Cyrus Skeen, private eye in 1928 San Francisco, is approached by a captivating French countess, Vanessa Favaul, and a brusque retired British army colonel, Burton Heywood, to find the thief who stole a priceless artifact from countess's mother. At the same time, he wonders why a harmless Austrian junk shop owner and connoisseur of the fine arts in China Basin, the city's industrial underbelly, was brutally murdered. Complicating these matters is the mystery of who wrote a hit play and why the author is so publicity shy. Skeen is further intrigued by his new secretary, Dilys Jones, who secretly admires him for reasons of her own. The countess and the retired colonel, he learns, have formed an uneasy partnership to find the artifact, while the thief turns out to be a master of disguises. This is Calvin Fincher, a discharged American artillery man who served in the Great War, but who vanished into Europe to become a professional con man who bilks widows from their money. Fincher will kill anyone at the least provocation and is a sadistic murderer. More a nuisance than a help to Skeen is his friend, Lieutenant Patrick Donovan of the city police. Skeen interviews and interrogates everyone with the least connection with the cases, which begin to coalesce around one central culprit. A succession of lies and deceit committed by his clients, his former college friends, and Fincher eventually lead Skeen to stage a literally dramatic resolution in a theater.