The action takes place in one of the major port cities of the North. Young welder Mark Talalin and foreman Ilya Besedin cannot find the true reasons for their disagreements and conflicts.

Based on a famous play by Ivan Turgenev. The sudden arrival of a guest, Count Lubin, stirred the quiet, measured life of Stupendievs, revived hopes for change. Childhood and youth of Darya Ivanovna, 28-year-old wife Stupendyeva, passed in the estate of the Count's mother, in Spassky. She remembers him as a brilliant officer, and keeps her youth's feeling about him.