St. Margaret's is becoming independent April 15, 1973 and Communist guerillas step up their attacks to achieve by force what they were denied at the ballot box. Connie is shortly kidnapped while John is involuntarily impressed into the Air Militia where he is handed an impossible mission to perform, a mission that leads to him being court-martialed for a capital offense.
The beautiful and mysterious Sybil Jack, daughter of one of the island's most powerful clans and suspected of Communist leanings by the new nation's secret police, shortly ingratiates herself into John's affections as the tensions mount and St. Margaret's fights for its life as a free country within the British Commonwealth. As the year progresses, the young expatriates find themselves caught up in a web of intrigue, treason and murder.