Times are hard for a struggling family circus in the long, cold winter of 1925. With their sons off in America and the last of their big cats long gone, Pa and Ma Cooke are more than happy to accept the offer of free winter standing on the remote Blackcraig estate in Perthshire in return for a few shows to the Wilson family around Christmas time.

Wealthy but brash Albert Wilson is cock-a-hoop to find himself the centre of a circle of bright young things from around the county, agog for the circus and ready to endure his company to get at it.

With the threat of revolution blowing in from the east on the icy gales, Hugh Gilver is less pleased to see the troupe Prebrezhensky ensconced in the valley but the Gilver boys, especially, cannot get enough of Tiny Truman the midget, Andrew Merryman the giant, not to mention the mysterious and beautiful Anastasia, bare-back rider and troublemaker combined.

When Ma Cooke asks for Dandy’s help to get to the bottom of a string of spiteful tricks at the winter ground, Hugh gives his approval, one eye on the bank balance as always. But the fun runs out when the silly tricks take a darker turn, leaving one of the performers dead and the Cooke, Wilson and Gilver families fractured amid whispers of murder.