James Harrison and his family move to an old cottage in Oxfordshire where they are beset by small domestic disasters. His parents assume James is up to his tricks again. How can he tell them he is being plagued by the ghost of Thomas Kempe, a seventeenth-cenrury sorcerer?

James tries desperately to put an end to the sorcerer's malicious activities, but it is only when he uncovers the reason for Thomas Kempe's sudden reappearance that he finds a way to lay the ghost to rest for ever.