The year is 1476, and after a hard winter hawking his wares through the ice and rain, Roger the Chapman is looking forward to spending Christmas in Bristol, enjoying the warm hearth and good food of his mother-in-law Margaret – even if it means the young widower will have to endure her constant matchmaking.

However, Margaret has barely introduced him to her cousin Adela when Roger’s attentions are demanded elsewhere. The long-lost son of a wealthy Bristol weaver, presumed murdered on a visit to London six years before, has miraculously reappeared, to the delight of the old man and to the indignation of Alison Burnett, who refuses to believe that the bedraggled stranger is her brother Clement – the rightful heir to half her father’s fortune. When Alison’s violent objections provoke Alderman Weaver into disinheriting her altogether, she appeals to Roger’s reputation as a solver of mysteries to prove her growing suspicions right.