Harriet Vane is at first reluctant to attend the reunion (or "Gaudy") at her old Oxford College. To have abandoned high-minded academia to write detective novels is understandable, but to be accused, then acquitted, of the murder of your married lover is another thing entirely. Fortunately, the reunion goes well - at least until Vane discovers a note in her gown accusing her of being a murderess. But this note turns out to be part of a poison-pen campaign against the faculty and students…