the book is the story of middle aged, burned out, small town attorney who comes into possession of information involving the shipment of a major quantity of narcotics through his town. having labored in the legal vineyard for almost 25 years he has become well slathered in the marinade of human duplicity and depravity or so he thinks.
believing he has acquired the expertise to intervene and take the money intended to pay for the narcotics, he soon learns that he has placed himself between competing forces on both sides of the law.
at issue is whether or not he can not only survive, but manage to hang on to the residue of human decency he's managed to retain throughout his legal career.