With France having fallen, by 1941 the Germans control every French port, turning the English Channel into a battleground where vast numbers of German Schnell-boats frequently clash horns with the handful of British MTBs charged with the responsibility of protecting the inshore trade.In the thick of the action is Lieutenant Lord Duncan Eversham, commanding an MTB flotilla. Already famous for having engaged and sunk a Schnell-boat, Eversham enjoys the privileges not only of his rank but of being the protege of his commanding admiral, having the untiring support of his wife, and most of all of his flamboyantly beautiful and outrageously amoral mother, Kristin, Dowager Lady Eversham, unaware that her interest centres less on him than on his youthful engineer, Jamie Goring... But little does Duncan suspect that his life - and Jamie's - will be turned upside down when they rescue the survivors of a sinking merchantman, amongst whom is the mysterious American Rebecca Strong, engaged on a secret mission for the British Government.