Minnesotan Paul Edin is killed by a nameless sniper during a Civil War reenactment of the Battle of Kirby Creek, near Corinth, Mississippi. His death is ruled an accident, but Paul's widow, Jenny, discovers the bullet was meant for the man standing next to Paul, a cop named Kenny Beeman. To penetrate the Mississippi smokescreen, Jenny enlists the aid of her former lover, news photographer John Rane. Appearing to be covering a story, Rane pokes into the Tennessee-Mississippi border country and teams up with Beeman. With demons nipping at his heels, Rane packs a Sharps rifle and live ammunition and heads off to the Shiloh battlefield for a showdown with a killer.