A supervillain stalks the countryside, and it will take a spinster to bring him to heel For months, the city has lived in fear of the Bat. A master criminal hindered by neither scruple nor fear, he has stolen over one million dollars and left at least six men dead. The police are helpless, the newspapers know nothing-even the key figures of the city's underworld have no clue as to the identity of the Bat. He is a living embodiment of death itself, and he is coming to the countryside. There, he will encounter the only person who can stop him: adventurous sixty-five-year-old spinster Cornelia Van Gorder. Last in a long line of New York society royalty, Cornelia has found old age to be a bore, and is hungry for a bit of adventure. She's going to find it-in a lonely old country house where every shadow could be the Bat.
"[Rinehart's] literary distinction lies in the combination of love, humor and murder that she wove into her tales. . . . She helped the mystery story grow up."
