“At exactly two o'clock in the afternoon on June 12, Eric Neville, a handsome young man in a white flannel suit, opened the glass door of the hallway and slowly descended the iron stairs into the magnificent, albeit somewhat old-fashioned, garden of the Berkeley mansion. A wide-brimmed Panama hat sat slightly askew on his blue-black curls: the young man had recently indulged in lazy rest, while the boat glided along the shady river, and his only companion on this walk was a book...”