The Black Coat

>A case of mistaken identity forces Anne Hillyer to masquerade as the granddaughter of the dying Aunt Ellen, the grand dame of a private New York City hotel, in this wacky mystery written and set in 1948. "I want to tell you where I hid it," the old woman whispers to the perplexed Anne. "I had to kill a man to get it." >Anne finds herself in this predicament after meeting up with a much younger girl, also named Anne, while taking the train to New York to begin a career in commercial art. The younger Anne is decked out in an outlandish and outmoded black sealskin coat with leg-of-mutton sleeves that seems totally out of character. The younger Anne disappears en route, swapping - without permission - Anne's stylish tweed coat for her own sealskin, prompting Aunt Ellen's nephew George to mistake our Anne for the old woman's granddaughter when he meets the train. >George soon realizes that Anne isn't the old lady's kin but convinces her to play the part, setting off a chain of events where dead bodies, old and new, begin popping up everywhere in the building. Anne's only real ally is an outrageous young man named Tim who calls her "precious" and insists on making martinis at the drop of a hat - or a corpse. >The result is another screwball comedy of murder from the sisters Little that poses the following questions: Is there really a treasure hidden in the building? Why is there an artificial hand dangling from the ceiling? What is so important about this sealskin coat? Who put the skeleton in the attic? Just how many murderers are there anyway? Will the stodgy but good- looking George or the flamboyant but lovable Tim win Anne's heart? The answers may surprise you.