Harry Denton is a middle-aged professor who leaves his secure post at a London university on account of the sense of failure and embarrassment caused by his wife Anne's mounting debts. An inheritance left to him by his father enables him to start a new life by buying a small hotel in the Scottish Borders. But in this new context his marriage to Anne proves to be just as hopeless and loveless. He escapes through flights of fancy, frequently contemplating suicide, and becomes obsessed with one of his guests-Eleanor. Although, ironically, she comes across as a pretty simpleton married to an uncouth double-glazing salesman, she expresses the thinking which, in time, will transform Denton's life. The ruins of a twelfth-century Augustinian Abbey in the Scottish Borders play a significant role in the initial evocation of atmosphere, providing the fantasy of a 'time-gate' to the past.