New York juvenile probation officer Joe Trumbull matches wits with a deadly unknown adversary responsible for the deaths of his fiancée and other women with whom he has been involved, as he takes on an enemy intent on destroying him.

"Harry Booth started stealing at nine to keep a roof over his ailing mother's head, slipping into luxurious, empty homes at night to find items he could trade for precious cash. When his mother finally succumbed to cancer, he left Chicago--but kept up his nightwork. Wandering from the Outer Banks to Savannah to New Orleans, he dons new identities and stays careful, observant, distant. He can't afford to attract attention--or get attached. Still, he...

Nikolai Rodchenko, a Russian ballet dancer who defected from the Soviet Union years ago, finds himself back in the motherland--trapped--thanks to an emergency airplane landing. The Soviets do not imprison him, however; they hope to score a propaganda victory by 'persuading' him to become Russian again. That is why he is sent to Siberia, to Raymond Greenwood and his Russian wife Darya. Greenwood is an American tap dancer who defected to Russia in opposition...

In this story that introduces the numbers from one to ten, Frankie the cat causes a ruckus when he works the night shift in his human family's hardware store.