The Dark Door

"Charlie Meiklejohn and Constance Leidl probe a mystery whose origins lie beyond the Earth. A series of arson attacks--seemingly unrelated--are destroying old empty buildings across the country, and costing insurance companies dearly. The problem proves not so much to trace the perpetrator, but to understand and prevent the phenomenon which he has been tracking and trying to stamp out for five years: a series of outbreaks of sudden, murderous insanity, each one centered on a remote, deserted building."@en
"Private investigator Charlie Meiklejohn is called in by insurance companies to follow the trail of a suspected serial arsonist. The arsonist, Carson Danvers, has been on a fanatical crusade, since the loss of his wife and son, burning down buildings in an effort to stop the manifestations of a malfunctioning alien space probe, which has caused random outbreaks of madness an murder that occur in old, abandoned wooden buildings. Meiklejohn begins following the criminal trail's but finds himself teaming up with his quarry to face the much deeper problem."@en
"A malfunctioning alien probe is running amok on Earth. Two detectives try to stop the killing but no one will believe their story."