A woman is brutally murdered in a hedgerow. Her son escapes the violent attack, only to fall through the ice of a frozen pond, where Vera finds him many minutes later. She wades in and pulls him out and, against all the odds, the boy survives.In LITTLE LAZARUS, DI Vera Stanhope and her team unravel deadly secrets and their murderous consequences - fuelled by power, money, and above all a mother's love. Vera, usually awkward and disinterested around children, finds a kindred spirit in the boy and begins to realise along the way that the key to the investigation lies deep in the child's memory.LITTLE LAZARUS is the fourth episode in the VERA series for ITV1 starring Brenda Blethyn.