CYRUS SKEEN, noted private detective in San Francisco, has followed an international art fence, ANDRE PETROSSIAN, to a burlesque theater, hoping that the man will lead him to the artworks stolen from a Boston museum. When the theater is raided by the police, Petrossian makes a run for it, but is shot dead by Sergeant ROBERT HOILE, a homicide detective who had made a wager with a colleague that he could find the man responsible for molesting children in a city playground. Together Hoile and Skeen recover the cache of stolen artwork, and learn that Petrossian had planned to sell it to HANDY OLLO, a mobster who owns a gambling ship off the city's coast. The next evening, while attending a ballet, Skeen is approached by EDGAR FREUND, a trial attorney famous for representing gangsters and corrupt politicians. Freund wants to hire Skeen to find evidence proving the innocence of his newest client, ENOCH PAIGE, a noted orator and promulgator of atheism. Paige, the son of a wealthy mining company founder, has been charged with the brutal rape-murder of his ex-wife, ESMEE PLANCHET. Paige is free on a quarter million dollar bail posted by his older brother, REUBEN, who inherited their father's estate and business. Paige is supposed to have bludgeoned his ex-wife to death with his wedding gift to her, a marble bust of Athena by the 19th century sculptor, Hiram Powers. His trial is scheduled for August, and the city's newspapers and clergy are clamoring for his conviction. As bodies pile up and the most unlikely parties become suspects, Skeen refuses to allow mob rule and the elusive dissimilitude of clients and hostile witnesses to triumph over his commitment to the truth.