This book is about the doings of a street band composed of criminals, all of whom claim to be ex-servicemen. Like is attracted to like, the writer states, and some had met in prison, others while serving in the same Anti-aircraft Battery on a gun-site on the North-east coast.
Led by the Drummer, these engaging ruffians start performing in the streets of Liverpool as soon as the war is over. Good musicians though they are, they fall on hard times and turn their hands to other things.
From the streets and docks of Liverpool the story moves to the fell country on the borders of Yorkshire and Westmorland. Here, in a derelict roadside garage and bungalow and in an equally remote cottage occupied by the hero, tension increases and murder occurs.
The story reaches its climax in a night chase across the fells. But the police are after the Drummer and his friends, and never very far behind.
The work of the CID, which runs in unobtrusive pattern throughout the book, rings true and therefore convinces, and as one of our readers reported on reading the manuscript, "this is one of the best suspense stories I have read for a very, very long time".
The fell country in which most of the action of the book takes place is actual, and anyone who wishes to check up on the map is referred to Sheet 90, 1-inch Ordnance Survey.