When Mrs. Packington's husband begins keeping regular company with an office girl, she turns to Mr. Parker Pyne, master of the human soul, for help, in the first of a series of cases that take him from London to the Middle East.

The well-known mystery author presents one of her most famous sleuths, the inimitable Miss Marple, as she follows the trail of a murderer who seems to be very fond of nursery rhymes.

"Set in 1916, we meet Captain Hastings as he is invalided out of the Great War and goes to convalesce at Styles Court, the family home of his great friend, John Cavendish. By an extraordinary coincidence, billeted in the village is a brilliant little retired detective with an egg-shaped head, who made a considerable impression on the Captain when he was in Belgium. Styles is not a happy household and in the blistering summer heat, tensions mount....