For the prostitutes of Leather Lane, nurse Hester Monk's clinic is a
lifeline, providing medicine, food, and a modicum of peace--especially
welcome since lately their ailments have escalated from bruises and
fevers to broken bones and knife wounds. At the moment, however, the
mysterious death of railway magnate Nolan Baltimore in a sleazy
neighborhood brothel overshadows all else. Whether he fell or was
pushed, the shocking question in everyone's mind is: What was such a
pillar of respectability doing in a seedy place of sin?
Meanwhile, brilliant private investigator William Monk acquires a new
client, a mysterious beauty who asks him to ascertain beyond a shadow of
a doubt whether or not her fiancé, an executive in Nolan Baltimore's
thriving railway firm, has become enmeshed in fraudulent practices that
could ruin him.
As Hester ventures into violent streets to learn who is responsible for
the brutal abuse of her patients, Monk embarks upon a journey into the
English countryside, where the last rails are being laid for a new line.
But the sight of tracks stretching into the distance revives memories
once stripped from his consciousness by amnesia--as a past almost
impossible to bear returns, eerily paralleling a fresh tragedy that has
already begun its inexorable unfolding.
