San Francisco, 1960. Samuel Hamilton, ad salesman for a local newspaper and aspiring reporter, decides to investigate a suspicious death: Reginald Rockwood III, someone that he'd known from the Camelot bar and who is supposedly a millionaire, has just been run over by a bus. Intrigued by Reginald's peculiar life and the shady circumstances surrounding his death, Samuel, with the help of his friend Melba, unravels bit by bit a complex plot whose epicenter is located in Mister Song's Many Chinese Herbs store in Chinatown. Mr. Song is a very powerful man in his neighborhood, and his ancient Chinese vessels are a safe place for many of its residents to deposit their money and documents. The trafficking of Chinese art and antiquities, disreputable businessman, crimes and femme fatales all appear in this novel set in San Francisco's mythic Chinatown, which the author knows perfectly and recreates with a master hand.