Chapters 7-9 Summary

At breakfast, the hung-over Fraser lets it slip to Ellen that the burned body was a woman. Ellen agrees to keep the secret and also lends them her car. They drive to the cottage. With Hunter's approval and Fraser's disapproval, the ex-cop Brody continues to work on the case. Strachan suddenly arrives at the scene and is immediately shooed away by an angry Brody, who later muses on his dislike of the island benefactor. Hunter spends the rest of the day conducting a forensic investigation on the body. At first he surmises that the fire was an accident but then, upon examining the skull more closely, he finds evidence of a blow to the head that preceded the fire. Hunter thus concludes that the woman has been murdered.

Hunter begins chapter 8 eager to inform his superintendent, especially after realizing that the...