Jack Laidlaw's Glasgow is a city of hard men, powerful villains and self-made businessmen, of big industry and its victims, of enduring women, terrible slums and, one morning, of murder. An unorthodox detective who cloaks compassion with sardonic wit, Laidlaw knows the right questions to ask, threading his way through the pubs and clubs, the bookies' and tenements, trying to find the killer of a young, apparently innocent girl.