Beryl Stapleton felt joy, when her husband Jack was sucked into the Grimpen Mire. Free of his oppressive evil, she opened a fashionable dress shop in London. Known as The Widow of Dartmoor, her enterprise is a success . . . until she is caught, at 2am dragging the body of a murdered man into an alleyway. Who better to defend her than The Bastard, the nephew of Sherlock Holmes? A barrister, Jeremy Holmes is the illegitimate son of Sherlock's oldest brother. Revered by the criminals of London, Jeremy lives to peel the masks off witnesses and find the truth. But his gifts are not the product of reason. Rather, his art. His pictures reveal the passions of those he draws. He can feel their hearts.