It is 1936 and Philo Vance is searching for the missing wife of a police officer. Suspects? The police officer makes an excellent one. He's been married four times and his last two wives died, mysteriously. But Vance focuses his suspicions on another candidate: Albert Pickens, grafter extradorinaire. The trouble is, Albert Pickens is dead. Is Philo Vance completely off the mark on this casee? Or is Albert Pickens alive and living under an alias as Vance contends?