A warm day on Central Avenue, and Philip Marlowe's hunch about the man beside him is as vague as the heat waves that dance above the sidewalk. Moose Malloy stands six five and one-half and weighs two hundred and sixty-four pounds. After eight years in the pen, he wants little Velma back, and no cops or mobsters are ready to stand in his way.

The death of Sylvia Kaye figured in Thursday afternoon's edition of the Oxford Mail . By Friday evening Inspector Morse had informed the nation that the police were looking for a dangerous man - facing charges of wilful murder and rape. But as the leads fade into darkness, Morse becomes more and more convinced that passion holds the key.

The thought suddenly occurred to Morse that this would be a marvellous time to murder a few of the doddery old bachelor dons. No wives to worry about their whereabouts; no landladies to whine about the unpaid rents. In fact nobody would miss most of them at all.

They called her the Swedish Maiden - the tourist who disappeared on a hot summer's day somewhere in North Oxford. 12 months later the case remained unsolved - pending further developments. On holiday in Lyme Regis, Chief Inspector Morse is startled to read a tantalizing article in The Times about the missing woman.

Many people in the Haworth Hotel that fateful evening had been wearing some sort of disguise; and the man who had died had been the most consummate artist of them all. Chief Inspector Morse seldom allowed himself to be caught up in celebrations. So the murder inquiry in the festive hotel had a certain appeal. It was a crime worthy of the season.

Derace Kingsley's wife ran away to Mexico to get a divorce and marry a Casanova-wannabe named Chris Lavery. Or so the note she left her husband insisted. When Philip Marlowe asks Lavery about it he denies everything and sends the private investigator packing with a flea. But when Marlowe next encounters Lavery, he's denying nothing.

For Oxford, the arrival of 27 American tourists is nothing out of the ordinary, until one of their number is found dead. Only Chief Inspector Morse appears not to overlook the simultaneous theft of a jewel-encrusted antique from the victim's handbag. Then, 2 days later, a naked and battered corpse is dragged from the River Cherwell. A coincidence?

The murder of Yvonne Harrison had left Thames Valley CID baffled. A year after the dreadful crime they are still no nearer to making an arrest. But one man has yet to tackle the case - and it is just the sort of puzzle at which Chief Inspector Morse excels. So why is he adamant that he will not lead the re-investigation?

The murder of a young woman... a cryptic 'seventeenth-century' love poem ... and a photograph of a mystery grey-haired man ... it's more than enough to set Chief Inspector Morse on the trail of a killer. And it's a trail that leads him to Lonsdale College. But then, Morse faces a greater, far more personal crisis.

The sweet countenance of Reason greeted Morse serenely when he woke, and told him that it would be no bad idea to have a quiet look at the problem itself before galloping off to a solution. Chief Inspector Morse was alone among the congregation in suspecting continued unrest in the quiet parish of St Frideswide's.

Morse was beset by a nagging feeling. Most of his fanciful notions about the Taylor girl had evaporated and he had begun to suspect that further investigation into Valerie's disappearance would involve little more than sober and tedious routine.

Morse had never ceased to wonder why, with the staggering advances in medical science, all pronouncements concerning times of death seemed so disconcertingly vague. The newly appointed member of the Oxford Examinations Syndicate was deaf, provincial and gifted. Now he is dead.