The Duchess Didn't Do It - The Marchioness of Merritt Mysteries, #5

Eleanor, Marchioness of Merritt, has spent four quiet seasons quietly solving the murders that polite society would prefer left unsolved. The fifth is rather more inconvenient. Her closest friend — Cressida, the thrice-divorced Duchess of Ashcombe, a woman of eccentric habits and notoriously sharp opinions — has been arrested for the poisoning of Cornelius Vane, a gentleman she had the poor judgement to threaten in front of twelve witnesses at his own dinner table. To the public, Cressida is a monster. To Eleanor, she is the only friend who understands the absurdity of high society. Proving her innocence, however, is a different beast than proving it in a drawing room.

Inspector Josiah Hale of Scotland Yard receives the case with the weary patience of a man who has known Eleanor rather too long. Solicitor Fenwick, summoned in desperation, finds the entire business insufferably messy. The evidence, such as it is, points squarely at Cressida; the social codes of Edwardian England ensure that a duchess's word is worth rather less than a servant's; and the real murderer, Eleanor suspects, is still comfortably seated among the company.

What follows is a country house enquiry conducted with impeccable manners and a deeply improper amount of snooping. Eleanor traces financial deceit through a tangled family trust, examines the dinner table itself for clues the police have overlooked, and confronts the particular cruelty of a man whose death has solved rather a lot of inconvenient problems for his heir. With Fenwick's legal persistence and her own stubborn observation, she assembles the evidence for a reckoning the guilty party never expected.

Charmingly British, delightfully deadly, and served with a twist of humour, The Duchess Didn't Do It is Book 5 of The Marchioness of Merritt Mysteries — a Victorian and Edwardian historical mystery series for readers who want airtight plotting, lived-in period detail, and a female sleuth who observes the absurdity of her world with affectionate contempt. Ideal for fans of the Violet Carlyle Mysteries, Beth Byers, and the Duchess of Stortford series.