December, 1922. Ruby Vaughn is looking forward to a quiet, relaxing trip to Oxford in the week before Christmas with her octogenarian housemate and colleague Mr Owen. Far away from the arcane, unusual - and occasionally illegal - books that seem to always get her into trouble. The most she expects to do is attend a handful of his antiquarian society meetings.
But when the body of disgraced scholar Julius Harker is amongst his exhibition of Egyptian antiquities looted by Napoleon, panic spreads throughout the cobbled streets of Oxford. The last thing Ruby wants is another investigation, but then an old friend comes begging for her help. If that wasn't enough, her past insists on haunting her when Ruan Kivell, the intriguing folk healer that she met in Cornwall, suddenly reappears. It seems there is much more going on in Oxford that meets the eye.