Dr. Roger Lavington answers an urgent call from the housekeeper of his antisocial neighbor Maximilian von Rheinhart, a man he had never met. Dr. Lavington finds his neighbor dead, with a gun wound and while the housekeeper goes to call the police, the good doctor discovers a petrified lady hiding in the room. He allows her to escape before the police arrive, but not too long after that a woman fitting her description is found dead in a train wreck. The matter seems to be concluded, but the mystery begins to unravel after a couple of years, when Dr. Lavington goes to take care of his old friend who was involved in that same train wreck in which he lost both legs.