Despite an unsolved break-in at the station house, Murdoch announces he's taking a vacation. His holiday turns out to be a trip in response to a telegram from Dr. Ogden requesting his help in Buffalo to solve what she thinks is a murder at The Children's Hospital. Murdoch agrees to go - thoughts of rekindling their relationship in the back of his mind. The case involves a 14-year-old terminally ill boy, Ben Wilkie, who has died under what Ogden feels are mysterious circumstances, not his cancer.

Julia is getting married to Rafe in a week - the letter she wrote to Murdoch confessing her love for him is lying beneath his desk blotter and he has no idea it exists. On top of his heartbreak, he has made no progress on a case involving a young French woman who had arrived in Toronto to visit her married sister and then vanished without a trace. The case is further complicated when Murdoch arrests a dashing young Frenchman breaking into a suspect's apartment, only to learn that he is Detective Marcel Guillaume, who has been hired by the disappeared woman's father.

Note: Guillaume is the real-life inspiration for author Georges Simenon's main character, Inspector Maigret.