Politics, murder, and mortal danger confront retired General George Washington as he considers whether to accept the presidency of the United States.
The General has retired to his farm, Mount Vernon, but he cannot escape the politics of his time. The new constitution requires a president, and no one doubts it must be him. Except himself.
Colonel David Humphreys, Washington's aide-de-camp in the war, has come for a protracted visit to his friend the General. He's working on his poetry and a biography of his benefactor while he enjoys the bucolic life in Virginia, but his aversion to enslavement distresses his New England sensibilities.
Colonel George Mason of Gunston Hall, a nearby plantation, is the General's principal political opponent in the area.
When the General and Colonel Humphreys find a murdered slave by the river, events take a darker turn. The General fears the event will give his political enemies ammunition to use against him, complicating his decision to accept the presidency.
As the official investigation proceeds, two things are clear. Colonel Mason and his allies believe they can charge the General with murder, and the General discovers that not all is well on his own plantation. Goods are missing, and he discovers growing problems with his enslaved workers. Probing these problems reveals connections to an effort by the British to stir up trouble in Alexandria and elsewhere in the former colonies.
To accept the presidency, Colonel Humphreys and the General must show he is innocent of the crime. As they investigate, they fall deeper into the political conflict of the day and find themselves in increasing personal danger. But the General must also confront a great moral decision-whether to free his slaves.
Murder at Mount Vernon is the first novel in the Founding Fathers series of historical mysteries.