Briefly departing from her Doctor Fenimore stories, Robin Hathaway brings readers Dr. Jo Banks, a young female doctor practicing in Manhattan. When a little patient dies, Banks blames herself. Unable to face her life, she runs, leaving her lover, driving away from New York and through New Jersey without a destination on the highway or in her life. She stops at a motel, and that evening is called upon to treat a woman taken suddenly ill. The episode leads the motel owner to present Jo with a deal. Neither he nor the other motel owners can afford to keep a doctor on hand, but it is sometimes difficult to get one to come out from the nearest city. What they need is a cooperative house doctor, someone who can quickly get to any of the nearby motels. How about it? Jo takes the deal, without knowing that it will involve her in a series of gruesome murders of itinerant farm workers.
