Five young thugs terrorize an elderly couple, Joe and Rose DeLucco, one winter evening. The assailants suddenly collapse and, inexplicably, die. Police question the DeLuccos but release them when it becomes clear that they are the victims. The media becomes intensely interested in the enigma of the five boys’ deaths. The DeLuccos return that evening to their brownstone home to hire their neighbor, Tim Frost, to represent them. Harley Digby, a vicious brother of one of the dead, accuses the authorities of a cover-up and vows revenge. In the search for clues, time flashes back to 1942 to the courtship of Rose and Joe. Nineteen-year-old Rose Finkel lives in an orthodox Jewish home and has "an understanding" with her Jewish boyfriend, Ensign Arthur Burns, only to fall in love with Italian-American, Joseph DeLucco. Joe proposes marriage after Rose discovers she is pregnant with a child he hasn’t fathered. Joe claims paternity, but Rose's mother insists on a Jewish marriage ceremony. They find an obscure rabbi, Petrokoff, who agrees to marry them. Petrokoff, escaped from Nazi-occupied Poland, presents a hand-scribed marriage contract to Rose after performing the rite. She accepts it not realizing the affect of her actions.