Margery Allingham

The painter John Lafcadio was brilliantly talented and, it appears, a bit psychic: Certain that his reputation would improve dramatically after his death, he left several paintings with his agent, along with the instruction that the widowed Mme. Lafcadio should wait a suitable interval and then begin doling out the work to a newly ravenous public at the rate of one per year. Albert Campion, an old friend of the widow's, is among the guests at Lafcadio's...