A robbery of the safe of a diamond merchant in London's Hatton Garden leaves one of the firm's veteran employees dead. Summoned to handle the case French pursues disparate clues over a number of weeks with some of the trails turning out to be dead ends.
Freeman Wills Crofts (1 June 1879 – 11 April 1957) was an Irish mystery author, best remembered for the character of Inspector Joseph French. A railway engineer by training, Crofts introduced railway themes into many of his stories, which were notable for their intricate planning. Although outshone by Agatha Christie, Raymond Chandler and other more celebrated authors from the golden age of detective fiction, he was highly esteemed by those authors, and many of his books are still in print.