Darcy Evans has spent much of her life scrounging on the streets of London. When she is dismissed from a girls' reformatory, she finds herself traveling to America at the invitation of an old friend. In the states, Darcy's uncouth mannerisms single her out for ridicule as she tries to fit into Lyon's Refuge - a home for delinquent boys, run by her friend's husband. Schoolmaster Brent Thomas is rigid and refined... and more than a little unnerved at the newest addition to Lyon's Refuge. When he is commissioned to teach this wild and outspoken beauty the subtleties of grammar, language, and etiquette, he finds to his surprise that he might have a thing or two to learn himself.