An exercise in mental acrobatics unleashes the deeply buried angers, grief, and frustrations of a professor so that within a short time span he has murdered, robbed, and almost been the success -- in an area unknown to him- he has dreamed of. Stuart Wise, widowed, inconsolable, and sensitive about his California university career, succumbs to guilt, an alter-ego visitation, and an identification with criminality -- and liquor -- and speeds through a spot of blackmail, the theft of entrance fees -- and wakes to the sickness he would not admit. A shocker that lines up with Murder Takes a Wife.