In the living room of his house is found the body of a retired builder who has managed to drag himself to a table and who has a china rabbit in one hand and an orange pip in the other. Two days later, in the family home is found the body of his former partner who has managed to reach the house through snowdrifts without leaving a single footprint. The current head of the building firm is shot dead in an attic room of the house at the same time as the butler is wounded. While DS Alistair MacRae is floundering, it is left to DCI Ian Forsyth to arrive by logical deduction at a solution that explains all the anomalies thrown up by the three murders.