"Chew on this," says Melrose Plant to Richard Jury, who's in the hospital being driven crazy by Hannibal, a nurse who likes to speculate on his chances for survival. Jury could use a good story, preferably one not ending with his own demise.

Plant tells Jury of something he overheard in The Grave Maurice, a pub near the hospital. A woman told an intriguing story about a girl named Nell Ryder, granddaughter to the owner of the Ryder Stud Farm in

...

A young friend pulls Scotland Yard’s Richard Jury into the life—and death—of a wealthy bachelor…
The once-charismatic Billy Maples was last seen in a club named Dust, before his murder in a trendy London hotel. Proving as inscrutable—and challenging—to Jury as the case is the beautiful chief inspecting officer...
Before his death, Maples was a patron of London’s finest art galleries and caretaker...

An unlikely trio of detectives teams up to identify a common link between three very differently executed murders spanning multiple counties in England.

Investigating a double homicide involving a heist at an art gallery and casino, Scotland Yard's Richard Jury teams up with a gang of kids to solve a case with ties to astrophysics, the Tanzanian gem mines, and an act of revenge.