When the distinguished Justice Stafford dies of opium poisoning at the theater, links emerge to another murder five years before, when Kingsley Blaine was found crucified in Farriers' Lane. A Jewish actor was arrested at that time, and then condemned to hang. In this 13th investigation in Anne Perry's atmospheric Victorian mystery series, Thomas Pitt finds that the judge was preparing to reopen the case. Curiously, Pitt receives little help from his colleagues on the force, but his wife Charlotte gleans startling insights into both cases from her social engagements. And slowly the two begin to suspect the same sinister and deeply dangerous truth.

"Gripping and intense…. [Perry's] characters are authentically and appealingly drawn, and her plot is sinister."—Booklist