The Dinner Party Murder — Part 2

The storm has not lifted, the guests have not moved, and the Belgian Detective is ready to explain precisely how a dinner became a death; in Part One a wealthy collector was poisoned at his own table among the silver and orchids, a spoon was exchanged, a glove was found behind the conservatory ferns, and in his breast pocket lay a note promising an announcement before midnight that never came; now, in Part Two, a missing glove becomes an accusation, the late Lady Clara's hidden letters emerge from the strong room with a final instruction — "look to the quiet one" — a loyal butler confesses to seventeen years of silent waiting, a disputed painting hides a network of stolen art and buried debts, and at the stroke of midnight a man believed dead steps forward from behind his disguise, bringing with him a debt that has waited seventeen years to be paid; the quiet figure in the hall, the gloved hand by the sideboard, the servant always seen from behind — never the face, until now; the conclusion of a two-part original Golden Age–style mystery about art, poison, and the discovery that a man who buries the living should not be surprised when the dead come back to collect.