Dr Lucien Blake left Ballarat as a young man. But now he finds himself returning to take over not only his dead father's medical practice, but also his on-call role as the town's police surgeon, only to find change is afoot, nothing is sacred, and no one is safe.

Dumpy a strange, cat-obsessed figure in a gold dress, who dreams of escaping to the big smoke. When a pleasant stranger appears, needing help to change a punctured tyre, opportunity final knocks.