Skeleton Staff

Skeleton Staff is set in Madeira, where wealthy Roberta Ellison and her husband had settled after Roberta had been crippled in a car accident. The attractions of the island were its beauty, its climate and the ease with which domestic help could be found. But when Roberta is left suddenly widowed, she finds that her staff problems have only just begun. She longs for the company of another Englishwoman and her young half-sister, Camilla, comes out to help find her a companion. But Camilla brings problems of her own with her, problems which at first seem trivial but soon involve the sisters in violent and mystifying events that lead up to murder.