Wellington, 1885: Tally Ho doesn't need to go to school because she is going to be a fisherman or cart driver or butcher boy like Harry Crawford. Taking her hero's advice, she runs away. Sydney, 1917: A burned woman is discovered on the banks of the Lane Cove River. Nobody knows who she was until the police find out a boy's mother went missing that very same weekend, and his stepfather, Harry Crawford, is not who he seems to be.