A Knife for Harry Dodd (Chief Inspector Littlejohn #21) (2024)

Not my favorite Inspector Littlejohn mystery... This one falls into the "country" character-driven tales where Littlejohn and Cromwell appear on the rural scene of murder and begin their interviews of the locals who always have the strangest characteristics and lives and are described comically. Our first body is Harry Dodd, a man who had a very complicated life story with a constellation of friends and family that were all suspects. Littlejohn and Cromwell have a hard job of it. More people die.
This was the last Bellairs book available to me through Kindle Unlimited and probably the last I will read. I reserve the right to go back and enjoy some of the Bellairs Provencal mysteries I favored since they usually included Littlejohn's wife and enjoyable land and sea descriptions.

Author George Bellairs packed the 21st novel in the Scotland Yard Detective Inspector Thomas Littlejohn series with even more twists and turns than usual! It’s like a roller coaster, with one surprising discovery after another. I never, ever guessed at the murderer of poor Harry Dodd, an easy-going weak man rejected by his family over a minor scandal.

It would be too easy to reveal too much, so I’ll just let you know that readers will be glued to the pages until the novel’s very end. This has to be one of my very favorite Littlejohn novels. As an added benefit, Kindle Unlimited subscribers can read this book for free.

This book was first published in 1953. It is now being republished by Agora Books and it will be released on 13th June. It involves the series characters Inspector Littlejohn and Sergeant Cromwell of Scotland Yard.
Mrs Nicholls, her daughter Dorothy, and Harry Dodd live together in a bungalow called Mon Abri in the village Brande. Harry Dodd often spends his evenings at the village pub. Once when he had gone out to the pub, the Nicholls receive a telephone call from him that he is unwell and needs a lift home. When the Nicholls reach him in the car they find that he is badly injured having been stabbed in the back. The knife is missing. They put him in the car but by the time they reach the bungalow, he is dead.
About 6 years back, Harry Dodd had a little fling with Dorothy who was then his secretary which he regretted later. But his children pressurized his wife to divorce him so that they could take control of the family business. Harry Dodd then bought Mon Abri to settle Dorothy and her mother and also stayed with them though he avoided any further physical relationship with Dorothy.
Harry’s ambitious M.P. brother William speaks to Scotland Yard and Littlejohn and Cromwell are sent to investigate the crime. Harry Dodd was a harmless and unassuming man. So who could have killed him ?
There follows a painstaking investigation with a lot of suspects. The detectives discover the dark side of the Dodd family and have to deal with jealousy, greed, intrigue and spurned lovers. They finally solve the case but not before further murders take place.
This is a well written mystery with an intricate plot. There are several twists and turns and plenty of clues. Most of the characters have strange lives which are described vividly and often comically. The characterization is very good.
However, my complaint is that there is a lot of padding of unnecessary details which slow down the pace and often make for dull reading. The book could easily have been reduced by about 25% It is because of this aspect that I rate the book as 3 stars, otherwise I would have rated it as 4 stars.
My thanks to Net Galley and Agora Books for the advance copy to me for my review.

Full review at classicmystery.blog

One for the Agatha Christie lovers! The writers style reminded me so much of her! I never guessed the murderer at all!! This book is about the death of Harry Dodd. Harry calls Dorothy for a ride home from the pub, Dorothy fetches her mother along too and when they pick Harry up they just think he’s drunk. By the time they get him home he’s dead. But who would want to kill Harry Dodd? When Inspector Littlejohn is called in to investigate the murder, he uncovers the dark side of the power hungry Dodd family. Dodds life may not have been as simple as it seemed.. Bogged down with jealousy, greed, and spurned lovers, Littlejohn has more suspects than he can handle. And as the body count rises, it seems there might be more than one murderer in his midst. Littlejohn is a character that is so likeable. I can’t wait to read more of the writers stories! This was excellent it kept you guessing and you had to keep reading to found out!

When the Nicholls, mother and daughter, receive a phone call from Harry Dodd to collect him, they at first believe his is drunk but later discover that he has been stabbed and is now dead. But why would anyone want him dead.
Inspector Littlejohn and Cromwell of Scotland Yard are called in to investigate.
An enjoyable well-written mystery, with some twists to get to the solution but also contains a set of unlikeable people called the Dodds' family. With an easy to read writing style.
Original written in 1953
A NetGalley Book

Well, this was a book full of twists and turns! A typical Bellairs in some respects, post war goings on in country towns (although I highly recommend his French excursions) but there were even more wonderful descriptions of the characters than usual - veering from glamorous to grotesque - and the end of the book has taken you so far from the start you could never have guessed the finale too early. I go to Bellairs for classic crime for an escape in times of stress and here he doesn’t disappoint.

