When a progressive gentleman doctor struggles to fit into the deeply entrenched culture of a rural Irish village, he realizes not all learning comes from books. Christopher Curran, newly graduated from Edinburgh Medical School, has dreamt of bringing modern medicine to Hawthorn Village. His struggle to fit into the deeply entrenched culture of the rural Irish village worsens when rumor of an unspeakable crime sifts through the village suggesting he might be involved. Renata Fitzjames and her irascible mother are newly arrived in Hawthorn from Portugal. They have come to fulfill a promise she made to her father on his deathbed. She resolves to keep her distance from the doctor knowing he has good reason to interfere. Dino, a runaway cabin boy off a pirate ship, becomes an unwitting complication for the doctor when the lad seeks refuge in the unlikeliest of places. Earl Talbot, disgraced and dismissed from medical school, opens up a chemist's shop dispensing medicines. He generously allows Renata to use the vacant backroom of his shop as a place to work with her herb collection. Constable Pete Waffer survived the battle of Vinegar Hill in 1798 and will surely uncover the chaos of Hawthorn's latest crime wave. He has made it his life's work to keep corruption from the village and protect its prickly folk. Beneath the thatched roof of the Black Pig incidents in the village are raked over by odious tongues as troublemakers and busybodies guzzle their pints.