1861. Private Krieger Andrewes, an Episcopal seminarian, interrupts his studies to join the Union Army only to be seriously wounded during the Battle of Wilson’s Creek in the Ozark hills of Southwest Missouri. Belle Potts, an unlettered woman healer, trained in medical care by a physician far ahead of his time, retrieves Andrewes from the battlefield. She saves not only his life, but his shattered leg that surely would have been amputated by a field surgeon. Through her unconventional care, Belle restores him to health. Healer and patient are drawn to one another in an affection with no future.
Andrewes, upon recovery, reluctantly returns to his seminary studies where he encounters a vivacious and beautiful musician, Annie Worthingham, to whom he becomes engaged. He is ordained and assigned to an affluent church in the suburbs of Saint Louis where he is overcome by unremitting pressures and the mounting awareness that parish ministry is not his calling. Andrewes contracts a severe illness and is ordered by his bishop to take a break. Fearing for his health, he travels back to southwest Missouri to secure the healing services of Belle Potts. However, Belle has disappeared. Dissatisfied with previous search efforts, Andrewes mounts a solo campaign to locate her. Will he find her alive? And what will that mean for him, for her, for them?