Behind him he has left a trail of broken lives - friends, lover, wife, son. Now two more people begin to feel the force of his restless compelling nature: Shirley Forsdike, a neurotic, hero-worshipping schoolmistress who has yet to meet him, and Frank Cauldwell, an impecunious young writer.

Out of the shifting conflict raised by their emotions and experiences Francis King constructed a taut novel of passion and despair.