Penguin books In 1967, King Vidor, the esteemed director of such classic films as Duel In The Sun and War and Peace, took on the toughest assignment ever: to solve the mystery behind the scandalous 1922 murder of flamboyant director William Desmond Taylor. Despite an intensive investigation, no killer was ever found, although the cast of suspects was impressive indeed. Was it the beautiful drug-addicted actress Mabel Normand? An up-and-coming young starlet, Mary Miles Minter? The starlet"s mother, Charlotte Shelby? Could it have been the homosexual houseboy? Or a sectary bearing an uncanny resemblance to Taylor"s elusive brother? What Vidor discovered was so explosive, he never revealed the identity of the killer. Now, this mesmerizing account reconstructs the full shocking truth of the murder that was too scandalous even for Hollywood.