Innocent Bystander

A midway murder sends a terrified eyewitness running for her life—from a cop, a con, and her own secrets—in this mystery by the author of the John J. Malone series.

The best carnival barker in the business couldn’t have drawn a crowd like the one now gathered around the Ferris wheel on the pier. In one of the cabs, still rocking with the ocean breeze, is a dead man—a bloody knife protruding from his back. Why the notorious gambling boss Jerry McGurn was killed is no mystery. Who did it is. And there’s only one probable witness to the crime.

As bystanders go, Ellen Haven comes across as innocent: pretty enough, plus her blue eyes well up with tears at the mere mention of something as awful as murder. Homicide detective Art Smith wants to believe she didn’t see a thing. Why would she lie? Then again, why else would she suddenly vanish? And Smith isn’t the only one looking for her; so is a brutal ex-con, fresh out of San Quentin, with a score to settle. Smith knows he’d better find her first, but Ellen is leading both men into a hall of mirrors where illusions of guilt and innocence can shatter with a single gunshot.

A former crime reporter, Craig Rice was “the first writer of detective fiction to make the cover of Time magazine. Her hardcover sales figures matched those of her bestselling contemporaries Rex Stout, Ellery Queen, Erle Stanley Gardner, and Raymond Chandler. She’s worth remembering” (Jon L. Breen, Edgar Award–winning author).