BERKLEY^® PRIME CRIME and the PRIME CRIME logo are trademarks of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

FIRST EDITION: November 2012

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Bowen, Rhys.

The twelve clues of Christmas / Rhys Bowen.—1st ed.

p. cm.

ISBN 978-1-101-61219-4

1. Aristocracy (Social class)—England—Fiction. 2. Murder—Investigation—Fiction. 3. Christmas stories. I. Title.

PR6052.O848T94 2012

823'.914—dc23

2012017861

In memory of my father,

Frank Newcombe Lee,

whose family came from Devonshire,

not far from Tiddleton-under-Lovey.

As always I’d like to thank John for his input and editing skills (even though we almost come to blows each time). I’d like to thank my wonderful editor, Jackie Cantor, for making my life so easy, and my equally brilliant agents, Meg Ruley and Christina Hogrebe, for taking such good care of me. It is a pleasure to work with you all.

And this book is also dedicated to Sandra Sechrest, who lent her name to one of the characters in this story.

Chapter 1

CASTLE RANNOCH

PERTHSHIRE, SCOTLAND

DECEMBER 14, 1933

Weather: cold, dreary, bleak.

Atmosphere here: cold, dreary, bleak.

Outlook: cold, dreary, bleak. Not in a good mood today. I wonder why. Could it have something to do with the fact that Christmas is coming and it will be utterly bloody?

Ah, Christmas: chestnuts roasting; Yule logs crackling merrily; tables groaning under roast goose, turkey, mince pies and flaming plum puddings; carols and mistletoe; goodwill to all men. I’m sure there were some houses in Britain where this was going to be the case, in spite of the depression—just not at Castle Rannoch, on the bleak Scottish moors, where I was currently trapped for the winter. No, I was not snowed in or being held prisoner. I was there of my own volition. I happen to be Lady Georgiana Rannoch, sister to the current duke, and that bleak castle is my family home.

There is actually no way to make Castle Rannoch festive even if one wanted to. Firstly it would be impossible to heat those cavernous great rooms no matter how many Yule logs you piled on the fire, and secondly my sister-in-law, Hilda, Duchess of Rannoch, commonly known as Fig, was in full austerity mode. Times were hard, she said. The country was in the grip of a great depression. It was up to us to set an example and live simply. We even had to endure baked beans on toast as our savory at the end of dinner, which shows how dire our situation had become.

It is true that times are hard for the Rannochs, even though we’re related to the royal family and my brother inherited Rannoch Castle and a London house in Belgravia. You see, our father lost the last of his fortune in the great crash of ’29, then went up on the moors and shot himself, thus saddling poor Binky with horrendous death duties. I had my allowance cut off on my twenty-first birthday and have been struggling to keep my head above water ever since. Not that our situation is as dire as those poor wretches in the soup lines. I was supposed to marry well, to one of those chinless, spineless and half-imbecile European princes, or, failing that, become lady-in-waiting to an elderly royal aunt.