A Union soldier is shot and then held as a suspected deserter during the Civil War. A wife, desperate to reach her husband and prove that he's not guilty of wartime treason, leaves her two young children in the care of a friend to take a position as a nurse in the nation's capital. There her life will cross paths with an American literary icon. But how do these events, 150 years in the past, tie in with Sofia Parker in moder-day Cabot Fall, Vermont? Perhaps the priceless heirloom quilt bequeathed to her by her grandmother holds the link.