Awash in tears, salesgirl Claire Turner arrives at the Times Square office of private investigator Faye Quick and begs Faye to find her missing boyfriend, army private Charlie Ladd, who has been AWOL for three days. Faye takes the case, which leads her to Charlie's room at the Hotel Commodore-where she finds an unknown man-naked, dead and stuffed inside a wardrobe. Who is the John Doe, and what connection does he have to the missing Charlie Ladd? While Faye detects, the mercury rises practically to the boiling point in the city that never sleeps.