Edwin James reaches the height of his professional career in the law when, on the brink of being knighted, legal scandals and debt force him to flee England with his new bride and attempt to establish a new career in America. There, his involvement with the most sensational actress of the day soon destroys his marriage, and he quickly finds himself recruited into Colonel Lafayette Baker's Secret Detective Service investigating Fenian activity in New York's hell-hole, the Five Point. And it isn't long before he joins forces with former political assassin, Carlos Rudio, in the hunt for John Wilkes Booth, the murderer of President Lincoln. Forced to work with corrupt judges and policemen in New York James becomes involved with the most notorious fraudsters of the day, and always in the background lie the lurking dangers that arise from the shadows of his scandalous past, shadows that threaten to rise up and engulf him once more.