Brought up amid the twin centainties of church and state in Edwardian Britain, young James Dunbar goes to sea in search of romantic adventure. Even when he falls in love with a waterfront prostitute named Conchita, he continues to believe that the purity of his emotion can rescue her from the Hotal Paradiso, the notorious brothel of Puerto San Martin.

But Puerto San Martin is a place of common trafficking and commerce - and no place for the innocent or the romantic. When Dunbar learns about his shipmates and the local inhabitants has a profound effect upon him. His meeting with the mysteriously veiled owner of the Hotal Paradiso reveals an event of terrifying brutality and makes him the agent of retribution; his encounter with the Brother's Madame confronts him with the demands of his own lust and those events not only alter his perception of life, but lead him to discover in himself a powerful artistic talent.