#1 – The Secret Adversary
Soon after the First World War, unemployed friends Tommy Beresford and Tuppence Cowley create Young Adventurers Ltd and offer themselves for dangerous work. Their first approach draws them into the search for Jane Finn, a young woman who survived the sinking of the Lusitania while carrying…
#2 – Partners in Crime
Now married, Tommy and Tuppence are asked by the intelligence service to operate a detective agency while watching for messages connected with foreign espionage. They handle a succession of thefts, disappearances, blackmail attempts and murders, adopting the methods and mannerisms of popular fictional detectives. The collection…
#3 – N or M?
During the Second World War, the middle-aged Beresfords are frustrated that younger officials consider them unsuitable for intelligence work. Tommy is secretly sent to a seaside boarding house to identify one of two enemy agents, and Tuppence independently places herself in the same investigation. Among retired…
#4 – By the Pricking of My Thumbs
While visiting an elderly aunt in a nursing home, Tuppence meets a resident who speaks of a child hidden behind a fireplace. After the woman disappears, a painting leads Tuppence to an isolated house and a village where old deaths, missing children and local legends have…
#5 – Postern of Fate
In retirement, Tommy and Tuppence move into an old house and discover a coded message in a children’s book stating that Mary Jordan did not die naturally. Their search through books, garden features and local memory points toward espionage and a death concealed during the First…