The year is 1904, and the setting is Cockshute Towers, one of England's Stateliest Homes. Earl Cockshute is faced with a grave dilemma: the debts of the once-great family have been bought by Snotty Shuttleworth, a local villager who ventured to Australia and made his fortune in trade. Now he is back in England, and fancies himself as Lord if they cannot pay what they owe within a month.

Butler Hampton is perhaps more despairing of such a notion then his master, and the rest of the staff are equally aghast at the idea of life at Cockshute not being what it was - for all enjoy casual and fulfilling liasons of a hot and sweaty nature.

With no family heirlooms left to sell, Lord and Lady Cockshute turn to that old aristocratic trick of a convenient marriage. Young Lady Kitty recalls that a school-friend, Betsy Ann Dureneck, is an obscenely wealthy American oil heiress, and would be a perfect match for Master Peregrine. He, however, is far more interested in his basement scientific laboratory...

As the Durenecks visit for the weekend, things go quickly awry. Hampton recognises Betsy Ann's mother as a dancing girl he was once engaged to, and comes to a realisation about her parentage; Shuttleworth declares his love for Lady Kitty; and Betsy Ann seems as buttoned-up and uninterested in love or sex as Peregrine! Is a staged jewellry theft the only answer left to ensure the status quo at Cockshute Towers is maintained?