This story moves with a really well- written cast of characters. Inspector Littlejohn is a regular in a long line of books and he puzzles things out by chasing the clues wherever they lead. There is a long, twisted, path of possible people with enough red-herrings to make it very enjoyable. I like the rural England shown in these descriptions written in 1953 and the Pub life in particular. The characters that hang out there...which Bellairs had a talent for developing-give life to this book.

There are many classes or kinds of detective stories and I am not going to try and classify them all but I will describe which this particular book falls under. We walk the line along with the lead investigators, seeing what they see and are only allowed to (probably) see a little bit further down the line till the culprit is unmasked. Then the tale still continues, in order to wrap the story up as well as the apprehension of the culprit. There is no tricking of the villains into revealing their doings but careful piecing of the puzzle by everyone as a team and sometimes a sleight of hand (on only a few occasions).
Harry Dodd is knifed and subsequently dies of the injury. He is a man of many faces. Each person, from varied parts of his life, indicate a whole different person and it hard to figure which of those descriptions can be actually added to the entire puzzle. There is subtle humour sprinkled about the tale, nothing extravagant but enough to get a feel for the investigative duo, Inspector Littlejohn and Cromwell. It was a pretty solid tale which could have been shorter but considering the time of its original publication, the length is to be expected. This story is not for anyone in a hurry, especially to pin their accusations correctly on any one person since the extended family, friends, and acquaintances are all under scrutiny to figure out who killed Harry Dodd.

I was invited to review this title by the publishers but this has not impacted my review in any way which is completely based on my reading experience.

Brilliant!!

Just re-read after many years.

A long and intricate police procedural full of wonderfully witty descriptions of all the protagonists. Littlejohn and Cromwell at their best.

Very highly recommended for lovers of Golden Age Detective Fiction.

Good old fashioned mystery

I enjoy these mysteries from the golden age. All of the characters are interesting, the mystery kept me going to the end and the plot resolved satisfactorily.

Odd plot.

The book goes along quite well and what seems like a straightforward murder story acquires a large number of subplots and plenty to mislead the reader. Justice is done at the end with both murderers meeting a watery grave. The characters are for the most part strange almost to the point of being caricatures. It’s entertaining but almost reaches the point where the reader may feel that the writer is a little bored with the medium and is embellishing it to amuse himself.

Yet another Bellairs' masterpiece! This book was quite different from the other Littlejohn series that I have read so far. The mystery, suspense, pace and tension was very well maintained until the end. Of course, given that this is a Bellairs novel, one can expect some quirky humour and weird characters.

Overall, this was an entertaining, engrossing and enjoyable read. A highly recommended book for those who love Classic mysteries.

This book was first published in 1953. It is now being republished by Agora Books and it will be released on 13th June. It involves the series characters Inspector Littlejohn and Sergeant Cromwell of Scotland Yard.
Mrs Nicholls, her daughter Dorothy, and Harry Dodd live together in a bungalow called Mon Abri in the village Brande. Harry Dodd often spends his evenings at the village pub. Once when he had gone out to the pub, the Nicholls receive a telephone call from him that he is unwell and needs a lift home. When the Nicholls reach him in the car they find that he is badly injured having been stabbed in the back. The knife is missing. They put him in the car but by the time they reach the bungalow, he is dead.
About 6 years back, Harry Dodd had a little fling with Dorothy who was then his secretary which he regretted later. But his children pressurized his wife to divorce him so that they could take control of the family business. Harry Dodd then bought Mon Abri to settle Dorothy and her mother and also stayed with them though he avoided any further physical relationship with Dorothy.
Harry’s ambitious M.P. brother William speaks to Scotland Yard and Littlejohn and Cromwell are sent to investigate the crime. Harry Dodd was a harmless and unassuming man. So who could have killed him ?
There follows a painstaking investigation with a lot of suspects. The detectives discover the dark side of the Dodd family and have to deal with jealousy, greed, intrigue and spurned lovers. They finally solve the case but not before further murders take place.
This is a well written mystery with an intricate plot. There are several twists and turns and plenty of clues. Most of the characters have strange lives which are described vividly and often comically. The characterization is very good.
However, my complaint is that there is a lot of padding of unnecessary details which slow down the pace and often make for dull reading. The book could easily have been reduced by about 25% It is because of this aspect that I rate the book as 3 stars, otherwise I would have rated it as 4 stars.

