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As commander of the River Police, Monk is accustomed to violent death, but the entrails hanging from the mutilated female body found on Limehouse Pier one chilly December morning move him with horror and pity. The victim’s name is Zenia Gadney. Her waterfront neighbors can tell him little—only that the same unknown gentleman had visited her once a month for many years. She was quiet and dull, unlike the usual fallen doxy; her pillar of support was respectable Dr Lambourn, recent suicide after his government requisitioned report on opium was discredited.
Monk's old superior Runcorn was first on the scene for Lambourn, and now suspects government suppression. Lambourn's beautiful wife wife Dinah, lies about her whereabouts, denies accusations, but Monk must arrest her despite his belief in her innocence. While public, press, government, and biased judge push for quick hanging before Xmas, Monk, his spirited wife Hester, and their brilliant barrister friend Oliver Rathbone, search for answers. From dank waterfront alleys to London’s fabulously wealthy West End, the three trail an ice-blooded murderer toward the unbelievable, possibly unproveable truth—and ultimately engage their adversaries in an electric courtroom duel.
