On a winter evening in 1892, Abigail Rook departs a ship and arrives in New Fiddleham, USA. She came from England and passed through Ukraine, Poland, and Germany before arriving. She enters an inn where she hopes to play piano in exchange for tips, but the innkeeper tells her the piano is out of service. He takes pity on her and allows her to sit inside and warm up with a complimentary pint. Abigail considers what her upright mother would think of her circumstance.

She is approached by a strange man she later learns is R. F. Jackaby. He examines her and pronounces her departed from Ukraine via Germany. Abigail mistakenly thinks he was on board the ship with him, and then guesses he must be a detective. After Jackaby leaves, Abigail questions the innkeeper. Immediately, the other patrons compare their stories of the man.

Abigail settles into a temporary room she’s bartered for housekeeping services, preparing to search for a job. As she begins, she remembers her only experience with true employment: an anthropological expedition where she hoped to follow in her father’s footsteps and uncover dinosaur bones. The dig was a disappointment, and Abigail prepared to return home.