I’m struggling with how to review this book.

On the one hand, the writing is sharp and engaging, the plot drew me in and kept me reading, there was a strong sense of place, which I like in a novel, and there was a fair amount of the dry British humor that I like so much.

But…but…but…

I really struggled with the very “social class-aware” premise of the book – that by running off with his secretary, Dot, the educated company director Harry Dodd had put himself beyond the pale. So far beyond the pale, in fact, that he had become a sort of “in-country” remittance man.

To me there may or may not be things wrong with running off with your secretary, depending on marital status of both, power/wealth difference, age difference or whatever. But violating social class norms is NOT, to me, one of the things wrong with this. And yet the entire plot is based on this premise, and many of the characterizations seem drawn to highlight this.

In a way this was made worse for me by the fact that this title was originally published in the 1950s and appears to be more-or-less contemporaneous. If this had been written today, as a historical mystery, I would have been more comfortable with it, since I could have viewed it as the author’s probably somewhat accurate portrayal of attitudes of the period. However, as I was reading it, I kept thinking that this in fact probably actually represented the author’s views, and that kept intruding on my enjoyment. It’s not that other British mystery authors of the period don’t have similar social-class issues that seem awkward to a reader of today - e.g. the original title of Agatha Christie’s “And Then There Were None”. It was that in this case, it was so central to the tale that I couldn’t compartmentalize it away while reading.

With that issue (big though it was for me) aside, I did like this enough to try at least one or two other Inspector Littlejohn titles, and hope that this is not a recurring theme for the whole series.

A Knife for Harry Dodd begins with a woman receiving a phone call from the man she lives with. After a night at the pub, he has begun to feel ill and needs her to take him home. What might seem like a predictable end to a night out drinking turns into a tragedy when he is found stabbed to death in the street. Harry Dodd is a man that, during what seems to be a midlife crisis, left his devoted wife and comfortable life for his mistress and clearly bitterly regrets it. Inspector Littlejohn is called in to try and make sense of Dodd's complicated life in order to solve the murder.

I found this novel hard work at first. The characters are all rather unpleasant and the story seems to drag on a bit. I will admit that I honestly did not care who killed Harry Dodd! Thankfully it picks up pace as more characters and subplots are introduced. It then becomes a page-turner with plenty of twists and turns and an ending that I did not predict. A Knife for Harry Dodd is far from being a perfect crime novel. One of the main problems for me was the fact that so many of the lower class characters are portrayed as being amoral buffoons. This is quite common with books from this era, but it does come across as being quite condescending. I also felt this humour obscures the fact that this novel does deal with some interesting issues such as infidelity, illegitimacy, thwarted ambitions and family breakdown. I did ultimately enjoy it because the plot is intriguing (I actually ended up staying up till 2 am to finish it). I would recommend this novel if you are already familiar with this series. If you are new to the Inspector Littlejohn novels I would not recommend starting with this one as it is definitely one of the weaker ones.

Originally published on my blog: Nonstop Reader.

A Knife for Harry Dodd is the 21st (!!!) Inspector Littlejohn mystery by George Bellairs. Originally published in 1953, this reformat and re-release from Agora, out 13th June 2019 is 312 pages and available in ebook and paperback formats.

George Bellairs was a prolific and very readable author. His books are enjoyable with solid characterizations, often droll dialogue and twisty plots. This one is maybe not my absolute favorite of the ones I've read by him, but it's an above average engaging murder mystery.

Harry Dodd is a friendly engaging man with set habits, egalitarian taste in friends, and a complex history. He is stabbed on the way home from the pub and the body count continues from there. Part of the appeal of the Littlejohn mysteries for me are the unerring 'English village' bucolic settings with tension and enmities rife just under the surface. Bellairs was an adept commentator on the human condition and I think the comparison with Simenon's French novels is an apt one.

Worth noting for Kindle Unlimited subscribers, this book (and others in the series) are included in the KU subscription.

Five stars, a diverting read, cleverly put together.

Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.

