A Pocket Full of Rye

First published in 1953, this detective novel opens when the City financier Rex Fortescue dies in his office after tea, poisoned with taxine, a pocketful of rye on the body. Inspector Neele goes to the Fortescue house at Yewtree Lodge, where the young second wife, the two sons, and the staff all have claims and grudges. A second death follows, then a third that looks like a grim joke. Miss Marple, who once employed the murdered maid, sees that the crimes track the nursery rhyme of the king in his counting-house. The book is a country-house whodunit built on a children's verse, not a treatise on the City.

Bound in purple buckram blocked with a cover design in green and grey by the artist, gilt title to spine. Brown slipcase.