Francis Pilkington, an English teacher at St Cuthbert's School, gets a new toy, a Commodore 64 computer. He uses it to solve some of the petty misdemeanours of the pupils, a mess in the boy's toilets, a missing Rolex, stolen lunch money, but, one day, he is called upon to use his fledgling computer skills to solve a much more serious crime, when Anthony Holborne, a candidate for the headship, is found dead by the matron the day before the interview. Is it suicide, or the work of a jealous rival, and can Francis and his digital detective do anything to help? The story is set in the early 1980's and is full of 80's nostalgia, for 80's computing, 80's schooling-and even 80's loving as developed in the romantic sub-plot.