The Oxford Mysteries

Jesus College, Oxford, 1881. An undergraduate is found dead at his lodgings and the medical examination reveals some shocking findings. When the young man’s guardian blames the college for his death and threatens a scandal, Basil Rice, a Jesus College fellow with a secret to hide, is forced to act and finds himself drawn into Sidney Parker’s sad life.

An Army soldier – an ex-drunk – is brutally killed and a note suggests that the Salvation Army’s shadowy enemy, the Skeleton Army, is responsible. With the police unwilling to come between the two forces, Non Vaughan, aspiring journalist and great hope of the Oxford women’s college movement, and Basil Rice, Jesus College fellow and union-sanctioned guardian of the dead man’s family, are compelled to investigate.

Oxford, 1883. Young men are being found bound, gagged, and hooded at the gates of their colleges in the small hours. Basil Rice, Jesus College fellow, is asked by the senior proctor to investigate. But investigating matters of sexual purity is dangerous, as it lays Basil open to unwelcome scrutiny of his own private life. Meanwhile, the University Vice Chancellor's Court has wrongly imprisoned a young shopgirl from the town, and she seeks the services of Non Vaughan, a young academic and budding journalist, to clear her name.