Ben Sterndale prides himself on being a good fact-finding journalist, and in his book that means a thorough researcher and, most important of all, honest. When he is recruited by a top advertising agency to investigate the theft of a sheet of figures for a bit of pin money, he scans the local newspapers for clues. In one he discovers that a London stamp dealer has been knocked down in a hitand-run accident and when he visits the man in hospital there seem to be rather too many strangers paying courtesy calls. Then the stamp dealer whispers the mysterious phrase 'the shapes of sleep', and Sterndale suspects that at last he is on to a scoop. Following a trail that takes him through nightclubs, smart hotels and eventually to the pretty university town of Göttingen on the German frontier, Sterndale encounters some intriguing characters — including a fresh-face American girl with a fine left hook — and uncovers a disturbing story of espionage, bluff and double-bluff that leads him into increasingly dangerous territory.