Summertime in Provence, 1926, but for Scotland Yard detective Joe Sandilands it''s not all ''Dance and Provençal song and sunburnt mirth''. Joe is on leave, driving his way south to the Riviera while dropping off his niece at an ancient château in the Lubéron hills. Her father is spending the season here, one of a group of talented artists who are the guests of a generous but enigmatic host.

A troubling crime has been committed days earlier at the château, leaving a clear message that more violence is to come. To allay panic, Joe agrees to stay on and root out the guilty person. But, despite Joe''s vigilance, a child goes missing and an artist''s beautiful young model is murdered in circumstances eerily recreating a six hundred year old crime of passion.

Helped and hindered by a rising star of the French Police Judiciaire, Joe must delve into a horror story from the castle''s past before he can tear the mask from the diseased soul responsible for these contemporary crimes.