The Woman in the Wardrobe — Peter Shaffer

Mystery crime fiction written in the Golden Age of Murder

"Better and better!" cried Verity, chuckling and rubbing his hands. "A corpse in a blood-soaked room; a locked door and a locked window; a masked man; a beautiful girl trussed inside a wardrobe; and now a pretender to the throne! This is superb!"

The little Sussex town of Amnestie had not known a death so bloody since the fifteenth century. And certainly none more baffling―to all except Mr Verity. From the moment he appears this bearded giant―ruthless inquirer, devastating wit and enthusiastic collector of the best sculpture―has matters firmly (if fantastically) under control. Things are certainly complicated, but this is hardly enough to deter Mr Verity. As he himself observes: "when the number of suspects is continually increasing, and the number of corpses remains constant, you get a sort of inflation. The value of your individual suspect becomes hopelessly depreciated. That, for the real detective, is a state of paradise."