Death in the Wasteland

George Keelagher, head of a stock-broking firm in the city, thrusts himself on his nephew Waldo and his wife Averil, who are holidaying in the south of France in their new caravan. Not long after their arrival on the Riviera, Waldo finds Uncle George dead in the wasteland of the Estérel.

Panicked, Waldo and Averil pack the body in the back of their car and take it to the police in Cannes. Whilst in the station however, both car and body are stolen. When the body is at last found hidden in the wasteland it is confirmed as a case of murder.

Waldo turns for help to Superintendent Littlejohn, who is on holiday nearby, and enquiries soon shift to England's Great Missenden, where Uncle George lived, and to the city, where all is not well with the stock-broking business.

Littlejohn finds himself in one of his most complicated and unorthodox cases, in which the characters of the suspects count for as much as their actions.