Thus Was Adonis Murdered — Sarah Caudwell

DEATH IN VENICE
For young barrister Julia Larwood, it was to be a vacation in pursuit of eros, in flight from the tax man.... An Art Lover's Holiday to Italy. Reduced to near penury by the Inland Revenue, Julia could hardly afford such a luxury, but she'd be in hock to the Revenue either way, so why not? Poor, hapless, incurably sentimental Julia. How could she know that the ravishing young Art Lover for whom she conceived a fatal passion was himself an employee of Inland Revenue? Or that her hard-won night of passion would end in murder--with her inscribed copy of this year's Finance Act lying a few feet from the corpse....