First edition, first printing. Signed by the author. The author's retained and corrected copy. Publisher's original burgundy cloth with white titles to the upper board and spine, parts of the dustwrapper tipped in (at the author's hand). A very good copy, the binding square and firm with bumping, rubbing and minor fraying at the extremities, the cloth a little marked. The contents, with the odd finger mark and the author's emendations and tipped in typescript to seven pages, and some spotting to the margins and closed text block edge, are otherwise clean throughout. The front panel of the dustwrapper has been glued in at the front pastedown and publisher's blurb from the rear panel trimmed and fixed at the rear.
Inscribed by the author in blue ink on the front endpaper "Please return to / F. W. Crofts / Wildern / Blackheath / Guilford". The twenty-fifth detective novel featuring Chief Inspector French. The emendations in this, the author's own copy, were likely made for the 1952 second impression.
Stock code: 28335
£1,250