There are only eighteen black people in Kingsmarkham One is Chief Inspector Wexford's new doctor, Raymond Akande When the doctor's daughter Melanie goes missing, Wexford takes more than just a professional interest in the case Melanie had only just left university and had been to sign on for social security Against a background of rising unemployment and social change, Wexford is involved in a case which tests not only his powers of deduction, but his basic beliefs and prejudices