A splendid war record in Naval intelligence and a disastrous marriage left Martin Pendle Hill alone, leading an uneventful life in a pleasant Oxford upper maisonette. He had a good friend and a black Labrador as a companion. But when both these die, Pendle Hill accidently falls and breaks his thigh in his distress. The accident sparks a change of heart and after sixty-five years he decides he is going to live dangerously. Without permission from his stern landlady in the flat downstairs he fills his life with bright young people by taking in lodgers. Meanwhile, his landlady has embarked upon a plan for her old age, which has within it the seeds of disaster. 'Done with indefinable, inimitable warmth that characterises Fleming; this one's a joy' San Francisco Chronicle