Danny Cartwright and Spencer Craig never should have met. One evening, Danny, an East End cockney who works as a garage mechanic, takes his fianceé up to the West End to celebrate their engagement. He crosses the path of Spencer Craig, a West End barrister posed to be the youngest Queen's Counsel of his generation.
A few hours later Danny is arrested for murder and later is sentenced to twenty-two years in prison, thanks to irrefutable testimony from Spencer, the prosecution's main witness.
Danny spends the next few years in a high-security prison while Spencer Craig's career as a lawyer goes straight up. All the while Danny plans to escape and wreak his revenge.
Thus begins Jeffrey Archer's poignant novel of deception, hatred and vengeance, in which only one of them can finally triumph while the other will spend the rest of his days in jail. But which one will triumph? This suspenseful novel takes the listener through so many twists and turns that no one will guess the ending, even the most ardent of Archer's many, many fans.