When one thinks of popular fictional detectives, one likely jumps right to Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson, perhaps Hercule Poirot, or Inspector Clouseau, or even Encyclopedia Brown and the Hardy Boys: all males. If any female character does come to mind, she would likely be Miss Marple or Jessica Fletcher, both older women. However, James creates a young, female detective named Cordelia Gray—just twenty-two years old—who proves to be quite intellectually capable as well as empathetic and compassionate. In fact, her partner, an older man named Bernie Pryde, had such faith in her that he made her a partner in his practice after she'd spent just a year as his secretary, and he left the agency to Cordelia when he died. Despite several characters' insistence that running a private detective agency is an "unsuitable job for a woman," Cordelia proves them wrong with her keen eye, well-honed skills, and coolness under pressure.

Cordelia is as physically capable as a man, shimmying all the way up a stone well and holding on to a ladder with one leather strap when someone attempts to murder her. She is as intellectually capable as a man, outsmarting both Sir Ronald Callender and the police after Sir Ronald's death. At the same time, however, Cordelia is also empathetic, coming to identify with Mark Callender, the man's whose death she's investigating, and putting that empathy to use as she considers his actions and feelings and motives. Finally, she's compassionate, reaching out to the unlikable Miss Leaming and helping to protect her as well as Mark's memory after Sir Ronald's death (despite the fact that it will lead to her own charge for possessing an unlicensed firearm). In short, Cordelia combines the qualities typically associated with men and the qualities typically associated with women to solve her case and protect those people who deserve protection. In 1972, this seems to me to be a pretty radical way to present a young woman.