"'Our code word my dear lady, is Nemesis.'
Miss Jane Marple sat in the big armchair by the fireplace in her house at St Mary Mead, and repeated the sentence softly under her breath.
It was part of a letter - an unusual letter from an unusual man. The man who had written the letter was dead. She had read the announcement of his death more than a week ago.
'Nemesis' ... The word brought a picture before her eyes. Tropical palms - a blue Caribbean sea - and herself running through the warm fragrant night on the island of St Honore to ask for help. To get help in time so that a life could be saved.
She had insisted - had demanded - help, and the word that had come to her lops that night had been 'Nemesis'.
Now she herself was being asked for help - for a reason she did not know - in a matter of which she was ignorant! The whole thing was impossible, quite impossible - and yet...
What possible qualifications could she have-? Again a certain sentence came back: 'You, my dear, have a natural flair for Justice. I want you to investigate a crime. I see you in my mind's eye as I saw you once one night as I rose from sleep disturbed by your urgency enveloped in a cloud of pink knitting wool!' Miss Marple looked down at her knitting.
The letter had ended with a quotation from the Book of Amos:
'Let justice roll down like waters
And Righteousness like an everlasting stram.'
'It doesn't sound at all like me,' said Miss Marple doubtfully.
The latest Miss Marple story is a sequel to Agatha Christies famous best-seller, 'A Caribbean Mystery'." -- Inside cover.