When the seemingly safe return of an abducted millionaire ends in his murder in his own home, Nero Wolfe sends Archie Goodwin to do his usual legwork, while Wolfe uncovers corruption and greed among Manhattan's elite.
A bidding war for his services interrupts Nero Wolfe's attempts to solve the case of the businessman who died in his love nest--a case in which the police seem oddly uninterested.
Three murder cases place arrogant, gormandizing sleuth Archie Goodwin at an exclusive dinner party where arsenic is served, in a wandering cab with a dead lady driver, and at a rodeo championship.
Nero Wolfe and his sidekick, Archie Goodwin, are called in by a consortium of publishers and writers to investigate several cases of false plagiarism, but the probe soon becomes complicated by murder.
Unwilling to accept a suicide ruling after witnessing the death of the admittedly morbid Faith Usher, Archie Goodwin is assisted in the investigation by Nero Wolfe, who has been warned to stay away from the case.
