The CIA Man had bungled badly. Ralph Benson had made the mistake of contacting his agents openly. He had been on the job too long - and liquor and loss of nerve had caused him to take some incredibly foolish chances. He had been fingered for execution by CLAW, the Chinese Communist secret organisation that was smuggling its top agents into Florida under cover of an influx of Cuban refugees.

But Ralph Benson was already dead. A fatal connection with a beautiful woman in a white convertible had taken care of that. Now Nick Carter had been ordered to replace Benson. And Killmaster would have to go on being a human target named Ralph Benson - a fumbling, bumbling, has-been operative, too drunk, sodden and scared to be able to protect himself!