The story of a crowded day in the life of a modern Russian family - a day in which a young girl falls in love, a black marketeer is trapped by police, and a few hasty words spark a teenage rebellion.
Lord Arthur Saville postpones his wedding in order to commit a murder. Which of his many relatives is to have the honour of being the victim?
"I wonder how much longer us women'll take to learn that living and loving's all a damn swindle? Love's all right on the pictures, but love on the dole ain't quite the same thing."
Accepting the luck of the draw has become the Green's family motto. But Arthur, at 28 the only unmarried one, begins to have doubts. Should he carry on as before or should he forget family tradition and give fate a definite hand?
At a famous public school, a housemaster is in love with a girl without realising that her young brother is a member of his house. The boy takes a photograph of his sister in the housemaster's arms.
Nell Merriman disappears from home and the police organise a search on a large scale. Anxiety for her safety mounts, but the one person who is completely happy and undisturbed by events is Nell.
Children can sometimes have an instinct for situations that are beyond the grasp of their young minds...
An ailing mango, two wives and an ambitious employee, all help to upset a youthful tycoon's weekend in the hothouse.
"The greatest of our evils and the worst of our crimes is poverty, and our first duty, to which every other consideration should be sacrificed is not to be poor."
In the loneliness of space the world's first astronaut, cut off from base, is linked up by freak radio reception with a Canadian trapper's wife isolated with a life or death problem.