H. R. F. Keating was born at St Leonards-on-Sea, Sussex, in 1926. He went to Merchant Taylors, leaving early to work in the engineering department of the BBC. After a period of service in the army, which he described as 'totally undistinguished', he went to Trinity College, Dublin, where he became a scholar in modern languages. He was also the crime books reviewer for The Times for fifteen years. His first novel about Inspector Ghote, The Perfect Murder, won the Gold Dagger of the Crime Writers Association and an Edgar Allen Poe Special Award.

This dazzling off-beat thriller is H.R.F Keating's fourth novel, published in 1962.
Why is Roger Farrar, if that indeed was his name, on the run in Dublin? Is he a traitor and deserted? The innocent target of a kidnap plot? Or a lonely persecuted paranoiac? A classic tale edged with doubt and menace.