A chance encounter with a van leads DCI Cartwright into a convoluted case riddled with coincidences. The van is en route for London but the cargo, smuggled from Amsterdam and landed by boat on the River Deben, is not quite what the courier had been expecting. The discovery of a kidnapped and assaulted Dutch student is only the beginning and Cartwright becomes suspicious of the activities of a cut-price enterprise and a dodgy antiques business in Bethnal Green where a syndicate of small-time cockney villains is looking to develop the potential for import and export of stolen jewellery and antiques and an increasing demand for cannabis.