Wimsey and his butler, Bunter arrive at the Galloway Hills of Scotland for a quiet holiday. Wimsey intends to spend his time fishing, and Bunter that of painting. However they discover a corpse and they turn to investigating this mysterious death.

An artist is discovered dead at the bottom of a cliff, the police think it might be an accident, but Wimsey thinks otherwise, it is a murder.

Six suspects have been identified. However Wimsey knows only one committed the murder. he sets out to eliminate the "Five Red Herrings".

Wimsey reconstructs the murder to demonstrate how the crime was committed. The murderer is thereby forced to confess and brings the case to a final conclusion.