A surprise phone call leads to a fifty year old secret and a huge coverup by the Australian government. Bernard Wilfred Downs who prefers his nickname of Sarge in preference to those given to him, is a retired Detective Chief Inspector living in Cairns, Australia. Over the years he has built a network of contacts in the police force, the ADF, the AFP and Australia's spy network. He needs to call on many of these people to help him solve a mystery that has landed in his lap. There wasn't enough evidence yet to make it a police matter and it was the perfect antidote to the boredom that had taken over his life since retirement. Traveling from Cairns to Townsville and then over to the Vietnamese and Laotian border, he finds clues that may help unravel the dark secret that the ADF and the government don't want to see the light of day.