Miss Genevieve Hasting refuses to become a companion like her two older sisters. She aspires to loftier heights, and though she despises weak-willed men, society's rules, proper deportment, and stays, she's willing to suffer them all if it means winning a life of luxury without toil as well as a titled gentleman, except she's been banished to her father's country estate as punishment for too many scandals. It's dull and there aren't that many men to match with there.

Mr. Thomas Alderman is a country vicar who has enjoyed his living over the years. Though his good looks make him extremely popular with the ladies of his congregation, he hasn't given marriage much thought, for in his youth, he had been quite the rogue, but he left that behind him when he received his calling to minister. When Miss Hasting slips into his church one glorious sunny morning, he's thrown into confusion. He's not that man any longer.