Freeman Wills Croft

George Surridge, director of the Birmingham Zoo, is a man with many worries: his marrige is collapsing; his finances are insecure; and an outbreak of disease threatens the animals in his care.

Dr James Earle and his wife live in comfortable seclusion near the Hog's Back, a ridge in the North Downs in the beautiful Surrey countryside. When Dr Earle disappears from his cottage, Inspector French is called in to investigate.