Before Geoffrey Chaucer became a poet and diplomat, he was a junior member of one of the royal households. In 1359 he is about to embark for France and the wars. But first he returns to see his mother and father in London's Vintry Ward, though not before stopping off at a brothel and a tavern in Southwark. At home, Geoffrey finds his father dangerously ill and the sinister Nicholas Lombard in charge of the family wine-importing business. When Lombard is killed in apparently impossible circumstances, Geoffrey is baffled by the eagerness of the authorities to cover up the affair and decides to search out the truth for himself.