Was something fishy going on at the National Calculating Company? Was it mere inefficiency - or fraud? Irate stockholders have hired an outside accountant to investigate why all divisions, save one, are losing money. Unfortunately, the accountant is soon found dead, strangled with the cord of his own adding machine! Enter John Putnam Thatcher, the elegant silver-haired banker-detective who charmed so many readers in "Banking on Death." Thatcher would like to keep out of the whole affair, but his customary curiosity soon has him investigating just who would be accounting for murder.