Reporter Bertie Mallowan has drifted away from hard news stories and into the shallows of "fluff" features, the kind you find buried in the back of the newspaper. But when she gets the chance to interview greedy, nasty Robert Bellingham, the king of must-have luxury items for the rich of Southern California, she thinks her career is back on track. Bellingham, she learns, has not only made a lot of money, but he's got a lot of enemies, too. Two days after Bertie's interview, Bellingham's body is found on the floor of the foyer in the family mansion; someone has aerated his skull with the stereotypical blunt object. Thanks to her interview, Bertie has inside information about the life and times of a rich and powerful murder victim and is thrust into a big story again.