Winston Churchill receives startling news from a German aristocrat in early 1933 after Adolf Hitler is appointed Chancellor of Germany. The aristocrat has learned of a plot to stage a fake assassination attempt on the new German leader that the Nazis will use as a pretext to declare martial law and liquidate their political opponents. Unknown to Hitler, however, his enemies within the Nazi party - the Black Front - are conspiring with renegade elements of his own SS to turn the fake assassination attempt into a real one.

Churchill tells the American newspaper titan, William Randolph Hearst, of the fake plot, and together, they persuade Mattie McGary, Hearst's top photojournalist and Churchill's adventure-seeking Scottish goddaughter, to investigate. Mattie readily agrees, in large part because exposing the fake plot may help her finally shed the unfortunate reputation she has in Germany as "Hitler's favorite foreign journalist".

Soon after she leaves for Germany, Mattie's fiancé, the American lawyer and former MID agent, Bourke Cockran, Jr., also travels to Germany to help his publisher client, Freedom House, acquire the rights to Rear Area Pig, an expose of Hitler's less-than-heroic wartime service. Once in Germany, both Mattie and Cockran find themselves in peril at the hands of the SS loyal to Hitler who will stop at nothing to keep Cockran from acquiring the book and Mattie from learning the truth about the fake plot.

Threats to Mattie multiply when SS agents working for the Black Front attempt to coerce her into joining the real plot to kill Hitler. When Cockran learns the Black Front intends to kill Mattie along with Hitler at his alpine retreat, the Berghof, he reluctantly seeks the help of Reichspresident Herman Göring and Kurt von Sturm, a top Göring aide who is also one of Mattie's former lovers. The one-time rivals for Mattie's affection quickly conclude that there is only one way to protect Mattie.