Devil's Doorknob

Casino and brothel owner Royal Shane--deeply religious, uncouthly alcoholic, and circling the drain--is faced with ruin when state engineers decide to reroute an existing freeway away from his border gambling joint. He launches on a blackout drunk, during which he apparently murders his young business manager, whom he blames for the crisis. Is he innocent . . . or not? The police would certainly like to know, but Shane isn't sure himself. Enter a young, somewhat confused civil servant named Philip Hansen, who complicates things further by falling for one of Shane's prostitutes--even as he courts the love of his life, a New England transplant named Tessa Oulette. Shane is determined to establish his innocence and save his businesses through trickery. The hooker has some devious schemes of her own. Things could get downright dangerous here, if the characters weren't so comically inept.