Jack Haldean investigates the disappearance of Mark Helston, a rising star of a large coffee company, who left his apartment and disappeared, and the subsequent deaths of some of the missing person's family.

When a mutilated corpse is discovered in the sleepy village of Croxton Ferriers, Jack Haldean finds an odd clue at the scene of the crime : a black marble chess knight with crystal eyes. Is murder just a game? It could be -- to a killer who calls himself The Chessman.

'Art, my dear boy,' said Mr Askern, 'especially sacred art, needs tradition. Tradition is the bedrock of our art . . .' He broke off, staring at the woman in front of him. Her face seemed to lose all definition and her skin turned an unnatural shade of putty-coloured grey. 'Art,' she said, her voice scarcely more than a whisper. 'Art! Oh my God, art!' She swayed dangerously. Jack leapt forward, catching her as she fell. Jack Haldean expected Lythewell...

"Jack Haldean's newly-wedded bliss is disrupted by a series of shocking revelations in this gripping historical mystery. When an old schoolfriend of Jack's wife Betty witnesses a disturbing vision in the garden of a smart suburban house, Jack is intrigued. Just what did Jenny Langton see beneath the cedar tree at Saunder's Green that frightened her so much she fainted on the spot? Jack's subsequent enquiries stir up a hornet's nest of repressed emotions...