When friends Maggie and Carol disappear while on a seaside jaunt, their husbands turn to the Peter Piper Detective Agency for help. But the missing persons case suddenly turns deadly serious: a resident’s complaint of scavenging foxes leads to the remains of two women on a wooded roundabout in the small coastal town of Seaminster. Phyllida Moon, actress and private eye, is sent to investigate. Her impenetrable disguises win her unique entry into the lives of the victims’ family and friends. And gradually she begins to suspect that Carol’s daughter, Sally, knows more than she is prepared to reveal to anyone…