A collection of 30 short stories, including a dozen entries in the "Telegraph" competition of 2012 on varied themes and others previously published in "Pebbles on a Northern Shore"; one group on an eccentric rural community; another on a professional assassin with a conscience; dreams and fancies; a penalty of misplaced confidence; the odd bit of science fiction (definitely not of the "space western" type); a portrait linking mediaeval and modern romances; the friendship between an 18th-century aristocrat and his executioner; and the long-delayed fulfilment of a youthful crush.