I see that "A knife for Harry Dodd" is the 21st in this series of Inspector Littlejohn mysteries by George Bellairs, who has discovered so many ways to be bad and still get published. Bellaires does not let the fact that he has become utterly bored with his recurring characters deter him from plodding (and plotting) on; he has Littlejohn and Cromwell driving back and forth endlessly between small towns, villages and roadside pubs, holding interminable and mostly fruitless conversations, to give the impression of action. Every once in a while he wakes his readers up by having one of his minor characters gratuitously almost gored by a bull, but all the actual murders take place off-screen (so to speak) despite his use of a third-person, all-seeing narrator. This narrator goes behind closed doors to report on hidden conversations but is never there for the kill .
The scenes with the raging bull, the house fire, and a couple of other awkward farcical moments are attempts at tone-lightening humor, but end up jarring the tone of the police procedural because they are unbelievable and do not flow easily from the plot.
Although there are a few interesting and unusual characters (like Ismael Lott), there are inconsistencies within major characters that make them act as puppets chained to the needs of the plot rather than as complex humans who take on a life of their own as the story develops.
One repeated problem that Bellaires should have corrected after 21 novels is his over-explanation of the obvious, like a comedian who is compelled by his insecurities into explaining his jokes after telling them. During one of Littlejohn's conversations, a self-explanatory affectionate gesture by another character has to be explained by the narrator in terms of the inspector's wife's psychology textbook. That had the effect of pouring water on what could have been an effective scene.
I did like the atmosphere and details of rural England in the 1950's but Bellaires doesn't effectively capitalize on an interesting initial situation. He stretches out scenes and conversations with unnecessary and repetitious detail, thus spoiling any mood of suspense which is crucial to the mystery novel.

This is a very enjoyable classic crime novel with lots of action, interesting characters, and clever twists in the plot.

Harry Dodd made a mistake running off with his secretary Dot 6 years before, and is living at Mon Abri in Brande with Dot and her mother after his wife divorced him (forced into it by his three children). He sleeps in an upstairs room gotten to by a pull down stairway. He takes occasional fishing trips with his friend and goes to the local pub, The Bear, most evenings to be with his friends. At the beginning of the book he has telephoned Mon Abri and asked Dot to come get him in the car. She can't really drive, but manages to get down the hill just as Harry falls to his face in the road. Dot and her mother manage to get him in the car and into the house where they find he has a knife in his back and he dies. Dot called the police in the middle of the night, not realizing he died earlier.

Harry's brother is a politician, and immediately calls Scotland Yard, and Cromwell and Littlejohn are sent to Brand. They find lots of suspects, and learn a lot about Dodd's recent life. Shortly before, Harry and his Dad had been run off the road in a car accident and their friend driving the car was killed. Harry and his Dad were both scared. When Dodd's Dad is killed, they find a paper with the address of a local pub. The brother and sister running the pub claim that her 4 year old daughter is Dodd's daughter. They find from the lawyer that Dodd has a lot more money than they expected. And then, Dodd's lawyer is killed on his boat (he must know too much!).

Gradually, after lots of interviews and traipsing back and forth around the countryside, Littlejohn gets a break by seeing the car described from the road accident. He figures out the culprit who runs away. However, one of Dodd's friends who is running away from his wife manages to run down the culprit by mistake!

This is yet another wonderful Golden Age mystery by the prolific George Bellairs. I am really pleased to see these terrific old mysteries being republished for another generation of readers. Bellairs doesn’t need some cutesy theme to make his books appealing. He simply writes excellent mysteries, populated by interesting characters, sprinkled here and there with a bit of humor, and peppered with clues. He often brings things to an unexpected conclusion. I’ve read at least ten of this series and haven’t guessed the ending yet.

Inspector Littlejohn is one of my favorite sleuths. He is wise and perceptive and always calm, no matter what circ*mstances he finds himself in. In this book, A Knife for Harry Dodd, the plot is complex, and many of the characters are both unpleasant and suspects in the crime. The story might be perceived as moving a bit slowly for modern tastes, but I feel it adds to the sense of time and place. (No computers to quickly find information and even a long distance phone call was a big deal!). The end surprised me a bit, but it was both plausible and consistent with the story.

Highly recommended if you enjoy a classic mystery that is well written and easy to read.

First of all, in the interests…full disclosure….free copy…netgalley…..blah, blah, blah. You get the idea.

