Kemp Steadman is an antiquity reseller who acquires a rare human skull that has been designed into magic lantern for a woman whom he has never met. In the process of toying with the object, the image of a young woman named Mary Trollop is projected on the wall. Mary has been dead for a hundred years, yet she offers to grant Kemp one wish if he can solve the mystery behind her murder. The young woman then pulls him into a reality from the past, and makes him an active character in the story behind Mary’s murder. The resolution finds Kemp with his wish granted. To see Mary once again.