In November 1944, in the worst winter ever known in Bologna, in the depths of the war, the bomb-scarred streets are home to starving refugees who have fled the advancing Allies. The city is divided between the Fascist Black Brigades, the officers of the S.S. and the partisans of the Italian Resistance. Comandante De Luca finds himself in trouble when three murders land on his desk: a professor shot through the eye, an engineer beaten to death, and a German corporal left to be gnawed on by rats in a flooded cellar. De Luca must untangle all three cases in a hurry with ten lives on the line: ten Italian hostages who will face a Nazi firing squad if the corporal's killing is not solved to the German command's satisfaction.