A man is discovered murdered in a hotel in London and police investigations have difficulty in establishing who committed the crime and are also unable to find a motive.

The investigation is further complicated when it is discovered that the victim is a millionaire businessman and that he has died intestate, has never made a will and apparently has no close family. His lawyers are appointed as administrators of his estate and have the task of trying to trace beneficiaries, but soon discover that the deceased is not who he claimed to be, he has been living and transacting business under a false name for years.

A firm of private investigators is appointed to establish his true identity and to find beneficiaries to his estate, and to find out why he has been living a double life for all those years. Their investigations have to track back to the years prior to the Great War of 1914-18 and to the subsequent conflict of 1939-45 to ascertain who he was, a search that takes them through government departments, through M.I.5 and to country towns in England, to New York and to Australia before they are able to resolve the mystery.

First published in 2011 as ''The Man Who Had Five Lives''