Michael Beard, Premio Nobel, cincuenta y pocos anos, se encuentra en el tramo final de su quinto matrimonio. Cuando Patrice, la quinta esposa, diecinueve anos menor que el, descubre que el la engana, reacciona con una euforia inesperada, y antes de que pase una semana inicia una relacion con el constructor que les rehabilita la casa. Beard sufre desesperadamente por la bella Patrice. Y cuando una noche Tom Aldous, uno de sus jovenes becarios, lleva a Beard a casa en su coche, y conoce a Patrice, la historia se convierte en una negra comedia de enredos, de intriga en el mas puro estilo de Hitchcock, con cadaver incluido. / Michael Beard, Nobel Prize winner, fifty something years old, finds himself in the final stretch of his fifth marriage. When Patrice, his fifth wife, nineteen years his junior, discovers that he has cheated on her, she reacts with surprising euphoria, and before the week is out she has begun a relationship with the builder who is restoring the house. Beard suffers desperately at the hands of the beautiful Patrice, and when one night, Tom Aldous, one of his young interns, takes Beard home and meets his wife, the story becomes a black comedy of mix ups and intrigue in the purest style of Hitchcock, with corpse included