When the girl in the window waves to Henry Parker, he feels as if a seam in the fabric of experience has opened, welcoming him to a new exciting life and that promise seems almost fulfilled when that same day he meets the dark and seductive Jennifer Lacey, friend of Cyril and Valiant, the painter Ricky and others who seem to occupy a world of haunted enchantment. But because he is young and short of confidence, Henry is unsure he will ever fit into Jennifer’s world, drawn as he is. His alternative is the light and enticing Kate Rodgers whose insistence that our day-to-day lives are shot through with magic pulls Henry in a contrary direction. As Henry’s first autumn in Boston unfolds, Jennifer and Kate draw him equally. Will either of them prove to be the girl in the window? Or will Henry’s world collapse into the mundane?