Now here's a murd'rous tale of woe, See a hero misbehave. For it shows a valiant soldier go By railway to the grave. Yorkshire 1855. Colonel Aubrey Tarleton is a man respected by his neighbours in the small Yorkshire village of South Otterington - as much for his heroic feats in the army as for his social position.
So the community is left stunned when Tarleton, deliberately, walks into the path of a speeding train. He is crushed to death on the track, but it is not his broken limbs that attract the attention of the train driver; rather, it is the note pinned to his chest, fluttering in the breeze: 'Whoever finds me, notify Superintendent Tallis of the Detective Department at Scotland Yard'. Was Tarleton responsible for his wife's disappearance, and was his suicide the act of a guilty man? Tallis cannot believe that to be the case and sets out for Yorkshire, accompanied by Colbeck and his trusty Sergeant Victor Leeming, determined to uncover the truth.