Peter Zander-Howell

Présentation de l’éditeur
It is 1949. Sir Francis Sherwood - WW1 hero, landowner, magistrate - is shot dead while standing at an open bedroom window in his country house. A rifle is found in the grounds.

The county police seek help from Scotland Yard. Detective Chief Inspector Bryce and Detective Sergeant Haig are assigned to the case.

The first difficulty for the Yard men is that nobody with even a mild dislike of Sherwood can be found. But before that problem can be resolved, others arise......

Philip Bryce is an unusual policeman. A Cambridge-educated barrister, he joined the Metropolitan Police in 1937 under Lord Trenchard's accelerated promotion scheme. After distinguished army service in WW2, by 1949 he has become Scotland Yard's youngest DCI. A very private individual, he remains a bachelor, his fiancee having been killed during the war. Bryce is something of a polymath, and has a number of outside interests - railways and cricket near the top of the list.

Présentation de l’éditeur
In July 1949, an unpopular and deeply unpleasant man is stabbed to death in the courthouse of an English city. As the murder has been committed in a room to which the general public doesn’t have access, it seems probable that the culprit is someone involved with the business of the courts.

Suspects include a number of lawyers, police officers, and magistrates.

For various reasons, the local Chief Constable decides to ask Scotland Yard to investigate the murder.

Chief Inspector Philip Bryce and Sergeant Alex Haig are assigned to the case.

Theirs is a recent partnership, but the two men worked well together in another murder case a few weeks before.

Présentation de l’éditeur
In August 1949, Detective Chief Inspector Bryce and his new bride Veronica are holidaying in the East Anglian resort of Felixstowe.

During afternoon tea in the Palm Court of their hotel, a man dies at a nearby table. He has been poisoned.

Reluctant to get directly involved, Bryce nevertheless agrees to help the inexperienced local police inspector get to grips with his first murder case, turning his honeymoon into a ‘busman’s holiday’.

Présentation de l’éditeur
Three more 1940s cases for Detective Chief Inspector Philip Bryce.
The first two are set in 1949, and follow on from The Bedroom Window Murder, The Courthouse Murder, and The Felixstowe Murder.

The third is a ‘prequel’, going back to 1946, when Bryce – having returned to the police after army service – was a still a Detective Inspector, based in Whitechapel rather than Scotland Yard.

1. Death in an Office Kitchen
In the office kitchen of a London advertising agency, a man falls to the floor, dead. Natural causes are presumed – until evidence emerges showing this cannot be the case. Chief Inspector Bryce is assigned to expose the murderer.

2. Death in the Public Baths
A body is found in the public bathhouse in St Marylebone. Bryce is tasked with discovering the identity of the victim, and his assailant. With Sergeant Haig’s help, the DCI sorts the facts from the lies.

3. Death on a London Bus
On the upper deck of an experimental London bus, a man is found dead. All of the passengers claim they saw and heard nothing. Inspector Bryce, together with colleagues from Leman Street police station, solves one of his earlier cases.

The Seymor Place Baths, cadre pour la 2ème nouvelle
et qu'on a aussi choisi de montrer en photo pour la couverture pour ce recueil