Paulina Payne is deaf, but is an excellent lip-reader. When she lip-reads two men discussing what sounds like murder, she seeks out Miss Silver for advice--but doesn't take it. Meanwhile, Lucias Bellingden's adopted daughter Moira has convinced him to let her wear Marie Antoinette's diamond necklace for a masquerade ball. Unfortunately, the young secretary who fetches it from the bank is shot, and the necklace stolen. Lucius hires Miss Silver to come to his country house, and find out what is going on.This is another classic country house murder mystery, and at least one of the villains was painfully obvious from the start--perhaps that was the intention, but it did make for very little suspense. There were also a number of characters introduced as plot devices, then dropped with no further mention. I thought they should have been better tied in, with more consequences. All in all, though I enjoyed this, I thought there were too many loose ends and contrivances, and I also thought she missed a chance for a major revelation about someone's parentage, that would have added another layer of intrigue. Still, an engaging mystery.