Ok, I have to admit I love an old detective novel. To be fair, any reasonable whodunit gets my vote, but I’m particularly fond of what you might call the old-school British detective. Must-haves – lower class, salt of the earth side kick; seriously stiff upper lip; rarely seen wife and a way of persuading people to spill the beans just by giving them a stern talking-to. George Bellairs’ Inspector Littlejohn has all of these in spades and I fully intend to read every one of the novels.

In this particular mystery poor Harry Dodd has been stabbed outside the local pub. Who is responsible? The appalling women he shares a house with? His equally appalling family? Maybe the wronged wife? ….or someone else entirely?

It doesn’t take too long to figure out the guilty party but the story holds the attention right to the end with some well-fleshed side characters and some interesting possibilities.

All in all a satisfying read. Next!

Also on my blog below:
https://trillianmagic.wordpress.com/2...

3.75 stars

I am a fan of vintage mysteries, and Littlejohn's cases are always interesting. They are intelligently written and presume the reader to be paying attention.

In this instance, a family drama unfolds. Harry Dodd has been ostracized from his family (wife and grown children) after having a brief fling with his secretary. He loses everything, and ends up living in a cheap place with the secretary and her mother. Any romantic spark is long gone, and he escapes every evening to the local pub. One dark night he is stabbed on the way home.

When Littlejohn and crew start looking for suspects, layers of intrigue are uncovered. Is there another girlfriend down at the pub? And whose child is her little girl? What about Harry's business ventures? He is working on a secret project that could put his wife's family business in peril. And where did he find the money to make generous gestures to various friends?

More murders follow -- someone has something to hide. Enjoyable as always. Thanks to the publisher and to Net Galley for providing me with an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

A Knife for Harry Dodd

This was my first Inspector Littlejohn novel and certainly won’t be my last. It is a great page turner, it pulled me in right from the start and keep me interested throughout. It kept me up reading late into the night. It commenced with an usual phone call from Harry saying he’s in need of help but when Dorothy and her murder discover he’s been stabbed and subsequently dies they’re in no hurry to contact law enforcement. Dorothy, her mother and many other characters are given country, almost hillbilly characteristics which bring a comic element to the story. At first one wonders who might want Harry dead but as the story unfolds we learn how greedy for power his family was. The plot thickens too when we realise that with the victim number rising it is possible that there could be more than one murderer on the prowl. There are a number of sub plots excellently interwoven to keep the reader enthralled throughout. The conclusion is well written and I was pleasantly surprised at how it panned out. I’m looking forward to reading many more of the Inspector Littlejohn crime series now that I’ve been introduced.

Another great novel from George Bellairs, featuring the wonderful Tom Littlejohn, Scotland Yard's finest detective. A Knife for Harry Dodd is one of Littlejohn's most complicated cases, it’s not so much who killed him as why. On the surface it seems unlikely that anyone would wish him harm but it doesn’t take long before all sorts of secrets emerge, the power hungry Dodd family are hiding a multitude of sins and Littlejohn is knee deep in suspects.
George Bellairs is, undeniably, my favourite author and I am delighted that Agora Books are reissuing so many of his highly addictive detective stories. Bellairs was the pseudonym of Harold Blundell, a bank manager who wrote more than 50 novels in his spare time, to be honest one wonders how he ever found time for banking. He had a real talent for writing, his plots are intricate and his characters are fully formed and supplied with all sorts of idiosyncrasies. He writes with humour as well as empathy and can hold his own against the best of the Golden Age authors. I sincerely hope that all his titles will eventually be reissued. Very, very highly recommended.

Why have I never read anything by George Bellairs before this?!! I absolutely love this book. It is intelligently written, with sharp, witty dialogue. The plot is intricate and full of twists, but like a true Golden Age Mystery, all of the clues are there, laid out for you to solve the crime. And while this was published and takes place in 1953, the story doesn’t feel dated.

What I really enjoyed were the the many characters that Littlejohn and Cromwell encounter during the investigation. Each added something to the plot, but also, the colorful descriptions of each were fabulous. They ranged from funny “His thin neck projected from his collar like a snake, and his head was almost the same diameter, which gave it the look of a nail sticking out from his collar”, to downright snarky “Her face was round, good-natured and self-indulgent, her figure full and rather attractive for those who liked them that way.”

I have already put several more of the series on my TBR list, and I highly recommend this one to anyone looking for a good mystery, or just a good read.

