Jack Haldean, a young crime writer and former Royal Flying Corps pilot, is enjoying the local summer fete. But the idyll is soon shattered when Jack's fellow officer, Jeremy Boscombe, is found dead in the fortune-teller's tent. When a friend of Boscombe's is also found murdered, Jack soon realizes that the roots of the crime go back to an incident during the Battle of the Somme. Money, love, revenge and blackmail all play their part as Jack inches closer to the truth, putting his life and the lives of those around him in danger.