Recently married, Quentin and Tracy Collins have just moved into Collinwood, a New England estate that has long been in the Collins family and which Quentin has just inherited. They have invited their married friends, Alex and Claire Jenkins, who write horror novels together, to live in a cottage on the estate rent free. An artist, Quentin wants to find somewhere in the mansion to do his painting that will, among other things, give him some inspiration. The estate's humorless housekeeper Carlotta Drake, who comes from a long line of domestics serving the Collins family at Collinwood, directs him to the room in the tower. After his first trip to the tower room where he finds many other paintings, Quentin begins to see visions and have nightmares including that of a young woman hanging dead in a tree outside the mansion, and a young girl in another window of the mansion holding a doll. With further information from Carlotta about those visions and nightmares, Quentin may be placing especially Tracy's life at risk staying at the estate if he is to believe Carlotta. That may indeed be the case as his behavior becomes more erratic, like he is possessed.