Paging varies between hardback and paperback edition.

It's 1835 and the relentless glare of the late July sun has slowed New Orleans to a standstill. When Hesione LeGros--once a corsair's jeweled mistress, now a raddled hag--is found slashed to death in a shanty on the fringe of New Orleans's most lawless quarter, there are few to care. But one of them is Benjamin January, musician and teacher. He well recalls her blazing ebony beauty when she appeared, exquisitely gowned and handy with a stiletto, at a demimonde banquet years ago. Benjamin January has tracked down killers through the sensuous, atmospheric, dangerously beautiful world of Old New Orleans. Now, he follows a trail of murder from illicit back alleys to glittering mansions to a dark place where the oldest and deadliest secrets lie buried.