Detective Steve Carella answers the first call: he is the one who finds the note from the Avenging Angel in the nude dancer's room. The girl herself is in the alley, an ugly knife protruding from her chest. Within twenty-four hours an insane bigot has bombed a ghetto church, a weekend hippie has been murdered, and detective Andy Parker lies near death, the victim of two slugs from a killer's gun. Suddenly it all seems like more than the detectives of the 87th can handle.