Senior Constable Tom Lincraft has been summoned to view the body of local miller Edward Franklin, found hanging from a beam in his own mill as the result of a seeming suicide. With him is his junior colleague Giles Bradbury, a ladies’ man who is intrigued by Tom’s policy of never accepting the assertions of others until he has investigated them for himself.

Tom has grounds for suspecting that this is no suicide, and when he and Giles make further enquiries regarding the furtive activities of a man recently arrived at a local inn, they are set upon by three men who become their main targets in their investigation.

Then just as they are about to make arrests, they receive a visit from a shadowy figure who claims to be acting on royal authority, and they are diverted from a simple murder enquiry into an intrigue with grave implications for the welfare of Queen Elizabeth and the nation.