"Nora Blake, a schoolteacher in Banner, Idaho, lives in the home of Bishop Shepherd and becomes acquainted with a Latter-day Saint family. She meets Jed Oliver, a local rancher, and is astonished to learn secretly that he cannot read. She offers to teach him, and Jed accepts her instruction. Being informed that good virgin land is available, Nora takes up a homestead. One of her neighbors is Old Free, a mysterious hermit, and a non-Mormon. When Trudy Shepherd dies of influenza, Nora learns significant gospel principles from the funeral talks and the attitude of the Shepherds." [Publisher's synopsis]
