Miss Arnott's Marriage
: Violet Arnott has married Robert Champion, a good-looking scoundrel, who, as the book opens, is sentenced to twelve months' imprisonment for fraud. While waiting trial, Violet re-assume her maiden name in order to protect herself from the shame attached to her husband. His sentence pronounced, she goes back to the shabby lodging she has taken and contemplates the future. She has only a few shillings in the world and no friends. Starvation, or under-paid labour is all that is before her. She is rescued, however, by the news that she is the heiress to a colossal fortune and a fine country estate. She goes down to take possession and does her best to keep clear of the world in general, but with small success; every unmarried and eligible bachelor in the neighbourhood woos her. Champion is released early, and comes down to his wife's estate to claim what he is pleased call "his rights." But, on the night he arrives he is murdered, and murdered in a very singular fashion. He is shot in the back, which has nothing to do with his death, which is caused by a stab to the heart with a hunting knife. Whodunit? The wife? A suitor? A stranger?