A young coal heiress is missing. There are precious few clues to indicate whether she has been murdered, kidnapped, or has run away. She was trapped in an unhappy marriage in a coal town where her husband is the manager of the mine. He is a suspect, and so are the gangsters that operate out of the Shady Rest, a local roadhouse and hangout. It is southern Illinois during the Great Depression. The job of finding the missing heiress falls to Marcus Dixon, the young sheriff of the county. He gets help from Mary Ellen Selvedge, who runs the City Café and who wants desperately to be a detective. She has a good head for this type of work, but most of what she knows comes from the movies. She wants to be like Nora Charles in the Thin Man movies, and she wants Marcus to be her Nick Charles. Will they find the right clues to solve the Perfect Murder?