This is a story of revenge. A young man comes to believe his father, while a second lieutenant in Vietnam, was killed by his own men. Thirty years later, he tracks down those he holds responsible to impose on them his own rough justice. The last of those, a man of obsessive pride, lives in comfort in a small town in South Carolina. That comfort and his standing in the community are threatened by the intrusion of the town bully into his private affairs, especially his love affair with a young woman, the local beauty, scarcely half his age. The coming of the young man into town brings these three undeniable forces into conflict with tragic consequences for them all.