In the year 1934, Mary Elizabeth Graves, a 'cigar-smoking, whisky-drinking' British archeologist, and her team, carry out meticulous excavations at various sites in East Africa. With a propensity towards sardony, and a trademark temper, Mary Graves assumes the supervision of an excavation in Kenya, after a government project to erect a dam in order to safeguard a rhodolite mining site stumbles upon remnants of archeological value. Meanwhile, Mary's estranged husband, Charles, who aids a local clinic during the length of his stay in Kenya, has been struggling to maintain their marriage after the tragedies of the past years have caused antagonism between them. On the horizon, conflict lingers. Brief but vicious isolated incidents of rebellion have arisen against the established colonial rule.