Crime and Punishment #43

A chemistry teacher's marriage to a sickly woman becomes a trap when he falls for a colleague, but Harry Thorne's desperation leads him down a darker path—one where his knowledge of chemistry and a particular poisonous flower become the instruments of his undoing. When suspicion falls on him after his wife's sudden death, a detective's careful investigation of the foxgloves he discarded reveals the terrible truth he thought he'd hidden. This true crime tale from 1951 shows how even the most careful plans can unravel when guilt leaves behind the smallest evidence.

In 1951, *Crime and Punishment* told the brutal true story of Roy Cowan, a convicted murderer who makes a desperate escape from the execution chamber and flees into the underworld as a hunted fugitive. On a freight train, the hardened killer meets Bud Day, a drifter with an unexpected gift for loyalty, and together they form an unlikely partnership born of mutual isolation and suspicion. As Cowan's past closes in and survival becomes a daily battle, he discovers that even a man who trusts no one might need someone to survive.

When customs agent Ralph Ferris arrives at a remote riverside campsite to investigate smuggled gems, he finds himself caught in a dangerous pursuit—one that ends with a man dead in the rapids below Michu Falls. Now Evelyn Harmon, wife of the camp's organizer, finds herself accused of murder, her possession of a large sum of cash only deepening suspicion. With clues scattered among the campers and accusations flying, Ferris must uncover the truth before the real culprit slips away.