The play revolves around a couple, in which the wife is terminally ill with cancer. They are joined by old friends at a final cocktail party. Old animosities and competitions emerge and swirl around the heroine, who suffers with both mental and physical pain. Into this mix pops a sophisticated lady in black, accompanied by a Black male companion. They play word games with the husband, who knows these visitors are not ordinary and are certainly not whom they claim to be. For they are death, and their language and logic is unreasonable, and they inspire anger in those that resent their visit, and yet they are welcome guests to those that suffer.