When two governesses embark on their dream of opening a school for girls on the edge of Scotland’s capital, their chance of an independent life is threatened by the arrival of an Indian-British orphan, Jane Cumming, and her aristocratic grandmother, Lady Cumming Gordon.

As the pressures of class, race and deeply suppressed emotion build at Drumsheugh, a series of tragically avoidable events lead to the telling of one irreversible lie. At a time of great social conformity – accused of lesbianism – the resulting scandal leaves the teachers fighting for their lives.