Fun-loving theatrical producer Spencer Lockridge invites Ellery to his mansion for a weekend of working out how to adapt one of Ellery's works for the stage. But the producer disappears shortly thereafter, and presumed murdered. A series of clues are delivered by pranksters' means. The idea is to try to get the killer to implicate himself or herself.

Ellery and Simon join forces to figure out if an airplane manufacturer was murdered - or killed by a 2,000-year-old Egyptian curse.