A Public Body

One cocked hat, one red robe trimmed with black rabbit and one silver-gilt

chain with a gold and enamel knobbly bit at the end...

Eddathorpe''s mayoral regalia has disappeared in the possession of

Councillor William ''Klondike Bill'' Lynch, a colourful drunk who has devised

the perfect revenge on Eddathorpe''s new mayor, his much-detested second

wife Muriel.

But the joke''s not funny when Muriel Lynch turns up dead, with the regalia -

and Klondike Bill - carefully arranged in the next room. And less funny still

when Robert Graham''s least-loved superior officer arrests Bill for a murder

he probably didn''t commit...