Author William Deverell received an intriguing phone call. Would he be interested, he was asked, in defending a 59-year-old homosexual accused of bludgeoning his employer, a wealthy widow, with a liquor bottle while they were cruising in Canadian waters aboard a luxury liner. Deverell took the case – and found himself caught up in a bizarre world of eccentric characters, decadent behaviors, naked greed, and multi-million-dollar wills. To make matters worse, his sweet-tempered client had no memory of committing the murder – yet no means of proving he didn’t.