Inspector Thomas Brackenreid refuses to abandon his private vindictive search for his abusers Mick and Tim O'Shea, who also murdered Dawkins, and rejoin the force, but the fiend brothers are gone, perhaps back to Ireland, and nobody talks: Murdoch must promise his new boss inspector Hamish Slorach to arrest him if caught at a crime. Crabtree proves most helpful, working out that they racketeered waterside businesses, probably orchestrated by a tycoon like Lionel Jeffries, but harbor master's widow Cecily McKinnon is actively linked, even before Thomas recalls her presence at his pommeling and is staged prime suspect for the brothers' own murder, while the female corpse proves part of a network of white slavers from Europe. Crabtree becomes fatherless Simon's sugar uncle as benefactor of his proud single mother Edna Brooks, a former friend.
—KGF Vissers