Source: Review copy Agora Books via NetGalley

Poor Harry Dodd. He has a brief fling and his. wife, lawyer, and children are quick to get him out of their lives. So he lives in a little town with the young woman he had the fling with and her mother in such depressing circ*mstances that his bedroom is in the attic. He seems pretty depressed and friendless, until recently. But then, someone knifes Dodd and whatever he had planned came to a standstill. Since Dodd's estranged brother is an MP, Littlejohn and Cromwell are called in to figure out what's going on. Dodd's father escapes from an asylum and is found smothered, his lawyer is killed on his boat, the house he shared with the two women is torched, and a farmer who gave an alibi to one of the suspects dies of a heart attack. The mystery piles on the corpses and the culprits come to satisfyingly bad ends. Harry had been planning to reconcile with his wife and adopt his son's illegitimate daughter, which starts all the trouble, especially since he'd been speculating successfully on the stock market and wanted to make sure that the little girl was provided for. A very good read.

I count on George Bellairs for an instantly engrossing, solid read. His plot may not be as steady as a Patricia Wentworth or Agatha Christie, but the characters are fully developed, the dialogue exceptional- often bringing a wry smile to my face. And I never guess who the villain is at the beginning. One of the things I like best is the scenery, and great characterization, he truly understands people, human nature and his astute observations are often laugh out loud funny. I'm not a drinker, particularly beer, but I liked this book anyway- considering the importance of that bottle cap! Also, this plot rolls and bumps along just as an actual investigation pre-cell phone would have- I love the local bobby cycling to find our Scotland Yard man amidst his enquiries. When I rate books, I typically rate the book against the genre, or if I have read many of a particular author as I have this one, then I rate it against his or her other work. This is a 3.75 so I'll give him 4 stars for easy entertainment. Thanks, George!

I haven't read George Bellairs until now but I certainly will again. This story moves with a really well- written cast of characters. Inspector Littlejohn is a regular in a long line of books and he puzzles things out by chasing the clues wherever they lead. There is a long, twisted, path of possible people with enough red-herrings to make it very enjoyable. I like the rural England shown in these descriptions written in 1953 and the Pub life in particular. The characters that hang out there...which Bellairs had a talent for developing-give life to this book.

George Bellairs wrote over 50 books in a long career. The writing is reminiscent of the top-notch English mystery writers of the day with plenty of puzzles and not a lot of gore. I am fond of this type of writing and rejoice I have found another of these authors.

I had Bellairs recommended to me on one of the Golden Age Mystery sites and I highly recommend him to you. Harry Dodd has secrets in his life and they may have just gotten him murdered. Five Stars...

My thanks to Netgalley and Agora Books

First of all, in the interests…full disclosure….free copy…netgalley…..blah, blah, blah. You get the idea.

Ok, I have to admit I love an old detective novel. To be fair, any reasonable whodunit gets my vote, but I’m particularly fond of what you might call the old-school British detective. Must-haves – lower class, salt of the earth side kick; seriously stiff upper lip; rarely seen wife and a way of persuading people to spill the beans just by giving them a stern talking-to. George Bellairs’ Inspector Littlejohn has all of these in spades and I fully intend to read every one of the novels.

In this particular mystery poor Harry Dodd has been stabbed outside the local pub. Who is responsible? The appalling women he shares a house with? His equally appalling family? Maybe the wronged wife? ….or someone else entirely?

It doesn’t take too long to figure out the guilty party but the story holds the attention right to the end with some well-fleshed side characters and some interesting possibilities.

All in all a satisfying read. Next!

Very much of its time

Mr Harry Dodd is murdered, his last actions after being stabbed are to ring home and request that he's picked up from the phone box. The ladies he's living with are the secretary he had a brief encounter with which cost him his wife, family and business, and her mother; but contrary to what was expected he wasn't living with Dorothy as his wife. More his guilty conscience felt he ought to ensure she was settled and so he lived there like a lodger in a little attic room.

When Littlejohn and Cromwell turn up they are led on a merry dance and the bodies keep dropping. Walter Dodd his father, Mr Pharaoh the lawyer.. there's more money than their should be and a little girl who's allegedly Harry's daughter even though he's been getting back together with his ex-wife.. it's a lot to unravel but can Littlejohn and Cromwell fathom out the truth before the guilty party manages to cover up the remaining evidence?