Midsummer in the lowcountry of South Carolina is a dreamy, quiet time. Professor Sidney Lake uses this respite for literary research and planning his next semester, but his Gullah housekeeper, Tillie James, has other plans for him. She needs his help in dealing with a touchy subject: the death of George Reed and the suspicions it aroused that his wife Becky was involved, even though the coroner and the police chief declared Reed's death an unfortunate accident. As the police are in the business of catching the guilty and have no interest in proving someone innocent, it's up to Lake and Tillie--along with his graduate assistant, the local minister, and a retired policeman--to save Becky Reed's reputation. The proof of her innocence seems to rest on the quirks of the rising and falling tide in the marsh where George died. But the search for the truth turns out to be more than Sidney bargained for--and suddenly, his life and those of his friends are on the line...