June 21 1976

Police detective Marian Trout gets a phone call from a man who says before dying that he’s been murdered. Her superior, Sgt. Digger Boles, opposed to women police, scoffs when Marian tells him about the call but does agree to accompany her to the scene of the crime. The victim has been stabbed in the eye with a needle-like instrument. To Boles it’s a cut-and-dry case: The murder was committed by a neighbor, an elderly lady who admits that she has at times used a hat pin to defend herself. Marian disagrees, demanding further investigation.