"Toddy Kent had been born with a gizmo in his head--a talent for sniffing out the easy money. At present he's a freelance gold-buyer, shaking down the old ladies of Los Angeles for trinkets. The police reason that a man who persuades a housewife to sell him a hundred-dollar gold watch for five does not possess very high moral tone. In Toddy's case, they're absolutely right. Toddy may be a low-level scam artist, but after his encounter with the man with no chin and the talking dog, he is lifted into the big time by the seat of his pants. His slattern wife, Elaine, has been strangeled in their cheap hotel room, and Toddy's on the run--off to Mexico in the company of ex-Nazis, a forutne in drugs, and a load of twenty-four-karat trouble." --
