For Noel Tavares the tiny village in the Cevennes that he has been sent to for a year is a world away from what he has always known. Its isolation and tranquillity make it the ideal place to forget and be forgotten. But fate decides otherwise. Aided by Marmalade, a large ginger tabby cat who has accompanied him into exile, Noel finds himself unearthing secrets and plunging the village into a past that the years have buried.