When a ship is wrecked in a storm off the Portland coast, a taciturn stonecutter by the name of Joseph Rushmore sends his rescue dog to haul in plunder. What it brings instead is a baby in a cradle. As Joseph's wife has just given birth to a stillborn child, the couple decide to keep the infant girl. The Rushmores never tell their adopted daughter the truth about her origins, but on the death of Joseph and his wife, when the girl, Joanna, is 16, she finds herself at the mercy of her abusive and violent Rushmore cousins.