It begins for Basil 'Banger' Peyton-Crumbe the day he dies in a pheasant-shooting incident.

A tragic accident, thinks the local constable, but Banger's gundogs and Buck, the police dog, exhibiting a level of intelligence vastly superior to that of their owners, suspect murder. And for Basil, proud slayer of over 41,000 birds with the cheap old 12-bore he's had since childhood, things go from bad to very bad.