The body is identified as one Jane Carstairs, ‘a fishing fleeter’, the term used to describe young women from England who arrive in India looking for husbands. Suspects multiply and include the higher echelons of Madras business and government, an elusive American involved in the film industry, and the obligatory femme fatale, Jane’s friend and fellow fleeter Virginia Campbell, whose increasingly provocative outfits have a risible effect on Le Fanu.

Specialised knowledge does not always work to an author’s advantage. The details of life in Madras in the 1920s are interesting in themselves, but Stoddart’s needlessly repetitive descriptions of traversing roads clogged with ‘animals, people and vehicles’ lack vivacity, and his insistence on introducing every character with a description of their physique and costume is plodding. Anachronistic contemporary phrases – describing Madras as ‘a cruel place where “haves” and “have nots” were separated more than in most cities, even in India’, or a belligerent commanding officer as ‘a management problem’ – mar his meticulous scene-setting, as does slapdash proofreading, which allows the substitution of ‘horses’ for ‘houses’ to slip through.