Bobber Maxwell is finding that changing careers is not simple: the former prizefighter is trying to make it as a private detective. But, despite having earned a Medal of Valor, he still is having trouble paying his rent, and he can't pay his assistant at all. Living mostly on cashews as the year 1948 approaches, he suddenly catches a break: an ex-lover, Big Band singer Arlene Cavanaugh, hires him as a bodyguard for the New Year's Eve bash at Chicago's swanky Edgewater Beach Hotel. But as this lucrative gig approaches, a murderous blizzard bears down on the city; and Chicago itself is in the clutches of a brutal killer known as The Midnight Hammer. Dreaming of earning the reward for this killer, little does Bobber realize that somebody wants him dead.