Nora Porteous, a witty, ambitious woman from Brisbane, returns to her childhood home at age 70. Her life has taken her from a failed marriage in Sydney to freedom in London; she forged a modest career as a seamstress and lived with two dear friends through the happiest years of her adult life. At home, the neighbourhood children she remembers have grown into compassionate adults. They help to nurse her back from pneumonia, and slowly let her in on the dark secrets of the neighbourhood in the years that have lapsed.