**THE INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLING SERIES RETURNS THIS SEPTEMBER** A dismembered corpse is discovered in the vault of a silver shop. The police initially believe it to be that of a convicted armed robber - but not everyone agrees with that theory. One of them is Decima Mullins, who calls on the help of private detective Cormoran Strike as she's certain the body in the silver vault was that of her boyfriend - the father of her newborn baby - who suddenly and mysteriously disappeared. The more Strike and his business partner Robin Ellacott delve into the case, the more labyrinthine it gets. The silver shop is no ordinary one: it's located beside Freemasons' Hall and specializes in Masonic silverware. And in addition to the armed robber and Decima's boyfriend, it becomes clear that there are other missing men who could fit the profile of the body in the vault. As the case becomes ever more complicated and dangerous, Strike faces another quandary....
The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
Copyright © 2025 by J.K. Rowling
Cover design by Duncan Spilling © Little, Brown Book Group Ltd 2025
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First North American Edition: September 2025
Published simultaneously in the United Kingdom by Sphere, September 2025
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ISBN 9780316586023 (ebook)
A Library of Congress Control Number is available for this title.
E3-20250730-JV-NF-ORI
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Epigraph
Part One
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
Part Two
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
Part Three
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
Part Four
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
Part Five
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
Part Six
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
Part Seven
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
Part Eight
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
Part Nine
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
Part Ten
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
Epilogue
124
125
126
127
Acknowledgements
Discover More
Credits
Also by Robert Galbraith
Praise for Robert Galbraith
To Séan and Nadine Harris, who gave me back what I thought I’d lost forever.
Explore book giveaways, sneak peeks, deals, and more.
I had dipped in life’s struggle and, out again,
Bore specks of it here, there, easy to see,
When I found my swan and the cure was plain;
The dull turned bright as I caught your white
On my bosom: you saved me—saved in vain
If you ruined yourself, and all through me!
Robert Browning
PART ONE
John Oxenham
1
A. E. Housman
The windscreen wipers had been working their hardest ever since the BMW had entered the county of Kent, their soporific swish and clunk aggravating Cormoran Strike’s exhaustion as he stared out through thick rain, which had turned the deserted road ahead to gleaming jet.
Shortly after he’d boarded the sleeper train from Cornwall to London the previous evening, his detective partner’s boyfriend, who Strike always referred to inside his head as ‘Ryan Fucking Murphy’, had called to say that Robin had come down with a high fever and sore throat and would therefore be unable to accompany Strike on today’s visit to their newest prospective client.