The Great Plague has emptied much of London when Thomas Chaloner is ordered back into the city to investigate a skeleton found in a grave. The remains are decades old, but someone is prepared to kill again to prevent their identification.
The case becomes entangled with the disputed future of St Paul's Cathedral, where supporters of repair and demolition accuse one another of corruption and missing funds. Moving through a city of profiteers, exhausted officials and abandoned streets, Chaloner must uncover how an old crime still controls the struggle over the cathedral.