Adversity gives rise to opportunity. Albert Littlejohn and his black market gang operate in the town of Southampton during World War Two. Dockers by day but gangsters by night, these men take full advantage of the darkness of the blackout conditions to burgle and steal whatever they need to ply their illicit trade.

Marked by hard case characters like George (the cosh) Harcourt and the equally dangerous Salty Sam the Bournemouth knifeman, this story builds to an inevitable and explosive climax in the New Forest on VE day. Albert Littlejohn and his boys have to stay one jump ahead of the law and their rival gangs from Swaythling and Bournemouth.