The White Lie

In a breezy August afternoon along the wind‑tossed streets of Mundesley‑on‑Sea, Lieutenant Noel Barclay, a dashing Naval Flying Corps officer, is drawn into a puzzling case when his old shipmate, Dick Harborne, turns up dead in a roadside ditch, throat‑slashed and his motorcycle vanished. The quiet coastal village, with its flag‑staffed coastguard cottages and bustling market‑places, becomes a backdrop for a bewildering sequence of sightings that suggest Harborne was living a secret, perhaps lucrative, life far beyond his modest retirement. As Barclay and his land‑owner friend Francis Goring swap theories over tea, the odd details—a mysterious motor‑bike, a sudden disappearance, and a gruesome murder—hint at forces far more tangled than ordinary robbery.

The novel quickly expands from a simple homicide into a web of clandestine inquiries, safe‑breakers, and whispered state secrets that pull the protagonists into a shadowy underworld of honor among thieves. With each clue, Barclay is forced to confront whether his loyalty to a former comrade can survive the uncovering of hidden loyalties and a “white lie” that may have triggered the tragedy. The story balances crisp early‑twentieth‑century atmosphere with mounting suspense, inviting listeners to follow a layered investigation that could change everything they thought they knew about their friends and themselves.