This novel set in Glasgow tells the tale of Mungo Niven, a man who possesses a fiercely Scotch conscience and feels trapped in a drab and unfulfilling existence. Mungo's wife is the extroverted and excessively cheerful Bess, too busy cracking jokes or playing whist to notice her husband's misery. When Bess is stricken by cancer, Mungo sees an opportunity for him to escape both his loveless marriage and his tyrannical conscience.