Rima Marshall - a disgusting woman who has reached the lowest rung on the ladder of degeneracy. A ruthless liar, whore, drug addict, killer - and blackmailer. She proceeds to blackmail Jefferson Halliday who has moved on in every way since he first met this odious woman many years ago. And how she takes him to the cleaners, collecting very large amounts of money from him! Yet Jefferson on the whole is a fine gentleman who made mistakes whilst a young man (mainly getting involved with Rima) and it looks as if his whole life and future will be ruined because of this. Rima however is brutally killed later on, and Jefferson who had planned to kill her (not by himself) blames himself for this, and even hands himself over to (a blackmailing!) police officer. This is a thrilling novel as one would expect from the author, and the conclusion is more hopeful than bleak. Chase is often undermined by critics and purists, but he is a very fine writer who introduces convincing characters quickly. In this work eg, see how the dangerous Wilbur is introduced from the beginning: "The man who came in looked like something straight out of a nightmare...small, fine-boned with a thin pointed face that was as white as cold mutton fat. His black hair was long and plastered to his head by the rain. It hung down either side of his face in limp strands. It was his eyes that gave him his nightmarish appearance. The pupils were enormous, almost filling the entire iris..."
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