Danny Cartwright and Spencer Craig were born on different sides of the track. Danny, an East End Cockney, leaves Clement Attlee Comprehensive School at the age of 15 to take up a job at a local garage. He falls in love with Beth, the boss' daughter, and asks her to marry him. Spencer Craig lives in the West End, a graduate of an English public school and Cambridge University. After leaving university, he becomes a criminal barrister and is soon tipped to be the youngest Queen's Counsel of his generation. Danny and Beth travel up to the West End to celebrate their engagement. They end the evening in a wine bar where Spencer Craig is also celebrating his 30th birthday, along with a select group of university chums. Although the two young men don't meet, their lives will never be the same again. For, an hour later, one of them is arrested for murder, while the other ends up as the Prosecution's chief witness in an Old Bailey trial.