In 1936, police detective Tom Hickey learns that his long-missing father wrote a current bestselling novel. Tom confronts the purported author then investigates the man's claim that he and Charlie Hickey collaborated on the novel before Charlie argued with and was murdered by the Sundance Kid.

Florence Hickey, Tom's dashing, brainy sister, researches and determines the Kid escaped his reputed death in Bolivia. She provides Tom with clues that lead him to a gang whose boss convinces him that publisher William Randolph Hearst had Charlie killed.

Tom and Florence track the tycoon and his starlet mistress to a hideaway where they serve as judge and jury.

". . . anchors the reader in the story's time and place." ~ Booklist