Cover Her Face
First edition cover
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| Author | P. D. James |
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| Cover artist | Charles Mozley |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
| Series | Adam Dalgliesh No. 1 |
| Genre | Crime, Mystery novel |
| Publisher | Faber and Faber |
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Publication date
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December 1962 |
| Media type | Print (hardback & paperback) |
| Followed by | A Mind to Murder |
Cover Her Face is the debut 1962 crime novel of P. D. James. It details the investigations by her poetry-writing detective Adam Dalgliesh into the death of a young, ambitious maid, surrounded by a family which has reasons to want her gone – or dead. The title is taken from a passage from John Webster's The Duchess of Malfi: "Cover her face. Mine eyes dazzle; she died young."
The story opens with a dinner party hosted by Mrs. Eleanor Maxie at Martingale, a medieval manor house in the (fictional) Essex village of Chadfleet. Mrs. Maxie's son and daughter, Stephen Maxie and Deborah Riscoe, are both at the party. Serving at the party is Sally Jupp, an unmarried mother with an infant son, who was employed by Mrs. Maxie.
Deborah later goes to London and visits Stephen at the hospital where he works and sees her brother talking with Sally. Stephen says that Sally brought him some of their terminally ill father's tablets, which she found on old Mr. Maxie's bed. Stephen suspects that Mr. Maxie manages to deceive his devoted servant Martha, pretending to take his tablets when he is simply hiding them in his bed. On the day of St. Cedd's church fete, Sally announces that Stephen has asked her to marry him. The following day, Martha complains that Sally has overslept again. On entering the room, Sally's lifeless body is found. Detective Chief Inspector Adam Dalgliesh and Detective Sergeant Martin arrive and begin their investigation.
It emerges that Sally had been secretly married to James Ritchie, who has a successful job in Venezuela, but returns to England after her death. Sally had blackmailed her uncle (who unbeknownst to her had spent her modest trust fund) into giving her 30 pounds. She had pretended to be an unmarried mother because revealing the marriage would jeopardise her husband's job and she liked to 'play with people'. She revealed Stephen Maxie's proposal of marriage for the same reason, although it is notable that she had not accepted it.
Martha had been regularly drugging Sally at night so that she would oversleep, be discredited, and eventually dismissed. It is Mrs. Eleanor Maxie who eventually confesses to the murder of Sally Jupp after Dalgliesh reveals everyone's movements on the night. It is clear, through a process of elimination, that only she could be the culprit.
The novel ends with a meeting between Adam Dalgliesh and Deborah Riscoe. It is hinted that a relationship will develop between Adam and Deborah.
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