It is a dreary, rainy morning in July 1920 at a train station in the rural north England town of Oxgodby. A lone passenger, twenty-something Thomas Birkin, steps off the train. No one is there to greet him, although he takes comfort in the happy face of child staring at him through the rain-streaked window of the station. He has come to Oxgodby to work, his first employment since being discharged from the Army after nearly two years serving in the mud and confusion in France and Belgium. Birkin was a part of the long, bloody siege at Passchendaele. He served as a signaler who maintained a high-risk position along the front lines armed only with communications devices, relaying troop movements back to officers far behind the line.

Given his background in architectural studies at London Art College, combined with the fact that he is a “stone-fancier” (6), Birkin has been retained by the local church to restore a Medieval mural believed to be beneath centuries of careless whitewash on the church’s wall above an archway over the altar.

Despite the rain, Birkin begins the short walk to the church. Noting its ancient cemetery, Birkin decides to check out the church.