It is early January, 1930. This is the twenty-third Cyrus Skeen detective novel. It covers the time after Skeen has married Dilys Jones, his intrepid and lovely secretary, and after he has formed close friendships with Mickey Kane, Lieutenant Raggio, and Lieutenant Donovan. Linda Bolding and Lucy Wentz figured largely in over twenty previous cases as his secretaries. Clara Reyes now fills the role as his competent and not-to-be-intimidated secretary. Skeen is called to protect for a second time the atheist lecturer Enoch Paige, who has been charged with the murder of a Pentecostal minister. Paige last appeared in the Spring of 1929 in The Head of Athena. Skeen now encounters again his enemy from Civic Affairs, the Committee of Concerned Citizens for Public Decency, or the CCCPD. Skeen must learn who vandalized Paige's own "church," the Parthenon; was it the murder victim, or an unknown assailant?