This is my second time reading this book, because it’s a fascinating combination of noir novel with a race angle. Dr. Hugh Densmore sets out in a conspicuous white Cadillac on a relaxing drive from Los Angeles to Phoenix to attend a family wedding. When he picks up a teenage hitchhiker in Indio, he instantly knows he’s done the wrong; this simple action begins a chain of events that has him suspected of her murder and fighting for his reputation. If you haven’t read the blurb, it’s not until p.80 or 90 that you find out Dr. Densmore is an African-American in a racist Southwest of the 1960s. Racism colors his every encounter with the justice system for the rest of the novel, which streets he drives on, what restaurants he dines in, and, most importantly, who he trusts. It’s a bit of a historical document from an improbable source. As a white middle-class woman, Dorothy Hughes was an unlikely crime novelist, and yet this one was thoroughly enjoyable on many levels.