The Prince Who Was Late

Calcutta, in the breathless heat of the hot season: a celebrated detective and his loyal companion have come east at the invitation of Sir Lionel, only to be handed a case no English court was built to settle — a man has come back from the dead. Years after a prince of a great Bengal estate was declared dead and cremated, an ash-covered holy man appears in the bazaars, and the whispers swell into a roar: the prince has returned to reclaim his name, his lands, and a widow who insists she buried him. Is he the true heir, miraculously restored? A brilliant impostor drilled in a dead man's memories? Or something the family, the lawyers, and the Empire itself would all prefer stayed buried? Moving through committees convened to decide what is real, resurrection sweets, an umbrella offered as evidence, and a widow who refuses to be haunted, the detective must answer the oldest and most dangerous question of all: what makes a man himself? The Prince Who Was Late is an original Golden Age-style mystery about identity, inheritance, and the terrifying inconvenience of a dead man who will not stay dead.