John Henry Cole, an operative of Ike Kelly's Detective Agency, is just returning to the home base at Cheyenne, Wyoming Territory, ready to resign from the agency and pursue a different line of work after what had been a deadly assignment in Deadwood, Dakota Territory. In Cheyenne, Cole learns that Ike Kelly has been murdered and his body burned in a fire that destroyed both the agency office and the shop next door. No one seems to have any idea who might have murdered Kelly, and Leo Foxx, the town marshal, is so disinterested in the crime that an investigation has yet to be conducted. When Cole and a bounty hunter set on the trail of an apparent suspect, his finds his suspicions are proven wrong, his love life unravels, and his expectations are thwarted as the mystery takes a turn.--From back cover.