This Is Suspense #24

Paul Ajax, freshly released from prison, tracks down his twin brother Quentin to settle a score—but a violent confrontation leaves him in a desperate situation where impersonating his identical sibling seems like the only escape. Now caught between a vengeful killer, the law closing in, and a mystery knock at the door, Paul faces a reckoning he never anticipated. Who arrives to face him in this twist-filled detective tale?

When a desperate factory worker named Walt Davos pawns his wife Ruth's engagement ring to buy food and medicine during a strike, his bitter encounter with pawnbroker Alonzo White sets in motion a nightmare he can't escape. Waking in an alley with fragmented memories of violence and a pocket full of stolen cash, Walt returns home only to be arrested for White's murder—a crime he swears he didn't commit, though every piece of evidence points to him. As Walt's frantic alibi about a mysterious bar and a stranger who plied him with drinks unravels under police scrutiny, he faces trial and conviction in a case where desperation and circumstance may have sealed his fate far more surely than guilt.

When jeweler Alvin Fargo's diamonds go missing from his Detroit safe, Detective Craig Johns must untangle a web of accusations among those who knew the combination—his protégé Ed Mora and Fargo's own son Mels—each blaming the other in a tense interrogation. As suspicion falls on Ed, Johns must separate truth from lies to catch the real thief.