by Stephanie Barron, 2002
Being the sixth Jane Austen mystery. Not well-written! Contradictions – started out with tea and then “finished my chocolate.” Hard to follow. Story about Jane and her brother, Frank, a Navy captain, and the Navy and someone (a Navy captain, Thomas Seagrave) being wrongly accused of murder. A French gentleman posing as a surgeon on the French ship on which the captain is murdered is one of the prisoners of Wool House. Jane nurses him and finds out details that lead her and her brother, Frank, to eventually discover the real murderer, Lady Templeton, Tom Seagrave’s wife’s aunt. Tom Seagrave never developed well as a character. Too many loose ends throughout. Not a good book like some of hers I read.