The story begins in Bridgewater on the morning of the Monmouth Rebellion. Peter Blood, the town doctor, tends to geraniums in a window box while local men march in the street below. Blood chooses not to fight for the Duke of Monmouth; his dangerous military adventures as a young man, his ambivalence about religion and politics, his Irish identity, and his cynical nature guide Blood not to join in the endeavor his neighbors enthusiastically support. Blood sleeps soundly that night, not knowing it’s the last time he’ll sleep in his house in Bridgewater.

A loud knocking on his front door rouses Blood at daybreak. Jeremy Pitt, the shipmaster, is frantic to engage the doctor’s services for Lord Gildoy, a local nobleman who fought in the battle and suffered serious injuries. Blood agrees to go. He and Pitt ride to the place Oglethorpe’s Farm, where Gildoy rests.

On the way to Oglethorpe’s Farm, Blood and Jeremy pass rebels fleeing the battlefield. Baynes, the farm’s owner, ushers them into the main hall. The wounded Lord Gildoy rests on a daybed. Blood attends to the gentleman with the aid of Baynes’s wife and daughter. It isn’t long before dragoons invade the house.