'But Pierre could never know that in death Fame was his, for his was the second corpse.'
When a well-known local vagrant nicknamed "Peter the Hermit" dies of seemingly natural causes, the police uncover an old Bulgarian newspaper and a beautiful bejewelled comb worth substantial money in his ramshackle hut in the Kent woods. Not long afterwards, bookseller Theodore Terhune begins receiving bizarre anonymous short stories, each subtitled 'Ten Trails to Tyburn'. Fictional and old-fashioned narratives set in France, the tales at first seem nonsensical, but Terhune discerns a pattern that suggests old Peter had led a far more interesting life than anyone guessed, and that his death might not be so natural after all. A 1944 crime classic back in print; the fifth book in the Theodore Terhune series.
BRUCE GRAEME (1900-82) was a pseudonym of Graham Montague Jeffries, an author of more than 100 crime novels and a founding member of the Crime Writers' Association. He
created six series sleuths, including bookseller and accidental detective Theodore Terhune, whose adventures—Seven Clues in Search of a Crime (1941); House with Crooked Walls (1942); A Case for Solomon (1943); Work for the Hangman (1944); Ten Trails to Tyburn (1944); A Case of Books (1946) and And a Bottle of Rum (1949)— are republished by Moonstone Press.