"... Never get ahead of the mob. They're liable to shoot you in the arse."
A manhole opens at night in an empty street, and out climbs Lieutenant-Colonel Norman Hyde in a dinner suit. He gets into a Rolls-Royce and drives home. There, Hyde prepares seven envelopes, each containing an American crime paperback titled The Golden Fleece, one half of each of ten £5-notes, and an invitation to a lunch at the Cafe Royal hosted by "Co-Operative Removals Ltd."
Hyde sends the envelopes to former army officers, each of whom is in desperate or humiliating circumstances, and they all turn up at the lunch to get the other halves of their £5-notes. When Hyde asks their opinion of the novel, which is about a robbery, the men show little enthusiasm for it, but their interest is piqued when he reveals his knowledge of the misdeeds that led each man to leave or be kicked out of the military. Although he has no criminal record himself, Hyde holds a grudge for being made redundant by the army after 25 years of service and intends to rob a bank using the skills of the gathered men, each of whom is to get an equal share of £100,000 or more.
The gang meet again to discuss the plan in greater detail under the guise of an amateur dramatic society rehearsing Journey’s End. After agreeing to Hyde's plan, they move into his house, where they live like a military unit, complete with a regimen of duties and discipline in the form of monetary fines. Hyde reveals that he has spent the past year collecting details about the regular delivery of approximately a million pounds in used banknotes to a City of London bank.
To get weapons for the robbery, the gang raid an army training camp in Dorset. Hyde, Race, Mycroft, and Porthill create a distraction by posing as senior officers on an unscheduled food inspection, while Lexy and Stevens pose as telephone repairmen to infiltrate the camp and then steal the weapons, aided by Rutland-Smith and Weaver. The thieves speak in Irish accents to make it seem as though the IRA is responsible for the raid.
In Hyde’s basement, the gang studies maps, models, and surveillance footage to prepare for the bank robbery. Hyde also rents a warehouse, where the men modify the cars and lorry that Race steals, such as by fitting them with false number plates. One day, their work is interrupted by a passing policeman, who has noticed the warehouse is in use and offers to keep an eye on it as he patrols his beat, but the gang does not think he could have seen anything suspicious. On the eve of the bank robbery, Hyde destroys the plans and makes a speech thanking the men for their hard work.
