Дина Лампитт «Death and the Cornish Fiddler»

The spring of 1765 brings a welcome sense of recovery to the recently widowed Apothecary, but his tentative peace of mind does not last for long: a young child disappears in strange circumstances at the Helstone Floral (Furry) Dance, and a seemingly omnipresent blind musician is never far away. While this mysterious figure intrigues John Rawlings, the case of the missing child alarms him: he feels he must do all in his power to attempt to rescue the young life.

The Apothecary is just about to give up the child for lost when a beautiful woman — a known courtesan -dies one night, apparently of natural causes. But a minute examination reveals that she was smothered, and the hunt is on to find which of her many lovers was responsible. Accompanied by one of them, the feckless Tim Painter, John travels to Redruth and there stumbles across a coven who practise the black arts. Recognising some of its members as attending the Furry Dance, he returns to Helstone, this time to find his own daughter in deadly peril...

In this tense and dramatic book, John Rawlings questions whether his love for Elizabeth di Lorenzi is one that can ever be fully reciprocated, or if he must come to terms with living once more as a single man.