Sheltering from the 1918 Spanish Flu at their seaside estate, a Progressive journalist and his socialite wife take in a mysterious grifter as a private cook. But when the plague descends on the posh island, the family and staff find themselves cut off from society and, like castaways, struggling to survive . The new cook sees an opportunity to rouse his fellow staff to re-think their stations and have the run of the mansion for themselves. Their employer suspects the cook’s coup is part of a far more sinister agenda. It is not long before the mind games between master and servant breed an all-out war for dominance over the home. Social restraints crack apart. And civility gives way to animal instincts that lurk beneath…