Field’s hospitality before tragedy strikes. A niece ventures into old Jonathan’s study at night to ask him a question, and finds him stone cold with a revolver by his hand. An obvious suicide, it seems, but Inspector Abbott is not so sure.

Things had never been quite the same at Latter End since Lois had taken over. Suddenly life seemed to be an endless succession of bitter family rows which Lois, needless to say, invariably won. More than one person at Latter End found themselves stretched to the limit by Lois and her bullying, and it was only a matter of time before somebody snapped. It was unthinkable of course...but if anyone ever murdered Lois Latter, it would be very embarrassing to discover just how many people might have wished her dead.