A millionaire businessman hires Nero Wolfe to snoop on his daughter's boyfriend. It seems like a simple case. Then a powerful gangland boss tries to convince Wolfe to drop the matter by shooting up his orchid room. The great detective soon finds himself in a highly complex case involving drugged drinks, man-killing debutantes and a decidedly un-American party.
When a millionaire businessman hires Nero Wolfe to probe the background of his daughter's boyfriend, it seems like just another case of an overprotective father. But when a powerful gangland boss "counsels" the detective to drop the matter, Wolfe receives a warning: a burst of machine-gun fire through the windows of his orchid room. Then the lawyer boyfriend turns up dead, leaving Archie the number one suspect. Throw in drugged drinks, two man-killing debutantes, and officials of a highly un-American party and Wolfe finds himself involved in a case where he must quickly solve one murder to prevent another: his own.

Introduction by William G. Tapply

"It is always a treat to read a Nero Wolfe mystery. The man has entered our folklore."--The New York Times Book Review

A grand master of the form, Rex Stout is one of America's greatest mystery writers, and his literary creation Nero Wolfe is one of the greatest fictional detectives of all time. Together, Stout and Wolfe have entertained--and puzzled--millions of mystery fans around the world. Now, with his perambulatory man-about-town, Archie Goodwin, the arrogant, gourmandizing, sedentary sleuth is back in the original seventy-three cases of crime and detection written by the inimitable master himself, Rex Stout.